SSTI Digest

Linda Fettig was named director of the Nebraska Rural Development Commission.

Kathie Olsen, nominated by the president and confirmed by the Senate, is the new deputy director of the National Science Foundation.

The San Antonio Technology Accelerator Initiative (SATAI) announced that James Poage is SATAI's new president and CEO. Poage replaces Randy Goldsmith, who continues as a director.

Wisconsin Gov. Jim Doyle today unveiled the plan that will guide his Administration's legislative agenda for the next 12 months. Grow Wisconsin: The 2005 Agenda focuses on three areas: investing in business, investing in people, and fostering a competitive business climate.

While the largest single funding element in the plan calls for changing the structure of the state's $500 million affordable housing program, tech-based economic development initiatives are prevalent. Highlights include:

Information, telecommunications and electricity provide the basic building blocks for all tech-based economic development - regardless of industry sector, research field or location. In the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, the technology infrastructure for many of the state's emerging tech-firms has been dismantled. How do you restore efforts to build a tech-based economy when the fundamentals are destroyed overnight?

Mississippi Technology Alliance (MTA), the leading tech-based economic development organization for the state, quickly responded to the Hurricane's wrath by launching a TechFix Mississippi Program to help small Mississippi companies rebuild.

One of the latest big-ticket investments targeting stem cell research came from Ann Arbor last week as the University of Michigan committed $10.5 million of its internal resources to establish an interdisciplinary center for stem cell research. The announcement is one of dozens from around the country since California voters approved Proposition 71 in 2004, borrowing $3 billion over 10 years for stem cell research.

With total spending on medical research now approaching $100 billion annually, up 154 percent from what it was a decade ago according to the Alerion Institute, many states seem to be feeling a need to get ahead or just catch up with their peers as each new funding commitment is announced.

Between 1996 and 2004, an average 0.36 percent of the U.S. population created a new business each month, representing approximately 500,000 new businesses per month, according to the Kauffman Index of Entrepreneurial Activity.

Using matched data from the monthly Current Population Surveys, a national population survey conducted by the U.S. Bureau of the Census and the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the Kauffman Foundation created a new measure to provide information on recent entrepreneurial trends at the national level. The Index looks at business creation at the individual owner level by gender, education, region, age, immigrant status, and major industries.

Not too surprising. Put the premier professional development opportunity for the tech-based economic development community in a great city and you'll draw hundreds of participants from at least 45 states and several other countries. Offer conference attendees five-star accommodations at prices well below market and we've ended up with the largest room block yet for an SSTI annual conference. It's a formula guaranteeing an incredible experience for everyone joining SSTI in Atlanta on Oct. 19-21.

SSTI is extremely grateful to the management of the InterContinental Hotel Buckhead-Atlanta for agreeing to expand the reserved block by 13-14 percent to allow as many of our participants as possible to savor the comfort of this luxurious property while they attend SSTI's 9th Annual Conference.

Limited Seating Remaining in Three Preconference Sessions

The desire to establish sound metrics to evaluate performance and progress for science and technology investments has grown as S&T programs mature, state and federal funding tightens, and good managers simply want to know what's working and what isn't. As a result, SSTI's all-day intensive pre-conference on sound TBED evaluation models has sold out.

Limited seating remains for the other three preconference workshops, described below. Individuals interested in attending any of the three are strongly encouraged to register on SSTI's website as soon as possible: http://www.ssti.org/conference05.htm

In 2003, academic institutions across the U.S. reported having a total of $23.76 billion in R&D expenditures for research related to the life sciences, according to the National Science Foundation's Survey of Research and Development Expenditures at Universities and Colleges, FY 2003.

The $23.76 billion figure represents 59.3 percent of the total academic R&D expenditures. Among individual states, however, the prominence of life science research among total academic R&D portfolios varies from a high of 89.6 percent in Vermont to only 18.3 percent in Alaska. Only 20 states had life sciences concentrations higher than the national average.

For more information on the positions below, visit SSTI's online Job Corner at http://www.ssti.org/posting.htm.

Georgia SBIR Assistance Program

This new program of the Georgia Tech Advanced Technology Development Center, one of the leading university-based technology incubators in the nation, is seeking a Biosciences Project Manager. The ideal candidate will have a Life Sciences background and experience with the SBIR/STTR programs. This person will provide guidance and hands-on assistance to companies in preparing SBIR/STTR proposals. More information on this position opening is available through the SSTI Job Corner at: http://www.ssti.org/posting.htm. Georgia Tech is an EEO/AA employer.

The TBED community owes a huge debt of gratitude to Thomas Friedman for his 2005 book, The World is Flat. Friedman has helped elevate the issue of innovation, competitiveness, and the U.S. standing therein to the New York Times bestseller list, the Sunday talk shows, and scads of press coverage. Friedman has helped convince pundits and policymakers that the world is flat and the challenges to the U.S. are more serious than ever and are only increasing.

While the pundits talk about the issue, the most pressing issue is what we're going to do about it. To protect our future we need to increase entrepreneurship, expand access to capital, fully integrate our universities into our economic system, improve our workforce through improved education, and better involve underrepresented peoples and regions. Friedman offers a variety of policy prescriptions, but virtually all rely on federal action. But it is incumbent on every city, region, and state to take its own future into its own hands and act.