innovation

Fostering a culture of technology & innovation: Louisiana’s 2025 strategic economic development plan

Recognizing Louisiana’s lag in some prosperity metrics, loss of talent over the past decade, and need to build a more competitive economy among its southern state peers, the Louisiana Economic Development (LED) has created a strategic plan that emphasizes innovation, technology, and entrepreneurship as the means to address the challenges and opportunities it faces in creating a more robust and talent-attracting economy.

Recent Research: Regionalism enhances productivity and innovation

Regional cooperation economic development is believed to stimulate growth in various ways, including increased trade, enhanced movement of technologies from lab to market, and improved resource allocation. Federal support for innovation-driven growth has increasingly forced applicants to take integrated regional approaches. However, empirical evidence on the specific impacts of such cooperation is scant.

Canadian program similar to SBIR faces big budget cuts

The Innovative Solutions Canada (ISC) program is often compared to the U.S. Small Business Innovative Research (SBIR) program. And, like the SBIR program, ISC has faced criticism from skeptics despite metrics that show the program delivers high returns on investment. When Canada’s Budget 2023 Initiative recommended reallocating 14.1 billion Canadian dollars (CAD) in federal spending, each Ministry was tasked to identify programs that did not address the government’s top priorities.

Election 2024: gubernatorial campaign positions

Eleven states and two territories, including Puerto Rico, are holding gubernatorial elections this November, with voters in eight of those states (Delaware, Indiana, Missouri, New Hampshire, North Carolina, North Dakota, Washington, and West Virginia) choosing a new governor to replace either a term-limited incumbent or governors who chose not to seek re-election. In Montana, Utah, and Vermont governors are seeking re-election.

Book Notes: Innovation for the Masses: How to Share the Benefits of the High-Tech Economy

Note: This brief quasi-book review/book synopsis is the first item in an experimental new section of SSTI’s newsletter, potentially joining other regular sections such as Useful Stats, Fed/Leg News, State News, Member Updates, and Recent Research. Its periodic continuation after the contributions we present over the summer will depend on feedback from our members and Digest readers. Comments may be shared with skinner @ ssti.org

Senate advances bill to reauthorize, expand EDA

By a bipartisan vote on Tuesday, the U.S. Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works approved legislation that would reauthorize the Economic Development Administration for the first time since 2004.

By a bipartisan vote on Tuesday, the U.S. Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works approved legislation that would reauthorize the Economic Development Administration for the first time since 2004. The bill amends the Public Works and Economic Development Act of 1965 and does not affect the technology-based economic development programs authorized through separate legislation that are administered by EDA.

NYC Launches Green Energy Action Plan

Leaders within the largest city in the United States, and one of the most influential in the world, recognize the daunting challenges resulting from New York City’s vulnerability to climate change—evidenced already in violent storms, flooding, and rising sea levels—as well as the economic opportunity that comes in combating the negative impacts of that change and reducing the city’s contributions to further temperature rise.