SSTI Digest

Carl Russell has resigned as president and CEO of Tucson Technology Incubator Inc. Bo Statham, a consultant to UniSource Energy Corp. on new business development and a client adviser at the incubator, has been named interim president.

Dr. Melvyn Schiavelli, senior program officer for the Harrisburg Polytechnic Development Corporation, has been named acting president and CEO, succeeding Dr. Charles Clevenger.

Lt. Gov. Gary Sherrer has left his position as secretary of the Kansas Department of Commerce and Housing to become executive vice president with GoldBanc Corp. Sherry Brown, who had retired from the department, will return to serve as interim secretary.

The National Science Foundation (NSF) recently announced 24 awards under the new Math and Science Partnership (MSP) Program — an anticipated investment of $240 million over five years in projects to improve the achievement of K-12 students in science and mathematics. The Department of Education is an NSF partner in this effort, co-funding two projects involving state education agencies. Seven comprehensive MSP awards total about $147 million over five years and will affect about 1.8 million students in 11 states. Seventeen targeted partnership grants, which are intended to improve achievement in specific disciplines or grade ranges, total about $90 million over five years and will affect about 200 school districts and some 600,000 pre-K through grade 12 students in 11 states. Also, 12 smaller awards for capacity building projects will focus on research, evaluation and technical assistance for the MSP Learning Network. Through this vehicle, researchers and practitioners in MSP and other related projects will unite in a national effort to further develop understanding of how students best learn mathematics…

Innovation Philadelphia (IP), the public-private partnership dedicated to enhancing the global innovation economy of Philadelphia through technological leadership, received on Monday a $442,500 investment from the U.S. Department of Commerce's Economic Development Administration. With a goal of developing a coordinated technology-based, cluster-driven, economic development strategy for the Greater Philadelphia Region, the investment will support a series of studies of the Knowledge Economy that will focus on new approaches, relationships, methods and technologies, including: cluster analysis, innovation diagnostics, nanotechnology and life science research and workforce development, university and industry technology consortium, angel investment, and knowledge partnership for student engagement and retention. "This investment from EDA will allow us to amplify the forward momentum of the regional knowledge economy," said Richard Bendis, President and CEO of Innovation Philadelphia, in a press statement. "It also demonstrates the increased access to federal funding that is one of IP's…

Universities and the investment they pour into R&D are "major factors" that contribute to a region's economic growth, concludes a recent report funded by the Ewing Marion Kaufman Foundation, NCOE and the U.S. Small Business Administration (SBA). The report's results show the growth occurs in less time than traditionally has been noted and that small firms innovate at a rate almost twice that of large firms. Building on Joseph Schumpeter's "creative destruction" concept and previous research, The Influence of R&D Expenditures on New Firm Formation and Economic Growth seeks to answer two questions: 1) do R&D activities at research universities have a significant effect on local new firm formations? and 2) do R&D activities as research universities have a significant effect on local economic growth? Creative destruction, the authors say, takes place when "newly formed independently owned firms commercialize inventions that increase overall demand thereby causing economic growth... ." Existing market structures consequently are destroyed, and the market's remaining firms experience a…

The continuing layoffs of thousands of workers, particularly in the information and communication tech sectors, creates significant hardships for the affected local and regional economies. For instance, a recent Federal Reserve Bank report noted office vacancy rates in Silicon Valley hovering around 40 percent. Fortunately, highly skilled labor does not tend to stay unemployed too long. If these people cannot find work, they make it by launching their own innovative businesses. The tech-based economic development community can do a lot to encourage tech firm start-ups in a down economy.  Understanding the entrepreneurial mindset, explored from two different perspectives in the following papers, is critical for ensuring support programs address the entrepreneurs' needs. Survey Finds Entrepreneurial Energy Among Minnesota’s Dislocated Workers An intriguing potential source of new entrepreneurial energy seems to exist among recently laid off workers, according to a recent report by the Minnesota Department of Trade and Economic Development (DTED). The report,…

Leslie McGranahan, in Unprepared for Boom or Bust: Understanding the Current State Fiscal Crisis, highlights the problems that are inherent in state policy when dealing with the cyclical behavior of the economy. The article released in the 2002 3rd quarter edition of Economic Perspectives, a publication of the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago, identifies the common problem of states cutting taxes and increasing expenditures during boom times only to be faced with revenue shortfalls during recessions. When revenues are reduced, states are forced to cut government services when they are needed most and increase taxes when taxpayers are the poorest. McGranahan identifies various reasons for the increased revenues during the boom period of the 1990s, including increased sales tax revenue from increased consumer spending, increase in revenue from taxes on capital gains and dividends, the influx of tobacco settlement money and decreases in spending on welfare programs as they have been restructured among various other reasons for enhanced revenues. While revenues were increasing, state spending was…

NASA has announced the Langley Research Center in Hampton, VA, will team with the National Institute of Aerospace Associates (NIAA), Reston, VA, to create the National Institute of Aerospace (NIA) to perform aerospace and atmospheric research, develop new technologies for the nation and help inspire the next generation of scientists and engineers. Locating the NIA at the Langley Research Center will facilitate the institute's involvement in agency sponsored research programs and foster collaboration with NASA, including access to its research facilities. This government-academic partnership is comprised of a cost reimbursable, indefinite delivery/indefinite quantity contract and a cooperative agreement. The maximum value of the contract for a five-year base period is $49 million. The value of the basic five-year cooperative agreement is $69 million. If the three five-year options are exercised under the cooperative agreement, the combined potential total value would be $379 million. NIAA is made up of seven non-profit organizations or universities including: American…

The Association of American Universities has posted the text of a September 17 letter written by Rita Colwell, Director of the National Science Foundation (NSF), that outlines the Bush Administration's opposition to S. 2817, a bill to double the size of the NSF budget over a five-year period. A similar effort has been introduced in the House by Science Committee Chairman Sherwood Boehlert (R-NY) and co-sponsored by members of both parties (see May 10, 2002 SSTI Weekly Digest). The Colwell letter was sent to Senator Ron Wyden (D-OR), chair of the Subcommittee on Science, Technology, and Space, Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation. In it, Director Colwell states: "[T]he amounts authorized in S. 2817 do not conform to the Administration's FY 2003 Budget request for NSF. NSF supports the Administration's budget request and therefore the bill should be amended to reflect the amounts contained in the authorizing legislation the Foundation transmitted to the Congress on May 14, 2002. Moreover, Dr. John Marburger, Director of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP)…

The future of Virginia's Center for Innovative Technology (CIT) became clearer on Wednesday with Governor Mark Warner's release of Commonwealth of Virginia Strategic Plan for Technology for 2002-2006. CIT has a lead position for half of the eight initiatives outlined in the 129-page document. Highlights of "One Virginia," CIT's portion of the plan, call for: Increasing federal research and development funding to industry and Virginia’s colleges and universities. The plan recommends 75 Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) proposals be submitted in March 2003 to increase Virginia's level of SBIR funding by 1 percent of the national total. Milestones also are set for more Advanced Technology Program funding in 2004. Increasing commercialization of intellectual property (IP) from Virginia’s labs, entrepreneurs, and institutions of higher education. The plan suggests publishing a guidebook of best practices and making university and laboratory IP easily accessible to interested companies by augmenting the marketing process through training and electronic channels.…

Following President Bush's call for the nation to "be aggressive about the deployment of broadband," the Technology Administration within the U.S. Department of Commerce recently issued Understanding Broadband Demand — a 25-page paper examining the state of broadband demand and usage in the U.S. and identifying successes, challenges and actions to promote more aggressive uptake. After several expert roundtables, TA concluded that, while significant supply side issues such as regulatory considerations remain, "(T)he factor most likely to accelerate broadband demand is the creation and deployment of easily understood, value-adding business and consumer applications at prices that meet the needs of the market." TA points to December 2001 research that reveals the U.S. ranked sixth internationally in the percentage of total households with broadband usage at 10.4 percent. South Korea led the world with 51.7 percent, followed by Hong Kong (26.0 percent), Canada (19.7 percent), Taiwan (18.2 percent) and Sweden (13.4 percent). Broadband usage and demand is heavily skewed toward higher…