Earlier this month Governor Jeanne Shaheen released New Hampshire in the New Economy: A Vision for Expanded Prosperity, the first-ever comprehensive economic development plan for the State of New Hampshire. The plan calls for New Hampshire state government to focus its activities toward encouraging innovation, strengthening education and workforce development, retaining and protecting the quality of life, and extending economic opportunity to every citizen in every part of the state.

The Semiconductor Industry Association (SIA), in cooperation with members of the semiconductor industry and the U.S. Department of Defense, is launching a new initiative to expand certain long range applied microelectronics research at U.S. universities.

This planned new initiative, the Focus Center Research Program, is being structured to utilize long range innovative applied research to meet industry needs. The envisioned Centers will:

Carolina Cruz is the first director of the Louisiana Immersive Technologies Enterprise, a $20 million research facility developed jointly by the University of Louisiana at Lafayette and the Louisiana Economic Development Authority.

Probably everyone involved in tech-based economic development (TBED) can name at least one research building, innovation center or tech park named after a significant contributor to the project. And has become commonplace individual components of the structure have been named for individual donors: a wing, the auditorium, the foyer, the artwork, the chairs in the board room.

The first four installments of SSTI's look at how tech-based economic development (TBED) will play in the 2006 legislative priorities of the governors can be found in the Digest archives at: http://www.ssti.org/Digest/digest.htm

Louisiana

The North Carolina Small Business and Technology Development Center (SBTDC) will host a six-state regional conference promoting three federal business technology investment programs: the Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) Program, the Advanced Technology Program (ATP), and the Small Business Technology Transfer (STTR) Program.

The advances being made in nanotechnology-based research are likely to impact most industry sectors eventually as more commercial applications are identified. As a result, the National Nanotechnology Initiative has been a research priority for the federal government for many years. Nanotech research is occurring around the world, but, at this point, the majority of effort is concentrated in several leading universities and private companies.

article prepared by Kay Etzler, SBIR Specialist for the North Carolina Small Business Technology Development Center

Citing the need to attract knowledge- and technology-based businesses to the state, Louisiana Governor Mike Foster has proposed converting the state’s Department of Economic Development (DED) into Louisiana, Inc., a private, state-chartered, not-for-profit corporation.

Nadia Goodman, the Louisiana Department of Economic Development's Director of Policy, Planning and Technology, has announced that she is retiring effective June 30. In addition to being very active within the Science and Technology Council of the States (STCS), Mrs. Goodman has been a good friend of SSTI's since its creation. SSTI staff trust that she will continue to provide advice and offer insights from her new residence in Mexico.

College tuition rates and a state's success at retaining its high school graduates for college attendance — both of which can be affected by state policy makers and university administrators — are strong predictors of a state's success in keeping its own recent college science and engineering graduates and in attracting graduates from other states, according to a study from the Southern Technology Council (STC).

Boston

After months of analyzing data and hundreds of interviews, organizers of western North Carolina's Future Forward economic development strategy only await the study's approval by local governments. Future Forward is aimed at improving economic development conditions for 12 counties in the Western Piedmont and Mountains of North Carolina located in the 10th and 11th Congressional Districts — Alexander, Burke, Caldwell, Catawba, Iredell, Lincoln, Rutherford, Avery, Mitchell, Watauga, Wilkes and McDowell counties.

With the sustained depth of the recession, the IT crash, the rapid growth in unemployment and the speculative office construction craze of the late 1990s, one would expect office vacancies to climb and property lease rates to edge down in many cities. Following this thought further might suggest, with cheaper office space available, the need for publicly supported low-rent technology incubator space would decrease.

The New Hampshire High Technology Council has announced Paul Houle is the new president and chief executive officer and Mary Collins will serve as executive vice president and chief operating officer.

Biotechnology has enormous potential for North Carolina's future, but the state's economic development strategy must be broader than any single industry and must include growth-from-within strategies, concludes a report published by the Institute for Emerging Issues at North Carolina State University.

Dennis Lower of the Biomedical Research Foundation of Northwest Louisiana is the new leader of the Louisiana Economic Development Council.

North Carolina Gov. Mike Easley was recently joined by Congressional, university, and local and business representatives last week in announcing a 180-acre expansion of Piedmont Triad Research Park in downtown Winston-Salem. The biotech park will include a new research campus for Wake Forest University School of Medicine.

Golden LEAF, the statewide foundation established in 1999 to use one-half of the state's tobacco settlement for the long-term economic advancement of North Carolina, has announced an $85.4 million economic stimulus package it believes will significantly improve North Carolina's economy and make the state a leader in the biosciences industry. Foundation officials anticipate the public investment stimulating at least $350 million in new private and federal funding biotech activity in the state.

The 2002 Special Session of the Louisiana State Legislature has yielded a series of tax credits that aim to benefit biotechnology companies in Louisiana, promote commercialization of technology, encourage R&D investments, and make the state more competitive in information technology. The tax credits are as follows:

The president of the Buffalo Economic Renaissance Corp, Alan DeLisle, is leaving to become director of the Office of Economic and Employment Development in Durham, N.C.

Sometimes, the economic advantages of consolidating state and local initiatives addressing different elements of building tech-based economies outweighs any potential dilution of specific efforts. Other times, the addition of an entirely new entity is required to provide concentrated focus on specific needs or activities. Here are a few of the most recent examples of the realignment of the TBED community:

George Bald is returning to serve as Commissioner of the New Hampshire Department of Resources and Economic Development. Bald served in the position from 1998-2004.