Academics turn to ‘crowdfunding’ to get research projects off the ground

By Moira MacDonald. Crowdsourcing is winning supporters as a financial incubator for early-stage research, university fundraising and getting ideas to market. Will Walmsley expected to be backpacking around the world after graduating last September with a master’s degree in applied science from the University of Toronto. Instead, he’s CEO and lead designer of Whirlscape Inc., a company founded on a university research project he and Xavier Snelgrove developed as part of the master’s program, working with their professor Khai Truong. The co-founders were able to commercialize the mobile technology, called Minuum, thanks in part to online, crowd-sourced fundraising. Using Indiegogo, a crowdfunding platform, Mr. Walmsley’s team reached its $10,000 fundraising goal in less than 14 hours last March. More...