BIRD Foundation

During its recent meeting Board of Governors meeting, the Israel-U.S. Binational Industrial Research and Development (BIRD) Foundation approved $6 million in funding for six new projects between U.S. and Israeli companies. In addition to the grants from BIRD, the projects will access private sector funding, boosting the total value of all projects to $13 million.

The BIRD Foundation promotes collaborations between U.S. and Israeli companies in various technological sectors for joint product development. The idea behind BIRD is to encourage the development of truly cutting edge new solutions that the private sector might not be willing to risk funding entirely by itself because of the uncertainty of success.

Projects submitted to the BIRD Foundation are reviewed by evaluators appointed by the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) of the U.S. Department of Commerce, and the Israel Innovation Authority. The six projects approved by the Board of Governors are in addition to the 1000 projects which the BIRD Foundation has approved for funding during its 44-year history. To date, BIRD’s total investment in joint projects is over $370 million, helping to generate direct and indirect sales of more than $10 billion.

The six newly approved projects are as follows:

  1. Over-Sat (Netanya, Israel) and MIL-SAT (Surry, Virginia) to develop a LEO Satellite End-User Mobile Terminal capable of tracking multiple satellites.
  2. Cyberint Technologies(Petah Tikva, Israel) and Secure Systems Innovation Corporation, dba X-Analytics (Arlington, Virginia) to develop an operational cyber threat intelligence capability to inform cyber risk financial decisioning.
  3. Sensifree(Kfar Saba, Israel) and the Cleveland Clinic (Cleveland, Ohio) to develop next generation non-invasive, continuous blood pressure monitor for hospital use.
  4. GrayMatters Health(Haifa, Israel) and the McLean Hospital Corporation (Belmont, Massachusetts) to develop personalized self neuro-modulation therapy for major depression disorder using clinical biomarkers.
  5. Skillreal(Ramat Gan, Israel) and Siemens DI (Plano, Texas) to develop a high-accuracy AR system supporting workers on installation and assembly lines with automatic validation to increase productivity and reduce assembly errors.
  6. YonaLink(Jerusalem, Israel) and Trialjectory (Closter, New Jersey) to develop a platform to enroll diverse patients from diverse sites in clinical trials by automating the clinical trial process, from patient selection to data management.