SSTI Digest

Gov. Mike Rounds announced last week the creation of four new specialized research centers at the state's public universities. The $2.8 million in awards mark South Dakota's first foray into using university-based research investments as a tool to grow the state's economy, the governor said.

The four 2010 Research Centers are:

The National Institutes of Health (NIH), the largest federal funding source for life sciences research conducted by small tech firms, has selected the Larta Institute to manage its nationwide Commercialization Assistance Program. The multi-year $2.5 million award will target Phase II recipients of the NIH Small Business Innovation Research and Small Business Technology Transfer Programs (SBIR/STTR).

"NIH is interested in seeing products derived from SBIR funding make their way into the marketplace for the benefit of the American people," said Jo Anne Goodnight, NIH SBIR/STTR Program Coordinator. "We are committed not only to supporting high quality research through NIH SBIR awards, but to investing in the long-term success of our SBIR-winners."

Encouraging entrepreneurship has been a predominant focus since the recession and jobless recover, but a recent report from one of the country's leading colleges for entrepreneurial education cautions the current wave of new business starts will not cure many job woes.

Less than one out of every five businesses started in the U.S. has the innovative spark that could lead to strong job generation capabilities over the next five years, according to the 2003 Global Entrepreneurship Monitor (GEM), a study conducted by Babson College.

There are less than 100 of our readers - now approaching a total of 100,000 - that may be able to look into their electronic mailboxes and even eight-year-old paper files to see that this issue of the SSTI Weekly Digest is our 400th. What began in March 1996 as a two-page weekly fax to key science and technology leaders in most states has evolved into the one of the most widely read e-news sources for the tech-based economic development community in the U.S. The addition of the funding supplement to the Digest in January 2001 made the publication a powerful and popular tool for encouraging research, innovation and entrepreneurship by increasing local access to and awareness of federal and foundation research and economic development grant opportunities.

If you consider North America's public investment to encourage economic growth through science and technology at the state or provincial government level, Ontario should be in your top 10. And the recent injection of $63 million for technology commercialization might have bumped the province of 12 million residents up a place or two.

Late last month, the Ontario provincial government outlined a four-year commercialization plan to link public research institutions with companies that can move the research out of the lab and into the market. Universities, colleges and hospitals will receive $27 million to help them identify promising research and make them investor-ready; and institutions will receive an additional $36 million to establish pools of seed capital to commercialize the best ideas. The goal is to create more spin-off companies and accelerate the growth of small- and medium-sized enterprises and leading-edge jobs.

Science Spending to Rise £1B Over Next 3 Years Alone

"..because we want Britain to be the most attractive location in the world for science and innovation, we are setting a new and ambitious target of increasing UK R&D investment as a proportion of national income from its current level of 1.9 percent to 2.5 percent by 2014 over the next decade."

The quote is from the first page of the United Kingdom's new Science & Innovation Investment Framework: 2004-2014, which lays out a specific and ambitious commitment to strengthening the nation's position as both a center for knowledge creation and as a world leader in technology commercialization.

One Goal would see Science Share of GDP Surpassing US before 2010.

Not to be outdone by its European neighbor across the Channel (see story above), the French government announced at the end of June it will create a national research agency modelled after the National Science Foundation, according to The Scientist, the European Commission and several French news reports. While the budget for the new government agency will not be released until November, the press reports indicate an additional $1.23 billion (US) could be available for research grants in 2005.

Innovation policy approaches need to address specific challenges, problems and opportunities found in different types of regions, according to a new research paper from the Vienna University of Economics and Business Administration. The paper, One Size Fits All? Towards a Differentiated Policy Approach With Respect to Regional Innovation Systems, was presented at the recent German Institute of Economic Research conference. In it, the authors stress there is no ideal model for innovation policy in tech-based economic development, instead making a case for more differentiated policies.

Various types of regions are analyzed, based on their preconditions for innovation, networking, and innovation barriers. The authors highlight the regional innovation system (RIS) approach, which is said to provide a useful framework for a differentiated approach.

The U.S. Department of Labor (DOL) launched last month a $17.2 million national Biotechnology Worker Training Initiative in support of the President’s High Growth Job Training Initiative.

“This $17.2 million in training funds will recruit and train workers for jobs in the biotechnology field, which is expected to be one of the fastest growing sectors by 2012,” said Secretary of Labor Elaine Chao.

An initial award of $2.4 million was made to the Pittsburgh Life Sciences Greenhouse (PLSG), a public-private partnership dedicated to Western Pennsylvania's life sciences industry. Chao said the grant to PLSG would help increase awareness about promising biotech-related careers in the state, while addressing the need for skilled workers.

New manufacturer training funds, enhanced enterprise zones, and new economic development infrastructure loans are among the incentives included in Missouri's Jobs Now legislation, signed into law by Gov. Bob Holden on July 8. Passage of key elements of the package was one of the governor's top priorities for the legislative session and was considered critical for securing the new 1,200-employee H&R Block headquarters in downtown Kansas City, according to local news reports.

The pace for new advances in science and technology has quickened significantly over the past 10 years -- so much so that companies are challenged to stay current with the latest innovations. Entire new fields such as nanotechnology are being created while products introduced this week may be obsolete before the year is out.

If tech firms and research labs are having trouble keeping up with science and technology, how do we expect our K-12 science teachers to do so when they are always in front of a classroom? Is it an issue for inspiring new students into these fields when they enter college?

In perhaps one of the first of its kind a new study testing Kentucky science teacher’s depth of knowledge and understanding of critical new technologies reveals the issue is quite real for the Commonwealth. The results most likely could be transferred to most school districts across the country, we suspect.

One of the recurring issues in many states for financing centers as part of their tech-based economic development portfolio is whether or not the organizations resulting from the multi-year, multimillion grants should become financially self sufficient at the end of the grant term. New York's approach of redesignating its Centers for Advanced Technology (CATs) provides a model similar to efforts employed in some states, but with broader applicability across many public-private initiatives to ensure long term, recurring public investments are yielding significant economic results.

Mandatory re-competitions through sunset clauses or grant terms force all of the partners in a particular tech-based economic development initiative to re-evaluate the program's continued value and effectiveness.