Research funding levels, with the exception of $150 million in Congressional earmarks, remain relatively flat between FY 2001 appropriations and the President's FY 2002 request. Economic development and Digital Divide programs, on the other hand, take several hits. Selected agency program highlights include:
The Bush Administration's first budget request offers a mixed bag for state, local, and non-profit practitioners and policymakers in tech-based economic development. In research categories, the budget reflects the Administration's research emphasis in defense, biotechnology, and life sciences. The budget also reorganizes the nation's energy research priorities. Most other research categories were held at FY 2001 funding levels or received modest increases or cuts.
Pennsylvania Governor Tom Ridge has promoted Tim McNulty to the new position of Deputy Chief of Staff for Technology Initiatives.
After seven years of serving as the first president of the Connecticut Technology Council, Laura Kent is resigning her position at the end of June. The Council now boasts over 400 members.
The Vermont Economic Progress Council has named Fred Kenney as Executive Director. VEPC is the nine-member panel established in 1994 with members appointed by the Governor to provide long-term economic policy planning. In 1998 it was given the responsibility of implementing the Economic Advancement Tax Incentives Act and reviewing applications for tax incentives.
Joe Alviani has resigned as Executive Director of the Massachusetts Technology Collaborative to accept a position in the private sector. MTC Executive Vice President Philip Holahan is serving as Interim Executive Director.
Joe Alviani has resigned as Executive Director of the Massachusetts Technology Collaborative to accept a position in the private sector. MTC Executive Vice President Philip Holahan is serving as Interim Executive Director.
The Best Practices program in the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD), which for the past five years has highlighted and honored hundreds of varied and effective approaches to community development, has been discontinued. The program publications, website and annual conference provided state and local economic development efforts easy access to information and contacts for successful practices worthy of emulation.
Due to a number of requests from SSTI Weekly Digest readers, we have prepared the accompanying table presenting the 1998 "R&D Intensity" rankings for all 50 states and the District of Columbia. R&D Intensity is considered a state's total R&D performance as a percentage of the Gross State Product.
Ben Franklin Technology Partners. Pittsburgh Technology Council. Industrial Resource Centers. Tech 21. Pittsburgh Digital Greenhouse.
On Wednesday, South Carolina Governor Jim Hodges announced the appointment of a 38-member Steering Committee of the Technology Transition Team. The group, chaired by the president of the South Carolina operations of BellSouth, consists of business leaders, technology entrepreneurs, financial executives, research university leaders, and government representatives. Technology Transition Team responsibilities include:
Offering an assessment of the progress made by the nation's 50 largest metropolitan areas toward becoming high-tech communities as well as providing policy recommendations to help cultivate and encourage New Economy businesses, the Progressive Policy Institute (PPI) and Case Western Reserve University's Center for Regional Economic Issues yesterday released The Metropolitan New Economy Index: Benchmarking Economic Transformation in the Nation's Metropolitan Areas.
Long-held opinions are hard to change. The state of the US manufacturing sector is a good example. Many people, particularly those in the Northeast and Midwest, hold tightly to memories of mass layoffs and factory closings nearly 20 years ago.
Legislation for the Technology Education and Training Act, introduced earlier this week by a bipartisan group of six Senators, calls for the creation of a income tax credit for businesses to offset information technology training expenses of their workers and trainees. The credit would be equal to 100 percent of the first $1,500 a business spends to train an individual worker.
The Small Business Administration (SBA) will distribute up to $3.4 million for small technology business development efforts across as many as 30 states through the first Federal and State Technology Partnership (FAST) request for proposals, released online Tuesday. Proposals are due Thursday, June 7, 2001. Individual state awards will range from $100,000 - $150,000.
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.
Using survey responses and a weighted index for caliber of students, curriculum, faculty, support for students, and overall program, Success Magazine has identified what it believes are the best 50 business schools for entrepreneurial education. The top honors are not necessarily the business schools that immediately jump to mind for most people.
With ten firms, Chicago leaders win bragging rights for being called home by the greatest number of Inc. magazine's "Inner City 100," the fastest growing urban businesses. In fact, six of the top 50 companies were from the Windy City.
Five businesses from Buffalo won inclusion in the magazine's list, earning the New York city the unofficial title as the second most popular home. Pittsburgh, Cleveland, and Oakland, CA each had four companies on the list.
U.S. companies originally backed by venture capital created 4.3 million new jobs last year according to a new economic impact study released this week by the National Venture Capital Association (NVCA). Those companies generated $736 billion in revenues in the year 2000 and, according to the study, venture capital-backed businesses represented 3.3% of the nation's total jobs and 7.4% of Gross Domestic Product in 2000.
A wide range of research and tech-based economic development bills were approved by the Arkansas legislature, which ended its legislative session in mid-April. With proposals and support coming both from Republican Governor Huckabee and the heavily Democratic legislature, Arkansas is the latest state to demonstrate broad bipartisan support for investing in science and technology.
Venture capital (VC) investments for the first quarter of 2001 totaled $10.1 billion, a staggering 40 percent less than the previous quarter, according to the latest Moneytree™ survey prepared by PricewaterhouseCoopers in partnership with VentureOne. Although VC investment now has declined steadily in each of the four quarters since the peak in the first quarter of 2000, the latest results mark the greatest quarter-to-quarter decrease in absolute dollar terms since the survey started.
SSTI welcomes Mark Kish to the staff as our new Writer/PR Assistant. Mark will assist with the SSTI Weekly Digest, updating and expanding our website, and planning for our September 19-21 annual conference.
Christopher Anderson has been promoted to become president of the Massachusetts High Technology Council. Prior to his appointment, Mr. Anderson served as vice president and general counsel to the organization.
Ann Rydalch has been elected to serve as chair of the Federal Laboratory Consortium for Technology Transfer. Ms. Rydalch works for at the Idaho National Engineering & Environmental Lab. Outgoing chair C. Dan Brand will be retiring this summer.