SSTI Digest

From undertaking a joint regional initiative to improve two cities' competitiveness in advanced manufacturing to launching an effort for engaging venture capital companies and bringing in top university students to showcase area opportunities, mayors in Lexington and Louisville, Boston and Chicago recognize the value in promoting their cities as top destinations for growing tech-based economies. While each of the three recent announcements detailed below target different sectors of the innovation economy, they share the same mission of making their region more desirable for startups.

Boston

Included below are recent development plans and groundbreaking news for research parks announced by officials in Connecticut, Colorado, Kentucky, Massachusetts, Nebraska, North Carolina, Rhode Island and Wisconsin.

Lawmakers last week advanced a bill to provide $25 million for a new research park at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln as part of the Innovation Campus. The Innovation Campus includes a life sciences research center and a U.S. Department of Agriculture Research facility, reports Bloomberg.

University of Connecticut officials announced a plan to build an $18 million tech park financed with state bonds. The tech park will house large, flexible-use laboratories with specialized equipment for research and will provide space for business incubators and individual companies. The plan also includes $2.5 million in state funds to create the Innovation Partners Eminent Faculty program designed to attract top scientists.

The Kentucky Cabinet for Economic Development is looking for an executive director who is an ambitious, successful professional that will provide leadership in Kentucky's efforts to develop a knowledge-based economy. The executive director will work in partnership with all levels of government, academia, and the private sector to help create a supportive high-technology environment. The executive director will leverage his or her executive expertise, entrepreneurial background, policy knowledge, and resources to strengthen Kentucky's technology industry-focused business attraction and expansion initiatives.

Maine Governor Paul LePage named Phillip Congdon as the new commissioner of the Department of Economic and Community Development. Cogndon is a licensed professional engineer who spent more than 20 years with Texas Instruments in Dallas. He replaces Acting Commissioner Thaxter Trafton.

Ohio Governor John Kasich announced Mark Kvamme, a partner at Sequoia Capital, will serve as the interim state development director. The Silicon Valley venture capitalist has agreed to do the job for a dollar.

Former NorTech CEO Dorothy Baunach will be Cuyahoga County's interim economic development director.

Ken Bloemer, executive director of the U.S.A. National Innovation Marketplace, will replace Phil Doepker as director of the University of Dayton, Innovation Center.

TBED People
Walter Bumphus has been named the next president and CEO of the American Association of Community Colleges. Bumphus currently serves as a professor in the Community College Leadership Program and chair of the Educational Administration Department at the University of Texas at Austin. Bumphus will begin his tenure with AACC in January.

Deborah Clayton resigned as the commissioner of the Kentucky Department of Commercialization and Innovation. She has accepted a position at the Argonne National Laboratory in Chicago. Warren Nash, deputy commissioner of the same department, also has resigned.

Kansas Governor-elect Sam Brownback appointed State Rep. Pat George to his cabinet as secretary of the Department of Commerce. George is expected to start after Brownback is sworn in on Jan. 10 and the Senate confirms his appointment.

Often credited with contributing significant revenue to states' economies, research parks also house facilities for workforce training and provide resources for tech-based industries, which is especially important as the nation's employment begins to pick up steam. In West Virginia, officials are building a $15 million advanced technology-training center at the state-owned research and technology park, and in Utah, officials recently broke ground on a building that will house engineers and analysts working on the nation's Intercontinental Ballistic Missile program.

Craig Dye was named director of the Mtech VentureAccelerator Program, a fast-track, early admission program tied to Mtech's Technology Advancement Program.

The Minnesota High Tech Association announced Margaret Anderson Kelliher, speaker of the Minnesota House, will assume the role of president of the Association beginning in January after she leaves public office.

Matthew Portnoy of the National Institute of General Medical Sciences will serve as acting SBIR/STTR coordinator for the National Institutes of Health.

Sheri Stickley is president & CEO of the Oklahoma Bioscience Association. Ms. Stickley previously served as Deputy Director for Strategic Planning & Initiatives at Oklahoma Department of Commerce.

Former Kentucky Commerce Cabinet Secretary George Ward was named executive director of the University of Kentucky Coldstream Research Campus.

Kentucky Governor Steve Beshear will host a conference sponsored by the Southern Technology Council exploring changing consumer demands and global competitions in the Southern automotive industry. The conference, titled Driving the Next 20 Years: Creating the New Automotive Industry in the South, will feature speakers from Toyota, Ford, Daimer and Nissan and panel discussions on auto R&D, site location and supporting the industry. The event will be held June 7-8 in Lexington, KY. Read more about the conference ...

Silicon Valley, a region often looked to for trends in the technology field, is expected to see a rise in the number of new high-tech incubators and the expansion of existing incubators in the coming months. A recent Wall Street Journal article points to these openings as a sign of revival for technology startup companies amid a relatively slow period last year as startup investment plunged during the recession. Across the nation, specialized incubators spanning clean energy, sustainable architecture and advanced materials have emerged over the past several months to support high-tech ventures.

USTAR announced in January the opening of Utah's first incubator focused on information technology and renewable energy. The Southern Utah Information Technology and Renewable Energy Incubator, located in St. George, will support businesses focused on high technology, green technology and alternative energy.

The newly-created Clean Energy Leadership Council, convened by the Washington governor's office and a state-wide public-private clean energy alliance, held its first meeting. The council will deliver a clean energy strategy and recommendations by December 1, 2010.

Vicki Gaddy has been appointed director of workforce development for BioNJ.

Kentucky Gov. Steve Beshear shuffled two top positions in his administration. Larry Hayes will be secretary of the state Economic Development Cabinet and budget director Mary Lassiter will replace Hayes as Executive Cabinet secretary. Hayes has been interim Economic Development Cabinet secretary since last September. Lassiter will keep her position as budget director.

On Monday, legislation was introduced in a special session of the Kentucky Legislature to amend several of Kentucky's economic development incentive programs. Additionally, HB 3 contains language to secure funding and land for a proposed lithium-ion battery manufacturing complex (see the April 22, 2009 issue of the Digest) in Hardin County.

Proposed changes to the economic development incentive programs include:

Within the last two weeks, both Kentucky and Michigan announced major developments in their ongoing efforts to build a statewide advanced battery industry. With these initiatives, the states hope to better position themselves for upcoming rounds of advanced battery development grants from the federal government and other future sources of investment.

A partnership between the state of Kentucky, the University of Kentucky, the University of Louisville, and Argonne National Laboratory is establishing a national Battery Manufacturing R&D Center to be located in Lexington. Focusing initially on advancing lithium-ion battery manufacturing, the Center will utilize the research and personnel from the universities, but also will have complementary R&D facilities at Argonne. Existing Kentucky programs to fund research grants and recruit researchers will be used to enhance the Center's activities.