dept of commerce

The National Institute for Standards and Technology (NIST) Manufacturing Extension Partnership (MEP) program recently awarded $2.5 million for five pilot projects to improve small U.S. manufacturers' supply chain competitiveness and foster their readiness to adopt advanced technologies. The projects will be led by MEP centers and bring together teams of experts in specific technology areas. MEP centers in California, Georgia, Oregon, Texas and Wisconsin each will receive approximately $500,000 for the pilot efforts, which, in most cases, involve partners in other states. Read the announcement…

Enacted FY14 funding is used for comparisons unless otherwise noted.

The FY14 Omnibus Appropriations bill, which the U.S. House of Representatives passed yesterday and the U.S. Senate is expected to pass on Friday, contains $10 million for the Regional Innovation program in the U.S. Department of Commerce’s budget. This is the first time the grant portion of the program was directly funded.  The program was authorized in the America COMPETES Act of 2010 and establishes the program “to encourage and support the development of regional innovation strategies, including regional innovation clusters and science and research parks.”

The U.S. Economic Development Administration (EDA) has announced a new competition to reward communities demonstrating best practices in attracting and expanding manufacturing. EDA will offer the competition as part of its Investing in Manufacturing Communities Partnership (IMCP), which helps support comprehensive, integrated efforts to boost manufacturing and jobs. EDA plans to publish a Federal Register notice on Tuesday, December 10, seeking applications for regions to be designated one of up to 12 manufacturing communities. The communities will be eligible for an array of cross-agency federal assistance totaling $1.3 billion. More information on the IMCP next Tuesday...

Fresh off a nationwide listening tour and against the backdrop of 1776, a global hub for startups in Washington, D.C., U.S. Secretary of Commerce Penny Pritzker unveiled the department's strategic vision and priorities focused on three key areas: trade, innovation and data. Pritzker said her department will make sure businesses have a strong voice when it comes to strengthening the digital economy by working to protect intellectual property, ensuring robust cybersecurity infrastructure and championing free and open Internet. In the coming months, Commerce will develop a coordinated approach to those policies that affect businesses.

A recent report from the U.S. Department of Commerce highlights university programs across the country working to facilitate student and faculty entrepreneurship as part of a larger federal effort to improve tech transfer activities and external partnerships. Information was collected from the leaders of 131 research universities to understand what universities are doing programmatically and strategically to nurture innovation, commercialization and entrepreneurship. Examples range from universities experimenting with on-campus accelerators, entrepreneurial dorms and student venture funds to tech transfer offices that focus on identifying and supporting entrepreneurship on campus. Universities also are increasingly partnering with companies to offer internships and shared facilities. Read the report...

Commerce Secretary Penny Pritzker recently announced the first ten winners of the Make It in America Challenge, which provides grants to accelerate regional job creation and encourage business investment. Grantees will receive a total of $20.5 million for projects supporting regional economic development, advanced skills training, greater supply chain access and other projects. Funding for this round of awards is provided by the Economic Development Administration, the Labor Department's Employment and Training Administration, and the Delta Regional Authority. The National Institute of Standards and Technology Manufacturing Extension Partnership will sponsor another round in early FY14. Read the announcement and list of winners...

Small businesses often are surrounded by a myriad resources and potential partners that could help leverage their products and services to innovate and grow, but they are not always aware of how to access them. In order to remedy this lack of strong regional networks, the Obama administration has attempted to connect existing businesses, institutions of higher education, economic development organizations, investors, small businesses, and startups to create regional clusters that stimulate economic growth through the Small Business Administration (SBA) and the Economic Development Administration (EDA) regional cluster initiatives. The EDA and SBA have led a total of 50 pilot programs around the nation thus far. A commissioned study of the first two years of the SBA's 10 pilot cluster initiatives in which the agency invested $1 million toward regional industries and advanced defense technologies found a significant correlation between these initiatives and economic growth.

Last week, the Obama administration announced that it would commit $200 million to establish three new manufacturing innovation institutions in 2013 (see the May 8, 2013 issue of the digest). The announcement was followed by the release of a funding announcement for the first of those proposed institutes — the Department of Energy-administered Clean Energy Manufacturing Innovation Institute. The Department of Defense released requests for information on the two proposed institutes focused on digital manufacturing and design and lightweight and modern metals manufacturing. The Economic Development Administration (EDA) also released a funding announcement for the Investing in Manufacturing Communities Partnership (see the April 24, 2013 issue of the Digest).