CEMI – the Centre for Excellence in Mining Innovation’s proposed national Mining Innovation Commercialization Accelerator (MICA) program has been approved to advance to the final stage of the Centres of Excellence for Commercialization and Research (CECR) competition. CEMI will be submitting a final application to the Canadian federal government by August 28, 2015. MICA is one of nine finalists and is the only mining sector program application to make it to this stage. At least three out of the nine finalists will be awarded CECR funding.

The national MICA program is being developed to fulfill the commercialisation gap in the transfer of mining innovations to market. CEMI understands that some high growth initiatives in the mining innovation space fail due to limited access to risk capital and commercialisation services. The MICA program is intended to facilitate the commercialisation and growth capital requirements of mining innovation projects and will create an ecosystem whereby Small Medium Enterprises (SMEs) can flourish and succeed on the global stage.

For MICA program lead and Director of Business Development, Charles Nyabeze, “there is an urgent impetus for MICA, given Canada’s pressing need for a national mineral sector innovation and commercialisation prosperity strategy. The Canadian mineral sector would benefit by regaining a competitive advantage through the commercialisation of mining innovations. Programs such as the Ultra-Deep Mining Network (UDMN), hosted by CEMI are beginning to address this commercialisation gap in ultra-deep mining conditions. MICA compliments UDMN and expands its reach beyond ultra-deep to engage solution providers from the mining industry.”

Mining companies rely more and more on service providers such as Original Equipment Manufacturers (OEMs) and SMEs to assist the operational integration of mining innovations. MICA is an answer to connect the dots and avoid this economic stagnation. MICA presents an opportunity for Canada’s mineral sector to benefit when commodity prices enter an upswing. MICA is a Canada wide private and public framework designed to capture wealth from ideas and encourages a sophisticated engagement between the private and public sector.

MICA is about learning, collaborating, mentoring, and investing in the commercialization of research and innovation. Through its business development team, the program will measure success that it brings to its clients via assessing impact on sales, profits and value creation. MICA’s client engagements are geared to result in generating a return on investment not only for the client, but also to contribute to a sustainable operating model for MICA.  MICA believes that there is an abundance of investment money for ideas with sufficient commercialization potential. By this understanding, the program views all its future and potential investments in mining innovation ideas, as being measured by their prospect of making a reasonable return from commercialization efforts. Currently, MICA is supported by 25 Canadian mining supply and service companies, six foreign mining supply and service companies that are seeking Canadian partners, 12 Canadian academic institutions which include colleges and universities, and six national R&D organisations.