They say that the future of IT lies in computers communicating with the use of human voice. In fact, the world’s reputedly best speech synthesizer, known as IVONA, was designed by two Poles Łukasz Osowski and Michał Kaszczuk, two-time winners of the prestigious Blizzard Challenge award of Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburg, Pennsylvania. Their IVO Software company does not just provide sophisticated applications for telecommunications, call centres and the rehabilitation of the blind, but it has also launched the distribution of the popular Expresivo speech synthesizer.
But not all news coming from research and development circles is good news. Polish entrepreneurs recently set about implementing a method of turning plastic waste into fuel. Loans for the purpose were made available by Bank Gospodarstwa Krajowego. The National Environment Fund also chipped in to the tune of PLN 25 million. Foreign investors started eyeing the project with growing interest. But then the Ministry of Finance stepped in with a new set of tax regulations. The exciting project went bust. 700 workers lost their jobs. According to Polish R&D watchers, this was not an isolated case.
While the “Polish Market” team was busy working on this edition devoted to innovation in the Polish economy, we kept wondering what to make of the stark contrasts that came to light. On the one hand, Polish media keep bombarding us with news reports about bright new ideas, discoveries and awards won by Polish researchers at national and international competitions. On the other hand, the annual European Commission innovative economies ranking makes a depressing reading. Last year Poland turned out to be one of the least innovative countries in Europe, having scored a mere 0.24 on a 0-1 scale. And yet everyone concerned seems to realize that policies geared toward stimulating innovation are the key to success. It appears that it is generally known what needs to be done. Much more public funding earmarked for the development of science should be made available through competitions. Completion guarantee funds should be created for consortia commercializing the results of R&D. Tax concessions, instead of higher taxes, should be introduced. Universities should be encouraged to forge partnerships with business through sponsorship and joint undertakings. The law on the Polish Academy of Sciences should be amended to allow scientists to commercialise intellectual property. Well, if all of this is common knowledge, why is so little done about it?
Every year as we work on the Cent for Future and Golden Euro competition we cannot help but wonder. The competition is our attempt to, jointly with the chairmen of all of Poland’s sixteen provinces, promote promising new companies and products. So far our partners in individual provinces have had more problems selecting than finding the right candidates. More than one hundred companies and products have been spotlighted in the competition to date. We realize that not all of them will be able to develop their market success. We keep track of the winners from the past. Only one of the companies appeared to have gone under. But to our satisfaction, we have just found out that it has resumed its activities and is doing fine.
In this edition of “Polish Market” together with our guests we do some crystal ball gazing. In our view, the picture we paint is both realistic and optimistic. A few days ago we received a white paper by the Polish Minister of the Economy on public procurement for small and medium-sized companies, innovation and balanced growth. Judging by what it contains, things are looking up for innovation in the Polish economy.