SSTI Digest

Two of North Carolina's state-created non-profit science and technology centers announced new leaders last week. David Rizzo is the new president and chief executive officer of MCNC. and Leslie Alexandre will serve in the same position for the North Carolina Biotechnology Center.

Matthew McClorey is the new president and chief executive officer of Kansas Innovation Corp. McClorey formerly served as vice president for business development & portfolio management at KTEC, a position now filled by Michael Peck.

In honor of Independence Day, no SSTI Weekly Digest will be published July 5.

While tight state budgets have slowed the number of tech-based economic development programs being created by states, Kentucky and Oregon have both approved new laws designed to encourage the growth of technology companies.

Kentucky

Kentucky Governor Paul Patton has signed into law House Bill (HB) 525, economic development legislation, designed to attract high-tech, new economy companies to the state that provide high quality, high paying jobs. The legislation is designed to help Kentucky develop a business culture that promotes research and development and an entrepreneurial climate that allows new ideas to flourish.

Specifically, HB 525 does the following:

Publisher's Note: While more than 40 states are working to encourage the creation and growth of biotechnology companies, as we have said over the years, the U.S. is competing in a global economy. This is just as true in technology as in textiles. The fact that the recently concluded BIO annual conference was held in Toronto only underscores the point. Over the years, the SSTI Weekly Digest has featured selected international initiatives as a gentle reminder to policymakers that the U.S. is not alone in this effort. Below, we feature two European efforts focused on biotechnology.

A study released by the Beacon Hill Institute at Suffolk University in Boston is one of the more recent efforts to examine all aspects of U.S. states and their economies. Entitled State Competitiveness Report 2001, the study defines competitiveness as the ability to ensure and sustain a high level of per capita income and its continued growth.

The BHI report combines more than three dozen variables into nine subindexes: government and fiscal policy, institutions, infrastructure, human resources, technology, finance, openness, domestic competition and environmental policy. Using the nine subindexes, each of which represents an element of competitiveness, the authors made an overall index and ranked the states according to their overall competitiveness.

Among the study's key findings are:

Videoconferencing, videotelephony, Internet-based audio and video entertainment, local wireless data services and telecommuting — all are part of the "last mile" broadband services that Charles Ferguson assesses in a recent working paper for The Brookings Institution.

In The United States Broadband Problem: Analysis and Policy Recommendations, Ferguson argues that broadband services are hampered by a slow rate of deployment and technological progress. Monopolistic structure, entrenched management and political power of the incumbent local exchange carrier (ILEC) and cable television (CATV) sectors, he says, are principally responsible for the problem. Moreover, these industries are "worsened by major deficiencies in the policy and regulatory systems covering (them)."

The National Science Foundation has released a new set of statistical tables that show research and development (R&D) funding levels, reported by 31 federal agencies for the last three fiscal years.

Federal Funds for Research and Development: Fiscal Years 2000, 2001, and 2002 offers R&D totals in terms of both outlays and obligations. The R&D obligation data are categorized according to character of work (basic research, applied research, and development), performer, field of science or engineering (for research but not for development), and federal R&D funding by state. The report also shows obligations for research performance at colleges and universities by fields of science or engineering, and additional data is given for R&D plant.

Albuquerque, New Mexico

Tenants of the Sante Fe Business Incubator have seen their one-story building increase from 10,000 sq. ft. to 30,000 sq. ft., according to a story by the Albuquerque Journal. The expansion is part of a $2.5 million project funded by the federal Economic Development Administration (EDA), the Regional Development Corporation and other agencies.

Arizona

The U.S. Women's Chamber of Commerce has started the Women's Business Growth Leadership Council to help boost women owned business revenue in Arizona, the Business Journal in Phoenix reported. The group is designed to help women better obtain financing and procurement opportunities from the government and large corporations.

One of the most widely used barometers of states' relative positions in technology-based economies has been updated and expanded. The 2002 State New Economy Index: Benchmarking Economic Transformation in the States, published by the Progressive Policy Institute's Technology and New Economy Project (PPI) and released online this week, offers an innovation-oriented public policy framework for the states to foster success in the New Economy. States that overhaul traditional approaches to economic development and replace them with a new approach focused on boosting skills, entrepreneurship, technology and quality of life are best prepared to prosper in the New Economy, according to this new accounting of state economic transformation to the New Economy.

The results of Tuesday's primary election in Maine reveal the state's voters continue to be committed to improving their economy through technology-based economic development. Winning approval at the ballot was Question 2, allocating $35 million in bond revenues for 11 specific projects - a majority of which were tied directly to research and technology-based economic development.

Maine-based biomedical research institutions will receive $5.5 million to be used to obtain matching federal funds for health research to cure disease, other medical R&D, and to retain Maine graduates by providing quality Maine jobs.

Nine million dollars will be used to construct manufacturing centers at the University of Maine and the University of Southern Maine. The product development and support facilities will enable the institutions to help Maine industries to solve daily manufacturing and engineering problems.

The Illinois General Assembly has passed legislation to encourage venture capital investment in technology businesses across the state. HB3212 creates the Technology Development Fund, which permits the State Treasurer to use up to 1 percent of the state's total investment portfolio for equity investments through Illinois venture capital firms.

The Chicago Tribune reported last Friday that the total amount of state funds available for venture capital investment will be as much as $60 million.

Eligible Illinois venture capital funds to receive monies from the new Technology Development Fund must use the state funds to place investments in technology businesses seeking to locate, expand, or remain in Illinois.