NIST has released a plan to make its scientific data and publications more readily available and accessible, following a memo from the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP) instructing all government agencies to do so.

If a recent forecast from McKinsey & Company is correct, climate change isn’t the only rough ride ahead over the next decade for regional and national economies.

The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) has reduced its funding for the Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) and Small Business Technology Transfer (STTR) programs. The cut at the Office of Science—the agency’s primary program administrator—appears to be about 35%. The change resulted from congressional direction that the agency had miscalculated its SBIR set-aside and is intended to make the Office of Science’s calculation more consistent with that of the other programs in DOE.

Did you use the Recompete Mapping Tool to check your eligibility for this new EDA funding opportunity when the fact sheet and map were first released? If you did, and you got the response, “Contact your local economic development office” don’t stop there! EDA has updated its mapping tool in the past few days to reflect significant flexibility in program eligibility.

As states continue to grapple with the effects of low unemployment and a tight labor market, lawmakers and workforce development organizations also continue to explore how to increase labor participation among nontraditional or marginalized workers – including several states which relaxed child labor laws during this year’s legislative sessions – to address areas or sectors that are experiencing workforce shortages.

In a recent installment of SSTI’s federal funding video series, SSTI program director Jerry Coughter conducted a two-part interview with Amanda Kosty, management and program analyst with the Economic Development Administration’s Office of Innovation and Entrepreneurship.

The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE), U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) and the Hollings Manufacturing Extension Partnership (MEP) have all made recent announcements on new funding provided either through the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law or the CHIPS and Science Act. DoE is accepting applications for an $80 million program focused on benefiting small and medium-sized manufacturing firms. USDA and MEP announced more than 170 awards to expand innovative uses of wood and to address supply chain issues.

On May 30, 2023, FCC released a broadband map that had been updated to reflect states' challenges to the availability data for more than 4 million locations throughout the U.S. Seventy-five percent of those challenges had been resolved in the new map. The new map reflected a net increase of more than one million new serviceable locations that had not appeared on the previous map.

The Distressed Area Recompete Pilot Program (Recompete Pilot Program)—authorized by the CHIPS and Science Act— will invest $200 million toward interventions that spur economic activity in geographically diverse and persistently distressed communities nationwide. The program will support economic revitalization in distressed communities across the country.

The House and Senate are working toward FY 2024 appropriations, but not even a negotiated agreement has kept the chambers moving in the same direction. Today, the Senate appropriations committee directed its subcommittees to produce bills that align with the slight reduction in non-defense spending agreed to in the debt ceiling agreement reached earlier this month.

The U.S.

The U.S.

Connecticut Governor Ned Lamont has signed into law a bill that establishes a green jobs corps program. This program will identify a talent development strategy for communities to address the impacts of climate change and reduce carbon emissions. The bill includes several provisions to accomplish those goals and a plan to market and recruit these jobs to individuals, especially from underrepresented populations.

SSTI’s Annual Conference is in Atlanta this Sept. 6-8. The event will feature numerous opportunities to connect with your peers from across the country who are working to strengthen their regional innovation economies through roundtables focused on specific areas of practice and workshops on communications, building stronger organizations, and diversity, equity, and inclusion. The entire conference is available for a registration fee of just $390.

The Senate appropriations committee advanced a set of FY 2024 funding bills this morning that largely continue level funding from FY 2023.

The National Science Foundation (NSF) is expanding a network of research centers across the country to translate university-based R&D into new, and hopefully, better advanced materials. In late June, NSF announced the distribution of $162 million to support the creation of nine more Materials Research Science & Engineering Centers (MRSECs), bringing the total number of centers to twenty. Each of the new centers will receive $18 million over six years.

The Economic Development Administration (EDA) has updated its Comprehensive Economic Development Strategy (CEDS) Content Guidelines, effective April 2023. CEDS are strategy-driven plans for economic development prepared through a regionally owned planning process.

Over the last month, the Department of Energy (DOE), National Science Foundation (NSF), and National Institute of Standards and Technology 

Over the past two decades, business has done most of the heavy lifting for research and development (R&D) funding. Calculated in the dollar value of 2012, business funding increased from $10.4 billion in 2000 to an estimated $36.0 billion in 2021.

The National Center for Science and Engineering Statistics (NCSES) keeps track of these types of statistics, and the above data is from Business Sector Increases Funding for Basic Research, one of three InfoCharts released last month.

On June 14, 2023, NSF announced 34 semifinalists for the first-ever NSF Regional Innovation Engines (NSF Engines) competition. The NSF Engines will be led by universities, nonprofits, businesses, and other organizations from across U.S. states and territories. Each NSF Engine could receive up to $160 million over 10 years; actual amounts will be subject to a given NSF Engine's status and overall progress, as assessed annually.

A previous Digest article gave a broad overview of the most recent survey of Higher Education Research and Development (HERD) for FY 2021 (the most recent data available), including a breakdown of what field of studies receive the most R&D funding.

Microbusinesses (businesses with 1-9 domestic employees) spent $7.5 billion in both domestic and foreign R&D expenditures or costs in 2020, of which $6.7 billion was in the U.S. Of this total, $5.6 billion was performed by microbusinesses themselves, according to the National Center for Science and Engineering Statistics (NCSES) and data from the Annual Business Survey (ABS). The $5.6 billion performed by U.S.

Five SSTI member organizations — Conductor, Nebraska Business Development Center, University of Louisville, University of South Alabama, and Verge — were awarded micro grants by SSTI to host policy meetings with state and local officials in their regions about the needs of innovation-driven entrepreneurs. The awards were made possible thanks to a project with the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation. In total, the seven meetings held by these groups connected dozens of entrepreneurs and support organizations with federal, state and local elected officials, program administrators and staff.

Last fall, the United States International Trade Commission (USITC) issued its report on the distributional effects of trade and trade policy on under-represented and under-served communities. The report, which had been requested in 2021 by the U.S. Trade Representative Ambassador Katherine Tai, found a disparity in wage and employment among manufacturing workers by race and gender resulting from changes in trade policy.

The South Carolina Research Authority (SCRA) had an economic impact of over $1.15 billion in FY 2022, through follow-on funding, grants awarded, investments made by affiliate SC Launch Inc, job support and more,  according to their annual report. This total is an increase of almost 15% from their economic impact in FY 2021. The report was compiled by SCRA with assistance on the economic impacts provided by the University of South Carolina Darla Moore School of Business.