The NSTC Taiwan Germination Program (hereinafter referred to as the TGP Program) provides grants to applicant organizations to promote bridging between academia, industry, and research institutes, and to move toward commercialization and enterprise development of research and development results that align with the direction of the government's industrial innovation policy and demonstrate strong potential. Our goal is to integrate of the government's innovation and entrepreneurship resources and link the Ministry of Education, the National Science and Technology Council, the Ministry of Economic Affairs, the National Development Council and the Financial Supervisory Commission to support the sustainable development of domestic industry and promote the vitality and progress of the economy. The Ministry of Science and Technology (now the National Science and Technology Council) consolidated and promoted the TGP Program in January 110. Positioned as the first step in the government's academic innovation and entrepreneurship efforts, the program draws on the experience of the New Format Industry-Academia-Research Linkage Programs (referred to as the Value Creation Program) and the Sprout Program for R&D Achievements (referred to as the Sprout Program) to refine laws and regulations governing the derivation of new ideas within academic and research institutions, and to strengthen the mechanisms for case sourcing and early incubation to cultivate potential new ideas in the academic community in a phased manner.

The Sprout program was initiated by MOST in November 2011 and continued by the NSTC Planning Department. This funding will enable early-stage original research technologies with significant commercial potential in Taiwan to develop business plans that balance "technical" and "commercial" development. It is hoped that through the Sprout Program's resource support for technology teams, major R&D result technologies with industrial development value will be able to identify specific application areas, conduct market-oriented proof-of-concepts, or develop market-oriented pilot test machines or prototypes, and ultimately launch start-ups with investment appeal.

The Value Creation Program was established by the Executive Yuan in 2016 through the platform of the Executive Yuan Industry-Academia-Research Linkage Meeting. Aiming to strengthen and integrate the energy of domestic R&D units and promote economic growth, this program promotes the inter-ministerial linkage of research energy between academic institutions and legal entities, and the establishment of R&D centers with innovative and entrepreneurial advantages in academic institutions, so as to activate the value creation momentum of industrial innovation, revitalize the R&D and innovation value chain, and promote the momentum of forward-looking R&D in industries, and ultimately create innovative industries.

Combining the experience and models of the previous two programs, the TGP program focuses on harnessing the R&D energies of academia and research institutes. The program combines them with the mentoring energy of professionals with international connections and entrepreneurial experience, so that the R&D results of industry-academia-research collaborations can be applied in industry, with the aim of establishing a mechanism for cross-sectoral resource integration, bringing into play the mentoring and entrepreneurial capabilities of the industrial sector, and enhancing the feasibility of commercializing the R&D results so as to bring tangible benefits to industry.