Recent Research: ITIF: Feds Must Fund Collaboration, TBED to COMPETE

With the America COMPETES Act up for reauthorization, there is an opportunity for Congress to inject some innovation into the nation's innovation policies, writes Rob Atkinson, in a recent paper from the Information Technology & Innovation Foundation. Atkinson outlines eight specific recommendations to improve the Act — many closely tied to the goals and current investment strategies of state and regional tech-based economic development organizations — including direct funding support for TBED. The proposals include:

• Create a $110 million SCNR program (Spurring Commercialization of Our Nation's Research) under NIST to support university, state and federal laboratory technology commercialization initiatives.
• Fund joint government-industry STEM Ph.D. fellowships.
• Allow foreign students receiving STEM Ph.D.s from U.S. universities to automatically qualify for green cards.
• Create a university-industry collaborative R&D tax credit.
• Fund industry-university-government manufacturing research and deployment centers.
• Establish an Office of Innovation Policy in OMB (i.e., an Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs for Innovation).
• Institute a National Innovation and Competitiveness Strategy modeled on the National Broadband Strategy.

Atkinson asserts, given the fiscal constraints facing the entire nation, it is important to leverage non-federal resources whenever possible and “spur collaboration between various players in the innovation system.” He recommends state and regional TBED organizations receive half of the SCNR funding through a formula-based allocation system.

More information is available at: http://www.itif.org/files/2010-america-competes.pdf