Bridging the Valley of Death
The letter describes NADI as a solution to a structural problem in the Dutch innovation ecosystem: public research funding does not focus on multi-year, high-risk research. Venture capital often does not get involved at this stage due to technological uncertainty. This leaves a gap for potentially groundbreaking innovations: the so-called Valley of Death. Too few companies manage to bridge this gap, with the result that promising knowledge remains untapped or finds application abroad, where the economic benefits are then reaped.
The idea behind NADI is based on DARPA (USA, 1958), ARIA (UK, 2022) and SPRIND (Germany, 2019): an independent agency that defines a societal or technological problem for each programme and gives programme leaders a broad mandate to fund multiple solution pathways in parallel. Approaches that prove successful receive more funding; those that stall are discontinued. All the substantive work takes place outside NADI, at universities, research institutes, start-ups and companies.
A concrete commitment from the signatories
The letter responds to the letter to Parliament of 9 February 2026 concerning the exploratory study into NADI. The signatories endorse the conclusion that NADI could provide added value and have made a concrete commitment in this regard: should NADI be established, investors undertake to provide further funding for innovations arising from NADI programmes; researchers and companies undertake to participate actively in the programmes.
Terms and conditions and funding
For the signatories, however, this is subject to certain conditions: independence from departmental control; Programme Directors with a clear mandate and the freedom to fail; a stable multi-year budget; and a revolving component of up to 30 per cent. The Wennink report recommended a multi-year budget of between 1.5 and 2 billion euros; the signatories consider a minimum of 300 million euros, plus 150 million euros per year, to be necessary for a credible start. Regarding the 500 million euros from the coalition agreement (entirely revolving), they argue that this is insufficient for an effective launch.
The full letter and its signatories can be found via the link below.
