In This Week's Issue
SSTI News and Analysis
EDA Announces Winners of $37M Clusters Initiative
The U.S. Economic Development Administration (EDA) announced the 20 winners of the $37 million Jobs and Innovation Accelerator Challenge. The multi-agency competition will support cluster-based, regional initiatives to spur job creation and economic growth. Descriptions of all 20 winning projects are available on the EDA site.
Read the announcement...
return to the top of the page
White House Announces Initiatives to Accelerate
Commercialization
President Obama last week announced several initiatives aimed at
spurring technology commercialization following the signing of the
America Invents Act, including two new programs to assist
biomedical entrepreneurs at the National Institutes of Health
(NIH). The administration also will develop a national plan focused
on reforms to speed commercialization and open new markets. A
blueprint outlining those efforts is due in January. Following is
an overview of new and existing programs focused on accelerating
commercialization:
- NIH will offer new license agreements for startup companies to
reduce the cost and paperwork associated with obtaining patents
related to drugs, vaccines or therapeutics in the NIH/FDA
portfolio. Under the short-term Startup Evaluation License
Agreement, which can be obtained for $2,000, small companies can
apply for any of the available NIH patents and patent applications
by submitting a business plan detailing how they propose to use
them. Companies that are less than five years old, have fewer than
50 employees and receive investment of less than $5 million are
eligible to apply beginning Oct. 1.
- NIH also will establish a new National Center for Advancing
Translational Science to help industry shorten the time needed and
reduce costs for developing new drugs and diagnostics.
- The United States Patent and Trademark Office, the National
Science Foundation (NSF) and the Small Business Administration will
pilot a program to provide comprehensive IP support to 100 NSF SBIR
grant recipients and will engage external stakeholders to provide
pro bono or low-cost IP services to awardees.
- The Coulter Foundation and NSF launched a competition to
identify and promote incentives to adopt best practices that
improve university commercialization efforts. The foundation also
announced their selection of four universities to participate in a
Translational Research Partnership Program where each university
will create a $20 million endowment to foster research
collaboration between biomedical engineers and clinicians.
In coordination with the bill signing, some of the more than 135
university presidents and chancellors who pledged in April to work
with the administration to undertake greater efforts to advance
regional and national economic growth reported on their recent
activities. Read the full
announcement.
Learn More about Accelerating the Commercialization of
Research at SSTI's Conference
A dedicated breakout session during SSTI's
15th Annual Conference in November will examine
commercialization of technologies out of universities and research
institutions and the impact these efforts can have on local company
formation. We'll examine two organizations that
have broken down barriers between local institutions, and have
helped create companies that can thrive within the regional
economy.
Learn more about the session...
return to the top of the page
Five-Year Effort Seeks to Measure, Improve Quality of STEM
Teaching
The Association of American Universities (AAU) will undertake a
five-year initiative to assess and improve the quality of science,
technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) teaching and
learning focused on the first two years of college. Specifically,
the group will create a demonstration program at a subset of AAU
universities to implement its framework and develop tools to survey
and assess the quality of teaching, the extent to which effective
teaching methods are being used, and the effects of improved
teaching on retention of STEM majors and completion of STEM
degrees. The group plans to work with federal agencies, individual
universities and the business community. Read the
announcement...
return to the top of the page
Gordon Gee to Give Keynote at SSTI Conference
SSTI is thrilled to announce that Ohio State University President E. Gordon Gee will be the Keynote Speaker. Dr. Gee has held more university presidencies than any other American. He is the co-author of eight books and the author of numerous papers and articles on law and education. He is both an insightful and entertaining speaker that you won't want to miss. Be sure to register for the conference today!
return to the top of the page
New Milwaukee Initiative Intends to Connect Design Talent
with Manufactures
The Greater Milwaukee Committee (GMC) announced Innovation in
Milwaukee (MiKE)
— a new $500,000 initiative designed to align
southeastern Wisconsin's global and advanced
manufacturers with the region's design,
technology and innovation companies. MiKE will be built around
three core elements:
- Developing hi-tech talent for design and technology startups
aligned with service and product delivery for companies in the
cluster and for entrepreneurship within the cluster;
- Creating OPEN MiKE — a physical and virtual
space that promotes open source entrepreneurship and technology
prototyping; and,
- Establishing the MiKE Council— a leadership
group tasked with guiding the growth of
Milwaukee's design, technology and innovation
cluster.
GMC hopes that the development of a design, technology and
innovation cluster will turn Milwaukee's strong
manufacturing base (ranked second among the top 50 U.S. metros,
according to the press release) into an advanced manufacturing hub
fueled by rapid innovation and talent growth and attraction. The
MiKE initiative is supported by a grant from ArtPlace
— a new initiative of 11 of
America's top foundations working in conjunction
with the National Endowment for the Arts and seven federal
agencies. Visit MiKE's website...
return to the top of the page
Startup America Partnership Announces Online Services
Startup America, the nationwide, White House-endorsed
entrepreneurship initiative, officially began operations last week.
Young companies may now register to receive support services from
more than 25 private partners. Offerings include free and
discounted software packages, professional network memberships and
market data. Visit the site...
return to the top of the page
New ITIF Report Benchmarks National Policies and Programs
Supporting Manufacturers
The Information Technology & Innovation Foundation (ITIF)
released International Benchmarking of
Countries' Policies and Programs Supporting SME
Manufacturers — a new report that identifies
and analyzes manufacturing support programs and practices for small-
and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) that have been implemented in
ten foreign countries (i.e., Argentina, Australia, Austria, Canada,
China, Germany, Japan, Korea, Spain and the United Kingdom), in
addition to those of the United States. The authors, Stephen Ezell
and Robert D. Atkinson Ph.D., provide a cross-national comparison
of countries' SME manufacturing support programs
and pratices across five categories:
- Formal SME manufacturing support agencies or programs;
- The range of services provided by SME manufacturing support
agencies and programs;
- Funding levels and business models for these agencies or
programs;
- Best practices observed across countries'
SME manufacturing support programs; and,
- Measures of impact and return on investment from these
programs;
The authors concluded that the leading manufacturing countries
feature an "integrated, multifaceted approach
toward supporting their SME manufacturers and fund them
robustly." They also highlight that global best
practices have shifted towards supporting R&D, innovation and
growth efforts and away from helping SMEs with process and
productivity improvements. According to the report, nations have
shifted towards supporting R&D efforts with the intentions of
SMEs developing "their own indigenous and
repeatable capabilities at developing innovative new
products."
The report highlights that the U.S. Manufacturing Extension
Partnership's (MEP) evolution towards providing
support for SMEs related to technology acceleration, innovation and
growth-supporting activities is in line with international trends.
However, MEP and other U.S. public-private partnerships focused on
support for SME manufacturers should take the opportunity to learn from
their peers' best practices. To revitalize the
U.S. manufacturing base, the authors contend MEP and other
public-private partnerships must continue to provide
"support in an integrated fashion that focuses on
technology adoption, new product development and the innovation
activities of U.S. SMEs." According to the authors,
these integrated support services are essential for U.S. SMEs to
compete in the global economy due to other nations increasingly
realizing the importance of supporting their SME manufacturers. Read
the
report...
ITIF also hosted an event September 14, 2011 featuring
presentations from key officials in U.S. and foreign
governments crafting SME manufacturing policy in their countries,
including the MEP's Director Roger Kilmer. View
the
presentations...
return to the top of the page
OECD Finds Promise in Emerging National Innovation
Economies
The Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD)
has released the 10th edition of its annual Science, Technology
and Industry Scoreboard. Each year, OECD examines major trends in
the global innovation economy and uses 180 indicators to evaluate
the high-tech economies of OECD countries, as well as select
non-OECD countries. The overarching theme of this
year's release is the increased importance of
the non-OECD countries, including Brazil, the Russian Federation,
India, Indonesia, the People's Republic of China
and South Africa, together dubbed the BRIICS countries. In the wake
of the most recent global economic crisis, BRIICS countries have
become more important, not just in manufacturing, but in high-tech
manufacturing. While the U.S.' vaunted higher
educational system continues to boast 40 of the
world's top 50 research universities, the report
provides a more diverse picture emerges once the rankings are
broken out by research area.
In the OECD Science, Technology and Industry Scoreboard
2011, the 180 indicators are grouped into five categories based
on the role they play in national tech-based development. The
categories include:
- Building Knowledge, for indicators that measure
resources that firms and governments can use as a basis for future
growth;
- Connecting to Knowledge, for indicators of
interconnectedness within a country's innovation
economy;
- Targeting New Growth Areas, for indicators that show how
country's are targeting their scientific efforts
and how they leverage their comparative advantage in growing
industries;
- Unleashing Innovation in Firms, for indicator of
business dynamism and private sector innovation; and,
- Competing in the Global Economy, for more general
economic indicators and measures of overall high-tech
development.
OECD does not provide a global rank of high-tech economies.
Instead, the report offers data from the world's
largest national economies to depict current trends. The most
prominent of these trends is the increased involvement and
interdependence of OECD and BRIICS countries. Foreign direct
investment (FDI) in BRIICS countries has grown substantially since
2003, particularly investment from EU countries. At the same time,
FDI outward flows from BRIICS countries also grew during that
period. Over the past decade, outward flows from China and India
increased nine-fold and seven-fold, respectively.
While service industries now account for about 70 percent of
gross domestic product (GDP) in OECD countries, manufacturing has
remained strong in BRIICS countries. High-tech manufacturing, in
particular, has grown in importance in BRIICS countries in the
2000s, and now represents about 30 percent of total manufacturing
trade. In OECD countries, high-tech manufacturing represents about
25 percent of total manufacturing.
On the
OECD website,
you can find a 15-page summary of the 128 report, as well as a
number of videos highlighting specific OECD findings. One of these
offers an explanation of the report's new patent
quality index and how that index demonstrates that patent quality
is declining in OECD countries.
Read the OECD Science, Technology and Industry Scoreboard
2011...
return to the top of the page
TBED People and Job Opportunities
TBED People
Maria Haley, the executive director of the Arkansas Economic Development
Commission passed way Sept. 13 after suffering a brain
aneurysm.
The U.S.
Commerce Department's Economic Development
Administration announced Matthew Erskine will
join the agency as the U.S. deputy assistant secretary of
Commerce for Economic Development and chief operations officer.
Tom Palisin has been named the acting deputy director of
the Technology Investment Office at the Pennsylvania
Department of Community and Economic Development.
The University of Utah selected Bryan Ritchie to be the
next director of its Technology
Commercialization Office.
Paul Washington has been named
Denver's director of economic development.
John Ryan has been named the director of the
Vermont Agriculture Development Program. The new program will
provide comprehensive technical support to help the
state's value-added food enterprises manage
their growth.
Two administrators in Workforce Development & Continuing
Education at Pennsylvania
College of Technology have been appointed to assistant vice
president positions. Larry Michael was named assistant vice
president for Workforce Development and Special Projects. Tracy
Brundage was appointed assistant vice president for Workforce
and Economic Development.
Read more job postings
return to the top of the page
Staff Picks
The Bond Buyer: Obama Bill Would Restrict Use of
Tax-Exempt Interest
This article cites provisions in the
president's jobs bill that would have
"significant adverse impacts on the municipal
bond market" that could lead to higher borrowing costs
for state and local governments. Read more ...
Top 50 Entrepreneurship Programs Named in Review
Among the factors considered in Princeton Review's annual ranking of
the top undergrad and graduate entrepreneurship programs are
percentage of faculty who are entrepreneurs and number of clubs and
mentorship programs.
Analysis of LinkedIn Profiles Finds Many Entrepreneurs
Studied Technology in College
Challenging the idea that most entrepreneurs choose the MBA
track, LinkedIn finds subjects such as computer engineering,
computer science and electrical engineering topped their list of
entrepreneurs' college majors.
Read more ...
Tech Advocacy Group Calls for Startup Visa Bill in
Canada
The proposed measure would loosen entry laws for entrepreneurs
by reducing the amount of personal funds needed to begin the
immigration process as long as they have a minimum of two years'
experience heading a company.
Read more ...
Inside Higher ED: Why They Chose STEM
A survey of 500 undergrads finds females and males enter the
field for different reasons. Only 25 percent of respondents cited
the nation's need for more STEM grads as
motivation.
Read more ...
NIH Awards $144M for Innovative Research
NIH announced 79 awards for three programs supported by the
Common Fund. The awards are intended to speed translation of
research into improved public health.
Read more ...
NIST and the EU's Smart Grid Coordination Group Collaborate
on Standards
The two will work together on Smart Grid standards development
to promote the regular exchange of information on issues such as
legislation, work methods, standard deliverables, testing and
certification, and cybersecurity.
Read more ...
return to the top of the page
