SSTI Digest

The Growth Dashboard, an annual report released by the Enterprise Research Centre, a policy advisory group with researchers from five United Kingdom business schools, and the government’s Business Growth Service, serves as a source of evidence to inform discussions on the country’s business support priorities. Presenting a set of growth metrics for startups and existing firms across a range of sub-national geographies in the UK, the metrics used in the annually updated dashboard are:  Proportion of fast-growing firms in the business population (2011-2014); Net job creation ratios for 2013-2014; Three-year survival rates of startups (2011-2014); Proportion of surviving startups that reach £1m turnover (2011- 2014); and, Proportion of existing £1-2M ($1.57-3.15M USD) turnover businesses THAT grow to £3m ($4.72M USD) turnover (2011-2014). London, conventionally seen as the UK’s innovative anchor, places in the top three on four of the five indicators used in the dashboard. While London leads in factors such as startup rate, measured by employer startups per 10,000 populations, it ranks near the bottom for three-year survival rates…

Uber and the City of London are among the growing number of backers of a nearly driver-free world. Proponents of autonomous vehicles contend that they will lead to large cost savings for both consumers and transportation organizations while delivering a faster, more efficient transportation experience. However, there are still major strides to be made before the technology can be safely deployed in real world settings. Several U.S. states, cities, and the Canadian Province of Ontario have recently announced initiatives in an attempt to position themselves as leaders in the rapidly growing industries of autonomous and connected cars. MichiganSeveral new initiatives to support the Michigan’s growing autonomous and connected car industry clusters have recently been announced. The long-time home of the U.S. auto industry, Michigan hopes to remain a global hub for next-generation automotive technologies as they evolve.   MICHauto, an economic development program led by the Detroit Regional Chamber, announced the Michigan Mobility Initiative – an effort to support high-tech research and development into self-driving cars, connected vehicles, new…

The Canadian Securities Administrators (CSA) announced that securities regulators in five Canadian Provinces have agreed to CSA Notice 45-316 – a common set of rules that will allow startups to raise up to $500,000 CD (approximately $401,600 USD) per year from unaccredited investors via authorized Canadian-based funding portals. With the passage of the new rules, the provinces of British Columbia, Manitoba, Québec, New Brunswick and Nova Scotia join Saskatchewan as provinces that allow non-accredited investors to make equity investments in startups and other small businesses, according to techvibes.com. Under CSA Notice 45-316, each investor is limited to investing a maximum of $1,500 CD (approximately $1,200 USD) per investment. The rules include a unique feature that allows investors to rethink their investment and withdraw within the first 48 hours if any changes are made to the offering document. However, unlike shares in public companies, these crowdfunded securities will not be freely tradable when issued. They can only be resold during another round of crowdfunding offering or four months after the issuer becomes a reporting issuer. Startups can only…

On December 4, the Canadian government revealed their national Science and Technology (S&T) Strategy – Seizing Canada's Moment: Moving Forward in Science, Technology and Innovation 2014.  An update to the original report released in 2007, the S&T strategy identifies five priority research areas for federal support over the next seven years: environment and agriculture; health and life sciences; natural resources and energy; information and communications technology; and, advanced manufacturing. Read the strategy… Among the proposals included in the S&T strategy, the government launched a seven-year, $1.5 billion CD (approximately $1.3 billion USD) Canada First Research Excellence Fund. Each year, Canadian universities and research institutions will compete for $350 million CD (approximately $304.9 million USD) in funding to support projects that increase the research and development (R&D) capacity and innovation infrastructure of their institutions.  The fund will support a broad array of activities including talent attraction, funding for research, R&D infrastructure projects and large-scale multi-institutional initiatives…

Around the world, national governments are working to cultivate their innovation economies and increase their global competiveness by creating and increasing support for government-led initiatives. Leaders of advanced economies recognize that their positions as global leaders face a murky future due to the emergence of new economies. In turn, officials from emerging economies realize that supporting innovation is necessary for their economies to continue their rapid growth. In 2014, governments from both advanced and emerging economies searched for methods that would help their high growth-firms transform their economy and increase their global competiveness. One of the global trends of 2014 was the emergence of government-backed, privately managed venture capital initiatives. Governments across the globe recognized that the lack of mature risk-capital ecosystems was reducing the effectiveness of their high-growth firms and key industries. To remedy that issue, these governments provide significant funding/resources to support the growth of their private-led venture capital sectors through the establishment of government-backed fund of funds and private equity funds that…

UK Moves to Support Growing Social Innovation SectorThe United Kingdom (UK) recently announced that it will petition the European Commission, the European Union’s executive body, for permission to increase the size of tax relief for social investments that address significant social issues. The proposed plan would: Expand the options for indirect investment in social enterprises; Establish a government-run accreditation scheme for Social Impact Bonds eligible for social investment tax relief; and,  Make changes to community interest companies’ regulations to promote the strategy to investors and social enterprises. The proposed changes could spur up to £500 million (approximately $829.8 million USD) in social impact investments over the next five years. Read the announcement… These changes were among several recommendations from the Social Investment Roadmap. The government commissioned report outlined a process to further transform the UK into a global leader in social innovation and entrepreneurship. The proposed changes are the latest in a series of steps that the UK government has undertaken since David Cameron became…

Ontario officials launched a new fund-of-funds this week intended to boost capital resources for high-tech companies. The Northleaf Venture Catalyst Fund is a privately led initiative, supported by federal and provincial funds. The governments of Canada and Ontario have agreed to make a combined capital commitment of $1 for every $2 secured from the private sector. Current commitments total $217.5 million CAD ($195.4 million USD), but leaders hope to match the government’s maximum match level of $300 million CAD ($269.6 million USD) in a second closing later this year. Read the announcement…

In the face of the spiraling unemployment in Greece and Spain, the European Union (EU) received encouraging news regarding the economic recovery of firms across its 27-member states. According to the EU Industrial R&D Investment Scoreboard, European firms reported increased R&D investment (8.9 percent nominal growth), sales (4.9 percent nominal growth) and profits (3.5 percent nominal growth) for the second straight year in 2011. The 8.9 percent growth in R&D investments by European firms puts them above world average and similar than that of U.S. firms (9.0 percent). However, U.S.-based firms continue to perform better than EU-based firms in terms of sales growth (12.3 percent for U.S. firms versus 4.9 percent for EU firms) and profits growth (12.4 percent for U.S. firms versus 3.5 percent for EU firms). These numbers are particularly encouraging for the EU only two years after reporting negative growth in Industrial R&D investment in 2008 and a continuation of adverse market conditions and uncertainties due to the persistent effects of the crisis including the potential collapse of the Spanish and Greek economies. The European Union announced it would…

Governments of advanced economies are starting to believe as the 21st century advances significant opportunities for their technology-based product and service sectors will emerge from increasingly open, competitive and affluent global markets. To compete in this changing world, they are looking to expand access to capital for startups and entrepreneurs, support their research and development (R&D) infrastructure and address weaknesses in their national economies. Canada, the United Kingdom and the European Union (EU) are among those that recently have announced initiatives or released reports intended to strength their national innovation economy. CanadaCanada must become more productive to sustain its high standard of living, according to the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development's (OECD) Economic Survey of Canada 2012. The report points out that Canada's overall productivity has slightly fallen since 2002 compared to a 30% increase over the past 20 years in the United States. To address this decline in productivity, the OECD identified two priorities: Boost innovation — Although academic research is world class, the return…

As global economies shift, developing nations are attempting to transition as suppliers of raw materials to nations that are producers of value-added goods. Africa has been a major supplier of raw materials to the developed world. However, it drastically lagged behind in the production of valued-added goods. Recently, African nations have attempted to reinvent their economic development efforts from suppliers to producers by developing programs to grow tech-based economies. Two recent initiatives, the LIONS@FRICA Partnership and South Africa's manufacturing incentives program, highlight the changing attitudes on the continent. In addition, a new survey of European business leaders found discouraging results relative to European Union policies to improve innovation. LIONS@FRICA PartnershipIn partnership with the U.S Department of State and other U.S. agencies, the World Economic Forum, the African Development Bank and other partners launched a new partnership to promote innovation and entrepreneurship in Africa. The Liberalizing Innovation Opportunity Nations (LIONS@FRICA) partnership seeks to mobilize the knowledge, expertise and resources of leading public and…

The European Union (EU) launched the Technology Transfer Offices — Connecting Innovation and Research Centers and Laboratories in Europe (European TTO CIRCLE ), a network of tech transfer offices at Europe's 25 largest public research organizations. With the goal of increasing the market and societal impacts of publicly-funded research, the European TTO CIRCLE members already have adopted a set of several initiatives including: Fostering the use of their knowledge portfolio; Sharing best practices, knowledge and expertise; Performing joint activities; Establishing informal channels of communication with policymakers; Organizing training programs; and, Developing a common approach towards international standards for the profession of technology transfer. By adopting these initiatives, the EU hopes the major European public research organizations can play a role in collectively driving changes to the technology transfer landscape in Europe and across the world. The main emphasis of the European TTO CIRLCE will be to spur job creation by supporting the transfer of new technologies from member organizations to European firms, in particular to small- and medium-…

MaRS Discovery District, Toronto's innovation and entrepreneurship center, has launched a $30 million early stage clean tech fund, the first of its kind in Canada. This week, the group announced that it had raised its fundraising goal entirely from private sources, and that released information about its first two investments. The MaRS Cleantech Fund LP portfolio companies will be encouraged to seek maximum support from MaRS. Read the announcement... Interested in how U.S. states and regions are catalyzing clean tech innovation? Join Lewis Milford of the Clean Energy Group, Mark Muro of the Brookings Institution and Matthew Stepp of the Information Technology and Innovation Foundation on April 19 for a webinar to learn about how the energy debate is resulting in new policies and programs and the local level. Read about SSTI webinars...