Table 1 History of Acorn Technologies
From: Can incubators work in Africa? Acorn Technologies and the entrepreneur-centric model
Year | Event |
|---|---|
2001 | South African government asks a consortium comprising a venture capital firm, a university tech transfer office, a university’s biomedical engineering department and a successful biomedical device company to start Acorn. |
2002 | Acorn Technologies is incorporated as a section 21 not-for-profit organization and receives initial grant funding for three years from the Department of Trade and Industry, Department of Science and Technology and the European Union.South African government releases a set of recommendations in the report “A National Biotechnology Strategy for South Africa” including the creation of biotech incubators |
2003 | Department of Science and Technology withdraws from Acorn Technologies in order to focus on creating biotechnology regional innovation incubators, including Cape Biotech Trust |
2005 | Acorn launches its first and only run of its successful Hellfire internship program to identify potential scientists and train them to be entrepreneurs. The program closes afterwards due to lack of funding. |
2006 | Acorn, Cape Biotech Trust and the Medical Research Council sign a memorandum agreeing to work more closely together and form the “Kopano” partnership to facilitate technology commercialization |
2007 | Acorn approaches Cape Biotech Trust to discuss merging and secures funding for medical device projects from the Department of Science and Technology. Merger is completed by the end of the year. |
2008 | Medical Device Center of Competence is created by the South African government within Cape Biotech Trust to maintain biomedical device support services |