How MITACS Accelerate works:

The conduit between the partner company and the university is a graduate student or post-doctoral fellow under the guidance of a professor.

Armed with the very latest tools, techniques and innovations, the intern brings a new perspective and the latest knowledge to a research challenge faced by the partner. Internship projects can be undertaken in a wide range of areas including manufacturing, technical innovation, business processes, IT, social sciences, design and much more.

During a MITACS Accelerate internship, the intern spends approximately half of his/her time over a minimum four-month period on site with the partner, gaining a better understanding of the research issue in question and collecting data. The balance of the intern’s time is spent at the university, further advancing the research under the guidance of a faculty supervisor. Internships can be combined into longer, 8 or 12-or 24- month projects.

For each four-month internship unit, the company contributes $7,500 which is matched by MITACS through the support of federal and provincial funding partners. Longer projects (8, 12, 16, 20 months etc) are possible and simply require more funding from the partner company which is also matched by the program.

Per four month unit, the intern receives a minimum stipend of $10,000 with the remaining $5,000 supporting other costs associated with the research.