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In a recent ruling, a U.S. Federal Court of Appeals panel upheld the preliminary injunction against the Fearless Fund, preventing the organization from resuming operations of its Fearless Strivers Grant Contest, which awards winners with a cash prize and access to mentorship and business support services. Following on the heels of the U.S.

Led by increases in retail trade and professional, scientific, and technical services, the number of annual business applications nationwide has increased 119%, or nearly three million, from 2005 to 2023. However, the share of applications classified as high-propensity, or those more likely to result in businesses with a payroll, has decreased in all but the health care and social assistance sector, leading to a 26-percent point drop (58% to 32%) over the same period.

In SSTI’s recent TBED Community of Practice webinar, representatives from SourceLink and EcoMap Technologies shared practical insights on how ecosystem mapping supports both entrepreneurship and regional economic development.

Two weeks ago, I let the SSTI Board of Trustees know that I wanted to step down as President & CEO and that a search for a successor be launched. After leading the organization since its inception in 1996, I had come to the conclusion now was the right time for a new chapter both for SSTI and for me.

SSTI, a national nonprofit organization focused on strengthening initiatives to create a better future through science, technology, innovation and entrepreneurship, seeks a President & CEO, who will work with the SSTI Board of Trustees and staff to set the vision and direction for the organization.

Business applications have greatly increased over the last two decades, jumping 119% from 2005 to 2023. However, the rate of high-propensity business applications—applications identified by the Census Bureau as having higher likelihoods of turning into businesses with payroll—have decreased as a share of all applications every year since 2005, despite having grown 22% over the same period.

Ben Franklin Technology Partners, a technology-based economic development program serving all 67 Pennsylvania counties, reported in its 2023 Annual Statewide Impact Report that, since its inception more than 40 years ago, it has boosted Pennsylvania’s economy by more than $30 billion, generating more than 58,000 jobs in client firms plus an additional 101,000 spinoff positions, for a total of 159,000 new jobs that otherwise would never have existed.

The Rural Partners Network, an all-of-government program that helps rural communities find resources and funding to create jobs, build infrastructure, and support long-term economic stability, is asking the public to nominate rural innovators who are positively impacting their rural communities. Individuals of all ages, including youth, are eligible.

This article, including the downloadable data sheet, visuals, and analysis, was updated on July 10th, 2024, to include new data from Treasury’s SSBCI Capital Program Summaries.

This article was edited on April 4th, 2024, to correct for an error in, and add to, the original data. Refer to the note at the bottom of this article for more detail.

Why the U.S. Economy Needs More Consolidation, Not Less, a recent paper from the Information Technology & Innovation Foundation (ITIF), explains from an economics perspective the advantages of scale economy for improving an industry’s overall efficiency and productivity. Not all industries see significant economies of scale as firms grow, ITIF research points out.

SSTI has released a new video in our Federal Funding Video Library featuring Trent Thompson, economic development representative with the Economic Development Administration’s Denver Regional Office. In this interview, we discuss how EDA’s Economic Adjustment Assistance (EAA) funds can be leveraged to support technology-based economic development (TBED) activities.

The Securities and Exchange Commission is seeking candidates to fill a limited number of vacancies on the agency’s Small Business Capital Formation Advisory Committee, which provides advice and recommendations to the Commission on rules, regulations, and policy matters relating to small businesses.

The committee advises and consults with the Commission on rules, regulations, and policies as they relate to:

Registration is now open for the SSTI 2024 Annual Conference in Phoenix, December 10-12, at the Sheraton Grand at Wild Horse Pass, located in the Gila River Indian Community.

Join us to experience thought-provoking keynotes, open forums, and ample discussion so that you can share your perspective with peers and have your questions answered by policymakers and practitioners—all looking to exchange ideas on creating a better future through science, technology, innovation, and entrepreneurship.

On Wednesday, a bipartisan group of senators published Driving U.S. Innovation in Artificial Intelligence: A Roadmap for Artificial Intelligence Policy in the United States Senate. The roadmap encourages the executive branch and the Senate Appropriations Committee to reach the $32 billion per year non-defense AI innovation spending level proposed by the National Security Commission on Artificial Intelligence.

Accelerators are practically everywhere in the U.S., and a look at Pitchbook data on May 13, 2024, seems to confirm that. For the five years of 2019-2023, Pitchbook tagged 18,808 different companies as having received “accelerator/incubator funding.” Conceptually, they were all startups when they received that funding and will be at widely varying degrees of evolution today (the status for 1,730 of them, for instance, was listed as “out of business”). Only 765 were classified as being one of four statuses that might be most easily considered as positive exits:  1. publicly held; 2.

While the headline above may be one of the most boring written in the SSTI Weekly Digest’s history, any recipient of federal grant funding should be aware that changes are coming to the Uniform Grants Guidance that governs federal grants, effective October 1. The guidance “sets the foundational requirements for agencies in making grants and providing other forms of Federal financial assistance, such as cooperative agreements and loans,” according to the White House. The changes will apply only to awards after October 1.

This month, 65 Fellows will begin their two-and-a-half-year field placements with host organizations nationwide as part of the Economic Recovery Corps (ERC) funded by the Economic Development Administration. Fellows will spearhead projects that, according to according to an International Economic Development Council (IEDC) press release, "advance new ways of doing economic development to build more resilient, inclusive, and equitable economies." The 65 selected projects are located across 44 states and territories.

The National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) has issued a Notice of Funding Opportunity (NOFO) seeking proposals to establish and operate a CHIPS Manufacturing USA institute focused on digital twins for the semiconductor industry. The CHIPS for America Program anticipates up to approximately $285 million in funding will be awarded to the institute.

New House appropriations committee chair Tom Cole (R-OK) has announced a rule that nonprofits are not eligible for “community project funding” (i.e., earmarks) from the Department of Housing and Urban Development’s Economic Development Initiative in the FY 2025 appropriations bill.

In the 21st century, some high-tech firms in emerging fields are valued more for their perceived innovation potential than by traditional measures of a successful business. But how does innovation influence the value of existing publicly traded firms?

United States venture capital activity not unexpectedly slowed down in 2023, cooling off after multiple years of record-high deals and values during 2021 and 2022, according to the PitchBook-NVCS Venture Monitor Q4 2023. Pitchbook-NVCS estimates a total deal count of 15,766 (13,608 actual + 2,158 estimated) for 2023– exceeding the values of 2020 and prior years but falling several thousand short of the last two years.

“Inclusive clusters have an explicit focus on equity, have identified the precise issues that lead to economic disparities in the cluster and have targeted strategies in place to shrink those disparities,” say the authors of Developing Inclusive Clusters, a recent Insight Report from the New Growth Innovation Network (NGIN) and RTI International.