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Missouri Gov. Mike Parson last week announced that $1 million of the state’s CARES Act funding will be used to create a grant for nonprofit and university-based coworker and incubator facilities. The grant will be administered by the Missouri Technology Corporation (MTC). Organizations will be reimbursed with grant funds for expenses related to updating the facilities to encourage social distancing, adopting enhanced sanitation protocols or acquiring PPE to comply with the guidelines of the public health emergency.

The House has now passed 10 of the 12 annual appropriations bills for FY 2021. Within the total funding is support for key innovation priorities, including $35 million for EDA’s Build-to-Scale (i.e., Regional Innovation Strategies), $6 million for SBA’s innovation clusters program and $4 million for Federal and State Technology Partnerships (FAST). SSTI’s Innovation Advocacy Council had made expanding funding for each of these initiatives a priority for the year.

Just 10 percent of STEM faculty at four-year institutions are from underrepresented backgrounds, according to a new report by the Association of Public and Land-Grant Universities.

Banking regulators recently announced new rules, effective in October, that will allow banks to invest in venture capital funds. These arrangements had been barred by the “Volcker Rule,” which was put in place after over-leveraged banks caused a global financial crisis in 2008. A statement by the National Venture Capital Association praised the change and predicted a “significant impact on entrepreneurial capital formation … particularly in emerging ecosystems.”

COVID-19 is not just wreaking havoc across the national and global economies but is specifically causing that damage in a way that widens the existing fault lines between the “haves” and “have-nots.” Further, as countries and companies contemplate the possibility of managing operations alongside the new coronavirus, rather than an entirely “post-COVID” society, there is little reason to believe the worsening economic inequality will mend without specific intervention. The problem will not be easy to solve.

A new coalition funded by the Lumina Foundation and driven by manufacturing experts from across the country has formed to help solve the recruitment challenge and build a more racially inclusive future for manufacturing. The Urban Manufacturing Alliance teamed up with The Century Foundation to launch Industry and Inclusion 4.0.

Voters in Maine will consider a high-speed internet infrastructure bond issue on the July 14 ballot. The legislatively-referred measure would authorize $15 million in general obligation bonds for the Connect ME Authority to provide funding for high-speed internet infrastructure in unserved and underserved areas. The bond revenue would be used to match an estimated $30 million in federal, private, local and other funds.

The President’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology (PCAST) is recommending a set of bold actions to help ensure continued American leadership in Industries of the Future (IotF), comprising artificial intelligence (AI), quantum information science (QIS), advanced manufacturing, advanced communications, and biotechnology.

As discussion of innovation ecosystems remains near the front of science, technology, and innovation policy discussions — and resources are spent providing environments for creative exchange between researchers, industry, government, and entrepreneurs — substantive and empirical research is still lagging. However, a recent study sheds new light on the mechanisms and types of interactions that may contribute to the desired outcomes of promoting innovation ecosystems.

A new report released by the George W. Bush Institute has measured the impact that innovation research at U.S. universities and research institutions has had on the country’s economic development. The report, The Innovation Impact of U.S. Universities: Rankings and Policy Conclusions, examines and ranks institutions on four primary impact categories: commercialization, entrepreneurship, research, and teaching.

At a time when higher education is facing some of its greatest challenges, its value both for individuals and for states is reinforced through the findings of a recent working paper from the National Bureau of Economic Research. In “The Economic Impact of Access to Public Four-Year Colleges,” Jonathan Smith et al.

In an hours-long virtual workshop that could have covered days, the presidents of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine and leaders from government, academia, and publishing explored key questions the research enterprise must address to build a more effective and resilient 21st century research university. Facing challenges that may have long been present but have been exacerbated and accelerated by the COVID-19 crisis, the leaders began exploring questions that could help research universities rebound to a better place than the pre-pandemic status quo.

Exactly 21 years after the SSTI Weekly Digest ran its first story on the digital divide, a recent report by the Government Accountability Office confirms what inestimable studies before it have reported: access to broadband has expanded, but significant shortcomings in broadband still exist.

Faced with the sudden, unprecedented fallout from the COVID-19 pandemic, Gov. Ned Lamont last month launched a new resource to provide workers and businesses in Connecticut with career tools, including partnering with Indeed and workforce training providers.

The final wave of state career and technical education (CTE) plans have been approved under the new Perkins V Act, with innovation and workforce taking a front seat in the plans. Perkins V encourages states and territories to expand opportunities for every student to access educational opportunities that will put them on the path to success.

The Walton Family Charitable Support Foundation is making a $194.7 million grant to advance research and economic development at the University of Arkansas and will allow a new research institute to become reality. The grant is expected to grow the university’s cross-disciplinary research capability, expand the scope of discoveries made by U of A researchers and increase the speed in transferring such discoveries to the marketplace.

The Appalachian Regional Commission (ARC) announced $44.4 million in 54 awards to help expand and diversify the economy in Appalachia’s coal-impacted communities through the Partnerships for Opportunity and Workforce and Economic Revitalization (POWER) Initiative. One third (more than $14.6 million) of these investments will develop business incubators, increase access to capital, and provide other services to advance entrepreneurship in Kentucky, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Tennessee, and West Virginia.

If Americans are going to build better careers and share prosperity as technological changes occur, the U.S. will have to implement more comprehensive policies, according to an MIT task force’s preliminary report titled The Work of the Future: Shaping Technology and Institutions.

Last week Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Wolf issued an executive order directing the Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) to join the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative (RGGI), joining nine other Northeast and Mid-Atlantic states in a market-based collaboration to reduce greenhouse gas emissions from power plants and combat climate change. And in North Carolina, Gov.

NOTE: The nation's community of technology-based economic development organizations has entered the annual report season, and we've already seen several releases from SSTI members. All document TBED's impact on advancing research, moving it to market, and helping businesses improve their profitability and competitiveness.

Overall U.S. gross domestic product (GDP) has steadily increased over the past decade. However, the growth in the sectors which drive it has been uneven. Data from 2014 through 2023 reveals that sectoral contributions to private industry GDP have shifted from manufacturing (down 1.57 percentage points since 2014) and mining, quarrying, and oil and gas extraction (down 1.05), to professional and business services (up 0.85) and construction (up 0.72).

Wednesday, March 19, 3:00 pm EDT | Zoom
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By automating routine tasks, improving data analysis, and enhancing marketing efforts, AI can revolutionize how small firms conduct business—and that should impact the type of assistance technology-based economic developers offer their innovation-driven entrepreneurs. Understanding how small business owners perceive and utilize AI is crucial for developing strategies that support their growth and competitiveness. 

Since the inception of I-Corps, only 20% of participants have been women, according to the 2023 National Science Foundation I-Corps biennial program report.