Twenty-nine projects have been awarded a total of €95m in funding in the third round of the Disruptive Technologies Innovation Fund.

The 29 projects cover areas such as life sciences, medical devices, ICT, artificial intelligence, manufacturing and environmental sustainability.

They include sub-sea robotic drilling, artificial intelligence for safety in factories, more effective heating and cooling systems in commercial and industrial businesses, a platform to improve productivity on construction sites, and healthcare solutions in areas such as cancer treatments and chronic knee osteo-arthritis.

Enterprise minister Leo Varadkar (pictured) said: “We are funding projects which will have wide-ranging benefits across many areas of society. Projects using AI to make factories safer and drones to detect drug smuggling, for example.

“These new technologies will create high-quality jobs in existing and emerging sectors, now and over the coming decades. There is a good spread of partners, based all around Ireland, highlighting the strength of our enterprise and research base all across the country.”

In Association with

All projects involve collaborations of three to eight partners, including SMEs, multinational corporations and research organisations. SME participation is an integral part of the fund, with 62 SMEs among the 111 organisations involved and 22 leading their project.

The latest funding announcement brings the total awarded under the three DTIF calls to date to €235m, almost half the total committed. A total of 62 applications were received in the third call, and the cash will be drawn down over the next three years.

The minister said that some of the successful projects will:

• Develop an adhesive that will stick broken bone tissue together following fracture, allowing it to heal faster
• Use artificial intelligence to develop drones to better detect drug smuggling
• Develop a tool using artificial intelligence to identify breast and prostate cancer patients with early stage disease
• Design and build a prototype robotic drilling system for a wide range of applications including offshore wind
• Use artificial intelligence to trial a solution which will make factories safer for workers
• Use nanotechnology to reduce emissions by 40% in commercial and industrial heating and cooling systems
• Develop next generation therapeutic and gene therapies for gastrointestinal cancer.

• See details of awardees and grant totals here.