April 10, 2014 – Kudos, which helps authors and institutions maximize the impact and visibility of their publications, has been awarded a grant of £164,000 by the UK Government’s Technology Strategy Board. The grant will help Kudos to further develop and test its service, and explore additional routes to market.
The funding is part of the Smart scheme, which supports “small and early-stage companies with innovative ideas and high growth ambition and potential”; the expert assessors acknowledged Kudos’ fresh thinking and potential to broaden accessibility of research, in the context of the UK government’s policies around research impact and open access. They further acknowledge Kudos as “A very strong team with publishing experience and contacts and a range of commercial and technical skills. The detailed and specific answers throughout lend weight to the competence of the applicants individually and collectively”.
David Sommer co-founder and Director at Kudos commented “The award process for a grant of this nature is rigorous, and required substantial evidence of our skills and experience as well as detailed analysis of the market opportunity for Kudos. As such, the award represents a significant affirmation of our business and project plans, and should give our current and prospective partners great confidence in our future.”
To find out more about Kudos, visit www.growkudos.com or contact info@growkudos.com to arrange a meeting with the team at one of the following events:
- UKSG 37th Annual Conference and Exhibition, 14-16 April 2014, Harrogate, UK
- Allen Press Emerging Trends in Scholarly Publishing Seminar, 24 April 2014, Washington DC, USA
- STM Innovations Seminar, 29 April 2014, Washington DC, USA
- STM Annual Spring Conference, 29 April to 1 May 2014, Washington DC, USA
- SSP 36th Annual Meeting, 28-30 May 2014, Boston, MA, USA
Kudos (www.growkudos.com) provides a platform:
- for assembling or creating information (such as lay summaries or related multimedia) that helps readers filter the growing quantity of published research;
- for sharing such information (for example, via social media or email) to increase discoverability; and
- for measuring and monitoring the effect of both creating and sharing additional metadata and multimedia.
During its September–December 2013 proof of concept, authors registered to use Kudos for explaining and sharing articles. Hundreds of lay summaries, impact statements, short titles and multimedia items were added to aid discoverability and make research easier to interpret. Authors and their publishers, institutions and funders benefit from the thousands of additional article views thus generated.
Managed by the Technology Strategy Board, the Smart scheme offers funding to small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) to engage in R&D projects in the strategically important areas of science, engineering and technology, from which successful new products, processes and services could emerge. http://www.innovateuk.org/deliveringinnovation/smart.ashx
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