• Time to Seize the Moment? Will States and Regions Lead U.S. into Next Economy?
• U.S. Higher Ed Graduation Rate Slides to 14th among OECD Nations
• U.S. Slips from First Place in Global Competitiveness Rankings
• Incubator Numbers Grow with Interest in Tech Entrepreneurship as Recession Cure
• SSTI Job Corner

Time to Seize the Moment? Will States and Regions Lead U.S. into Next Economy?
This week’s Digest covers two new independent reports that separately assess two critical aspects to how well nations are prepared for the economic recovery: competitiveness and educational attainment. The news, obvious in our choice of headlines, may suggest the past year – actually several years – has not been kind to the United States relative to other nations. Reading the articles one will see, however, that it isn’t time that is working against the U.S. but rather our progress on several indicators of preparedness for a future based on innovation, technology and entrepreneurship. The reports show other nations are succeeding in laying a more solid foundation for their future than the U.S. is preparing for itself.

At this moment, every aspect of the U.S. economy is in a period of transformation. And nearly every aspect of getting out of the current mess is related to one or more of the fundamental principles of tech- based economic development (TBED).

That’s pretty impressive. But it also is pretty daunting. Congress is hardly focused on the issue at all. Meanwhile, the resources available to handle state and regional transformation are growing scarcer. As a result, the public/private programs, policies and investment decisions being made to support TBED never have been as critical as they are at this moment.

Even so, the rules for TBED’s fundamentals are in flux – capital access, university engagement, entrepreneurship assistance, research funding priorities, commercialization paths, you name it. If your state, regional, university, nonprofit or federal approach to promoting economic growth isn’t evolving, you’re writing its own obituary.

The future course of regional innovation and economic development resides among a small group – those public and private leaders, like the innovative companies and researchers they support, who see the tremendous opportunities that exist in this very particular moment. Fortunately, we can number most of the members of this small group among the Digest readership.

Visionary leaders of the TBED community need a forum to discuss how to turn the current realities into opportunities for innovation. SSTI’s 13th Annual Conference provides that forum. We will seize the moment. Join us on Oct 22-23, 2009.

SSTI’s annual conferences already are unique events for the economic development field because they attract the top thinkers and doers from every critical element of the TBED community – state, regional, university, nonprofit, private industry, and federal decision makers and practitioners. The circumstances leading the TBED community to SSTI’s 13th Annual Conference make this year’s forum that much more important.

Early registration ends Sep 29. More information, including the full conference program, a downloadable PDF and a secure online registration form is available at: http://ssticonference.org.

U.S. Higher Ed Graduation Rate Slides to 14th among OECD Nations
In the nation with the greatest difference in lifetime incomes between those people with college degrees and those without, it may be surprising to learn the U.S. ranking for college graduation rates has fallen from 1st in 1995 to 14th in 2007. The finding is included in Education at a Glance 2009, an indicator report looking at countries who belong to the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD).

U.S. graduation rates have not fallen as a percentage of those students attending American colleges and universities for degrees above an associate’s degree – growing from 33 percent in 1995 to 37 percent in 2007 – but rather relative to the graduation rates attained by the other 25 OECD countries included in the study. Nevertheless, the finding should be troubling for policymakers and TBED practitioners in an increasingly knowledge-based and competitive global economy.

In addition to 13 nations graduating more students with bachelors or similar degrees, the U.S. figure of 37 percent is lower than the OECD-country average of 39 percent. Also, the rate of growth for the graduation rate in the U.S. is not keeping pace with the 18 percent average achieved over the 12 years for the OECD, suggesting a further slide in the rankings is likely without a corrective change in the U.S. trend. For comparison, in the Czech Republic and Switzerland, graduation rates almost tripled over this same period.

Emphasizing the importance of higher education, Education at a Glance 2009 focuses significant attention on the economic value of attaining a college degree, both to the individual and society. For example:

• The earnings for a male college graduate in the U.S. are more than twice as much for American men who have completed only a high school degree or a GED.
• Men in the U.S. with some form of college degree will earn over their working lives, on average, a present value of $367,000 more than an individual who chooses not to complete school but instead makes an investment in long-term government bonds.
• The report shows women in the U.S. with a college degree continue to earn considerably less over time than men with a similar educational background: women only collect on average of $229,000 above the same base investment in government bonds.
• Women college grads in the U.S. earn almost twice as much as women with high school degrees – but still less than men. This is not the case in all OECD countries however, as women with college degrees earn more than men with college degrees in Korea, Spain, and Turkey.

Besides examining the progress of students seeking post-secondary degrees, the report also focuses on younger students at the other end of the age spectrum. The growth of early (4-year olds and younger) childhood education has increased rapidly across the OECD, growing from 40 percent enrollment in 1998 to 71 percent ten years later. While in the U.S. early childhood enrollment was reported to be 50 percent in 2007, in the EU19 early childhood enrollment averaged 79 percent, and enrollment in ten of the OECD countries exceeded 90 percent.

Education at a Glance 2009 also includes sections comparing the 21 countries in terms of students’ performance in science, economic returns for education, funds spent on students, tuition costs, studying abroad, teacher compensation, and various others. For several of the report’s key indicators, the U.S. is holding steady or marginally increasing in certain metrics, other countries are gaining and surging past the U.S.

Education at a Glance 2009 is available at: www.oecd.org/edu/eag2009.

U.S. Slips from First Place in Global Competitiveness Rankings
The United States fell from its position as the most competitive national economy according to the World Economic Forum’s (WEF) recently released annual Global Competitiveness Report. Switzerland took the top spot as the U.S. fell to a close second place in the weighted ranking system. The report attributed the switch in positions to a number of growing weaknesses that have plagued the U.S. over the past year, while the Swiss economy remained relatively stable. Though the U.S. continues to perform well in measures of innovation, the country declined in indices of its institutional effectiveness and macroeconomic stability. The U.S.’s persistent fiscal deficits and trade imbalances were noted as a particular threat to the nation’s mid- and long-term competitiveness.

The Global Competitiveness Report ranks 133 countries based on the institutions, policies and factors that, according to WEF, determine the level of national productivity and prosperity. The indices and data compiled in the report are organized into 12 ‘pillars’ of competitiveness. These pillars are weighted and used to determine a country’s final ranking.

Because the importance of these pillars differs by the stage of economic development, the report assigns each country a category based on gross domestic product (GDP) and the ratio of mineral exports to exports as a whole. A country’s category determines how the pillars are weighted in calculating the overall ranking. WEF sorts national economies into three stages of progress:

• Factor-driven economies compete based on unskilled labor and natural resources. For these countries, four pillars are weighted more heavily: institutions, infrastructure, macroeconomic stability, and health and primary education.
• Efficiency-driven economies, which compete by improving production processes and increasing product quality, are weighted toward the pillars of higher education and training, goods market efficiency, labor market efficiency, financial market sophistication, technological readiness and market size.
• Innovation-driven economies, including the U.S. and Switzerland, are evaluated primarily on the pillars of business sophistication and innovation.

WEF reports that the U.S. continues to perform well in its weighted categories, ranking first in innovation and fifth in business sophistication. In fact, the U.S. was ranked first in the combined innovation pillars (including both innovation and business sophistication), and in the weighted pillars for efficiency-driven economies. Still, the country’s overall score fell due to declining performance in the areas characterized in the report as ‘basic requirements’. The economic crisis of the past year caused the U.S. to drop from 66th to 93rd in macroeconomic stability, an area in which the U.S. already was struggling. A weakening opinion of U.S. private institutions, including auditing and reporting standards, also hurt the country’s rank.

Switzerland, on the other hand, remained stable across the board and placed third highest in each category. The country has mostly resisted the ill-effects of the economic crisis, particularly in comparison with the U.S. and other European countries (banking giant UBS being a notable exception). Only the country’s low university enrollment rate was noted as a cause for concern.

Finishing out the top ten were Singapore, Sweden, Denmark, Finland, Germany, Japan, Canada and the Netherlands – all of which were in the top ten last year. Countries that rose the most in this year’s ranking include: Taiwan (from 17th to 12th), United Arab Emirates (31st to 23rd) and Azerbaijan (69th to 51st).

The report suggests that the U.S. should address certain fundamental issues, such as fiscal stability and public and private institutional practices, to bolster its competitive prospects. WEF omits many factors that are emerging as vital elements in assuring long-term competitiveness, including investment in strategic industries, quality of life and environmental and business sustainability. Despite WEF’s focus on traditional economic indicators, the report highlights some of the long-term economic trends that, if ignored, could undermine efforts to grow the U.S. innovation economy.

“The Global Competitiveness Index 2009-2010: Contributing to Long-Term Prosperity Amid the Global Economic Crisis” is available at: http://www.weforum.org/en/initiatives/gcp/Global%20Competitiveness%20Report/index.htm.

Incubator Numbers Grow with Interest in Tech Entrepreneurship as Recession Cure
As economists and policymakers debate the details of how and when the nation will recover from the recession, the topic of entrepreneurship and the role it will play in shaping the new economy continually arises. In the coming years, some analysts predict a rise in entrepreneurship both as a result of massive layoffs and an aging workforce not yet ready or able to retire. Highlighting the correlation between joblessness and the uptick in entrepreneurship, several recent news articles have featured stories of the unemployed forgoing disappointing job searches and the corporate environment to pursue business ownership.

At the same time, the U.S. may be on the cusp of an entrepreneurial boom thanks to its aging population. A recent report by the Kauffman Foundation finds the highest rate of entrepreneurial activity belongs to 55-64 year olds. The study points to several factors driving this shift, including changes in job tenure, an increase in life expectancy, and the continued decline of lifetime employment and the experience and tacit knowledge such employees carry with them. Additionally, stronger regulations aiming to prevent the rise of giant organizations may help to create a more market-oriented society, the study concludes.

To help new tech entrepreneurial efforts succeed, incubators offer valuable resources such as access to university research, laboratories, mentors, and networking opportunities. The following is an overview of specialized incubators that have emerged over the past several months to support high-tech ventures.

NYC Mayor Michael Bloomberg announced last month the city will expand its sponsored incubator this fall to create up to four additional incubators with space for another 150 startup companies. First announced in February, the 16,000-square-foot Varick Street incubator offers high-quality office space, mentoring services from Polytechnic Institute of New York University, and networking opportunities for tenants. The city provided capital funds and negotiated a three-year lease with Trinity Real Estate as part of an 11-point plan to promote business innovation through entrepreneurial activity, according to a New York City Industrial Development Agency news release.

The bwtech@UMBC Research and Technology Park will house a new Maryland Clean Energy Technology Incubator@bwtech, or CETI, the first in a planned statewide network of clean energy incubators. A project between bwtech@UMBC, the Maryland Clean Energy Center and the Baltimore County Department of Economic Development, CETI will provide services tailored to the needs of companies working with solar power, wind power, geothermal, hydropower, biofuels, and energy management and storage technologies. The incubator will occupy about 18,000 square feet of office and wet lab space in the Biotechnology Building of bwtech@UMBC’s Incubator and Accelerator.

A group of volunteers from engineering and architectural backgrounds are working to renovate a former Model T showroom near Wayne State University into an incubator for sustainable technology, reports Crain’s Detroit Business. The Green Garage is an 11,000-square-foot building being renovated to provide office space and resources for green businesses. Construction is anticipated this fall with a goal of 90 percent of construction materials to be reused from within the building.

Construction will be completed in January on a 65,000-square-foot facility at the Arkansas Research & Technology Park to house wet laboratories and low-rent offices for startup businesses specializing in information technology and assembly manufacturing, reports the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette. Funding for the Enterprise Center will come from an economic infrastructure fund grant and from the Arkansas Economic Development Commission, according to the article.

The University of Florida will create a 45,000-square-foot facility to nurture high-tech startup companies funded through an $8.2 million grant from the Economic Development Administration and $5 million in university support. The Florida Innovation Hub, slated to open December 2011, will provide space and equipment to technology startup companies connected to the university.

The Macomb-Oakland University INCubator opened in July in Sterling Heights, MI with the goal of creating jobs and advancing business development in four sectors: defense and security, alternative energy, advanced manufacturing and life science technology. The program provides startup companies with help in developing marketing plans, acquiring funding and gaining access to Oakland University’s faculty for market research, reports the Detroit News.

A technology incubator working to promote Colorado’s clean-technology industry was launched in July. CleanLaunch Technology Incubator will work with the Governor’s Energy Office and the Colorado Tech Industry Association, reports the Denver Post. The incubator will work with both resident and virtual clients at any stage of growth. Services include low-cost office and research space, access to investment capital and advisory services.

During his State of the City Address earlier this year, Boise Mayor Dave Bieter announced the creation of a new business incubator to support local alternative energy startup companies, reports the Idaho Business Review. The 3,500-square-foot Green House incubator will house up to seven startup companies focusing on renewable and alternative energies in a city-owned building.

A new University of Central Florida Sanford business incubator opened this week in downtown Sanford. A joint effort of UCF and the City of Sanford, the business incubator will provide early-stage technology companies with tools, training and infrastructure to create stable, high-growth companies, according to a press release.

The property of an old waste management site in Ft. Collins, CO will house the new Inverness Innovation Park and anchor tenant, the Rocky Mountain Innovation Initiative (RMI2), a business incubator designed to support pre-financed companies with space to research and develop new technologies, reports Coloradoan.com.

SSTI Job Corner
A complete description of this opportunity is available at: http://www.ssti.org/posting.htm.

The Edison Materials Technology Center (EMTEC) has a full time opportunity for a Manager Request for Help Program. EMTEC is a non-profit, collaborative R&D organization located in Dayton, Ohio helping accelerate technologies to market and specializing in advanced technologies. The primary responsibilities of this position include providing technical assistance to EMTEC members, developing member value, and other EMTEC program support. Requirements include an undergraduate degree in Engineering or Materials Science; a minimum of five years experience in industrial product development and manufacturing with strong preference to experience in instruments, controls, and electronics and/or advanced energy industrial products experience; technical sales support experience is a plus.