Partners offers $1 million in innovation grants to employees

Partners HealthCare, as it steps up efforts to commercialize research done at its labs and hospitals, is offering up to $1 million in grants for employees who come up with promising ideas for new drugs, devices and other inventions that have the potential to improve patient care. The grants, up to $100,000 each, are open not just to researchers, but to anyone in Partners' workforce of 64,000 who has a good idea. The small sum is intended to help early-stage ideas get off the ground. Partners, with a research budget of $1.5 billion, and has been working to increase the deals it does with the life sciences industry, including by licensing technology and spinning off companies.