West Virginia Creates ED/Tech Centers, Limits CAPCOS

Wrapping up its 2003 session earlier this month, the West Virginia State Legislature passed three bills designed to help build a technology-based economy.

• Senate Bill 646 calls for the creation of university-affiliated centers for economic development and technology advancement to support industry/academic R&D partnerships and technology commercialization. One nonprofit center is to be established in association with each of the state's doctoral institutions. Center activities may include: evaluation of technology; verification and assessment of market applications; grant administration and human resource management for any entity associated with the doctoral institution if the entity is engaged in business-industry collaborations; and, technology advancement, commercialization activities and research into new areas of economic development. The centers have the right to receive, lease and sell real, personal and intellectual property.
• Senate Bill 651 creates the West Virginia Academy of Science and Technology to support R&D, assist in the transfer of technological innovations and discoveries to public and private enterprises, and facilitate the commercialization of intellectual property. Led by a Governor-appointed council and a volunteer executive director, the academy is charged to 1) conduct informed analysis of the status of science and technology research, development and commercialization capabilities, infrastructure and activities within West Virginia, and development of innovative options that build upon and expand them with the goal of increasing the gross state product; 2) coordinate efforts to attract private and federal assistance for R&D and commercialization in those fields most likely to maximize the gross state product; 3) increase collaboration among all of the federal, state and private R&D and technology commercialization organizations in the state; 4) strengthen the leadership and support of the West Virginia Experimental Program to Stimulate Competitive Research (EPSCoR); and, 5) provide leadership in science and technology policy.
• Senate Bill 657 lowers the total amount of tax credits available for venture capital investments through certified capital companies (CAPCOs) and makes a portion of the venture capital company tax credit available to investors in the new economic development and technology advancement centers (created in S.B. 646). The total credits available to each CAPCO is limited to $2 million; the total credit limit for each new economic development and technology advancement center is $1 million. The total exposure for the state is set at $10 million each fiscal year, although the FY 2003 combined credit limit may not exceed $3 million because of the state's current revenue forecasts.

Copies of each act are available at: http://www.legis.state.wv.us/