Arvind Chhatbar/ National Research Council Canada

FPTT Leadership Award

Arvind Chhatbar, National Research Council Canada

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Outstanding contribution to both the practice of technology transfer and commercialization and to the development of a culture of innovation, entrepreneurship and technology transfer in federal government.

A truly innovative system revolves around the people who inspire the development of an entrepreneurial culture while at the same time promote and provide the tools to achieve it. As the first recipient of an FPTT Award to honour leadership in fostering such an environment and contributing to the practice of technology transfer and commercialization, Arvind Chhatbar has set the bar at an impressively high level for technology practitioners across Canada.

As director of the National Research Council Canada's (NRC) Regional Innovation Centre in Ottawa since 1995, Mr. Chhatbar has played a critical role in the formation and spin-off of no less than nine new companies from NRC laboratories. An early champion of NRC's program to increased the flow of publicly developed technologies into the private sector, he has also participated in the further development of more than 40 new private sector ventures involving NRC research. Many of the methods he employs-including direct involvement in the training and support of entrepreneurs as well as in negotiations dealing with the licensing of technology and the search for early stage financing-are novel approaches that have broken the traditional mould of development and commercialization of government research. In fact, NRC began only five years ago to actively encourage the creation of new enterprises involving its staff. "Today, NRC is accepted as a prime partner, an open organization which builds and fosters cooperation and seeks to make its knowledge and technology available to others," says NRC president Dr. Arthur J. Carty. "Arvind Chhatbar has been a very important factor in making this happen."

Known for his affable, non-partisan approach and strong commitment to technology transfer, Mr. Chhatbar is a vital member of the community in which he lives. As the executive director of the Ottawa Regional Innovation Forum since 1995, he has drawn many of the country's top government, industry and academic leaders together in a series of roundtable discussions on the development and enhancement of technology-based economic growth in the Ottawa region. Under his guidance since 1996, the O-Vitesse (Ottawa Venture in Training Engineering and Scientists for Software Engineering) program and a not-for-profit spin-off organization, Vitesse (Re-Skilling) Canada Inc., have made important inroads in alleviating the shortage of software engineers in Ottawa and other regions. The influence of these organizations extends to government policy-making in such areas as SR&ED tax credits and immigration of highly skilled software engineers. Indeed, Mr. Chhatbar's efforts to promote and build a strong innovative culture locally are largely credited with playing a key role in the branding of Ottawa as a world-class technology cluster centred on information technology software and photonics.

A country's potential for innovation is strongly linked to its ability to stimulate a climate of risk-taking and entrepreneurial initiative that invigorates Canadian research and development and leads to the establishment of creative and productive new enterprises. Mr. Chhatbar's efforts in support of new company creation within federal laboratories and his drive to ensure that each has the support it needs to succeed are nothing short of groundbreaking.

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