Associate Professor Dr. Siree Chaiseri, Ph.D., Director of PMUC, spoke about the important mission that PMUC has worked on to close the critical gap that prevents Thai research projects from reaching real industrial production, that is to support capital infrastructure to support the extension of high-value agricultural and food industry production towards large-scale industrial production in all regions of the country. This includes investment in building a pilot plant, machinery, equipment and tools; providing standard testing services, as well as assistance in the transfer of knowledge for Thai entrepreneurs from SME to large organizations to enhance competitiveness from the local level to the international level; preparation of appropriate research tools to meet the needs of entrepreneurs in technology development. It is a collaborative effort with the private sector, where PMUC creates a suitable environment to match researchers with the private sector partners to cooperate in technology development and applying the resulting technology in real commercial applications. In addition to the resulting technology or innovation, the collaborative learning that happens between researchers and the private sector gives researchers a deeper understanding of additional requirements if the research work is to achieve commercial viability. On the other hand, the private sector partners learn the importance of collaborative development of technology as a prerequisite for successful commercialization.
“Mae Thom” is an example of business ideas developed by entrepreneurs, which were able to develop further to reach real marketable status by leveraging joint development effort along side researchers in order for the idea to develop further into a complete product which is commercially marketable. (click on the image for more details)
