The talk on Nurturing the Next Frontier: Building Translational Research Capacity in Indian Academia  highlighted India’s paradoxical position in the global innovation landscape: while the country ranks high in paper publication, it lags in converting academic research into impactful products and industry collaborations. With just 280 scientists per million population, minimal academia–industry engagement, and only 0.6% of GDP allocated to R&D, India remains stuck at the “projects and papers” stage rather than advancing to patents, prototypes, and profitable products. He emphasized the need for a self-sustaining, integrated innovation ecosystem that follows the “7Ps” cycle—problems leading to projects, papers, patents, prototypes, products, and profits, with revenues reinvested into solving new problems. True value creation, they argued, will come only when academia moves beyond literature-driven PhD topics and engages directly with real-world challenges articulated by ministries, agencies, and industry.

To address this gap, India must invest more in deep tech, foster stronger academia–industry collaboration, and create institutions that can bridge the critical “valley of death” between academic research and market-ready products. The key takeaway: India’s innovation success depends on translating knowledge into tangible solutions that create global impact.

• Strengthen academia–industry collaboration
   • Reform policies to incentivize partnerships and create mechanisms for industry to directly communicate real-world problems to academia.
   • Develop platforms where ministries, DRDO, ISRO, and other agencies regularly feed problem statements to researchers.

• Build a self-sustaining R&D ecosystem
   • Encourage the “7Ps” cycle: problem → project → papers → patents → prototypes → products → profits → reinvestment into solving new problems.
   • Shift focus from just publishing papers to generating IP and scalable solutions.

• Invest in deep tech and IP creation
   • Increase India’s R&D spend beyond the current 0.6% of GDP.
   • Support PhD and faculty research that produces patents and deep tech rather than only literature-based studies.

• Empower faculty and researchers
  • Provide financial incentives for interdisciplinary collaboration.
   • Enable faculty to generate IP and pass it on for scaling, freeing them to continue solving new problems rather than staying tied to commercialization.

• Establish institutions for mid-tier scaling
   • Create organizations that can bridge TRL 3/4 to TRL 8/9, converting academic IP into industry-ready products.
   • Position BFI as a hub to identify academic innovations, build prototypes, and transfer them to industry for scaling.

• Shift cultural mindset around innovation
   • Move beyond manufacturing as the crux of innovation — emphasize concept design, branding, and problem-solving, taking lessons from global leaders like       Apple.
   • Encourage interdisciplinary “idea factories” where people from diverse backgrounds collaborate on big problems.