PACE: A Complete Guide to Promoting Academic Research Conversion to Enterprise

India's universities and research institutions produce an extraordinary volume of scientific discovery every year, much of it genuinely commercially promising, and almost all of it stuck in the same place: inside a lab, published in a paper, with no clear route toward becoming an actual product. The gap here is not a shortage of good science. It is the absence of a structured bridge connecting academic research to the industrial partners who could actually help validate and scale it.

PACE, Promoting Academic Research Conversion to Enterprise, is the Biotechnology Industry Research Assistance Council's answer to that exact bridge. PACE was launched specifically to encourage and support academia in developing technology or products of genuine societal and national importance, up to the proof of concept stage, and then to facilitate that innovation's validation by an industrial partner. It is a scheme built on a straightforward but important premise: universities are where much of India's frontier biotech research happens, and giving that research a real, funded pathway toward industry validation is essential to turning discovery into impact.

The Funding Opportunity: What PACE Actually Offers

PACE operates through two distinct components, suited to different stages of academic to industry translation.

• Academic Innovation Research (AIR): supports the development of proof of concept for a process or product by academia, with or without industry involvement. Total project cost is capped at Rs. 50 lakh, with non recurring costs limited to 10 percent of that total. Projects typically run for up to 24 months, though BIRAC's Technical Expert Committee can extend this at its discretion depending on the nature of the research. The technology readiness level targeted by the end of an AIR project is TRL 3, meaning proof of concept established.
• Contract Research Scheme (CRS): aims specifically at validating a process or prototype, one that academia has already developed, through an industrial partner. Funding is provided to both the academic and industrial partners. The academic institution receives support for the in house research forming part of the validation, while the industry partner receives funding for the validation work itself. Notably, there is no funding ceiling under CRS, reflecting the scheme's flexibility for genuinely significant validation projects. CRS projects have no fixed time limit.

Who is eligible

For AIR:

• The applicant must be academia, a Public or Private Institute, University, NGO, or Research Foundation with proper registration or accreditation from a relevant government body, such as UGC affiliation, AICTE, or a CSIR, DSIR, or SIRO certificate.
• Industry involvement is optional for AIR. Academia can apply alone or in partnership.
• Projects must show well established proof of principle leading toward a prototype of national relevance or commercial potential. Purely basic or exploratory research without commercial potential is not supported.

For CRS:

• Academia must be the primary applicant, with at least one partner being a registered company holding at least 51 percent Indian shareholding, excluding OCI and PIO holders.
• Academia must already have an established proof of concept, specifically at Technology Readiness Level 3, TRL 3, with validation ready scientific data. This evidence is compulsory, and its absence can disqualify a proposal.
• The applicant company should have adequate in house facilities to implement the project, or be incubated at a recognized incubation facility.

How the process works

1. Determine which PACE component fits your stage, AIR if you are still developing proof of concept, CRS if you already have TRL 3 validated data ready for industrial validation.
2. Register your institution with BIRAC through Institution User Registration, since proposals must be submitted online only.
3. Submit your AIR or CRS proposal with the required supporting documentation. For CRS, this critically includes your validation ready scientific data.
4. Successful AIR projects with strong national priority or commercial potential are encouraged to subsequently apply under CRS, continuing the same industrial partnership where possible.

Since PACE runs periodic calls for proposals rather than a continuously open window, checking BIRAC's current call announcements is essential before preparing an application.

The Institutions Powering PACE

PACE is built around India's academic and research institution network, universities, public and private institutes, NGOs, and research foundations, connected to industrial partners through the CRS component specifically. Because CRS requires a registered Indian company as a partner, PACE effectively functions as a structured matchmaking mechanism between academic labs and industry, with BIRAC's funding making that partnership financially viable for both sides.

Frequently Asked Questions

Who owns the intellectual property from a PACE funded project?

Under AIR, IP rights may sit with academia alone, or be jointly shared with industry if the industry partner was involved in establishing proof of concept, as agreed between the two parties. Under CRS, IP rights generally reside with academia, though the industry partner typically holds first right of refusal for commercial exploitation of any new IP generated.

Can an industry partner apply to PACE without an academic partner?

No. Academia must be the primary applicant under both AIR and CRS. PACE is fundamentally designed to fund and empower academic research, with industry playing a supporting or validating role.

What is the difference between AIR and CRS?

AIR funds the development of proof of concept itself, capped at Rs. 50 lakh. CRS comes later, funding the validation of an already developed process or prototype by an industrial partner, with no funding ceiling, reflecting its role in supporting more advanced, higher stakes validation work.

Is there a deadline to move from AIR to CRS?

There is no strict formal deadline, but PACE explicitly encourages successful AIR projects with strong commercial potential to continue into CRS, ideally with the same industrial partner who was involved in the AIR stage.

The Bottom Line

PACE addresses a translation gap that is easy to underestimate but genuinely costly when ignored: the distance between excellent academic science and an industry partner willing to validate it toward real world use. By funding both sides of that relationship and removing the funding ceiling for serious validation work under CRS, PACE gives India's universities and research institutions a real, structured route from discovery to enterprise, backed by industry partnerships rather than left to chance.