The Small Business Innovation Research Program Challenges and Opportunities (1999) / Chapter Skim
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I. Preface
I. Preface
Pages 1-12
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For example, in 1798, the federal government laid the foundation for the first machine tool industry with a contract to the inventor, Eli Whitney, for interchangeable musket parts.) A few decades later, in 1842, a hesitant Congress appropriated funds to demonstrate the feasibility of Samuel Morse's telegraphy Both men fostered significant innovations which led to whole new industnes.
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At the industrial level, there were "major collaborative initiatives in pharmaceutical manufactunng, petrochemicals, synthetic rubber, and atomic weapons."4 An impressive array of weapons based on new technologies was developed during the war, ranging from radar and improved aircraft, to missiles and, not least, the atomic bomb. The government also played a central role in the creation of the first electronic digital computer, the ENIAC.5 Following the war, the federal government began to fund basic research at universities on a significant scale, first through the Office of Naval Research and later through the National Science Foundation.6 Dunng the Cold War, the United States continued to emphasize technological superiority as a means of ensuring U.S.
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Innovators are able to take advantage of the tacit knowledge available in such centers to address technology and other business development issues.~° In addition, some economists have suggested limitations to traditional trade theory, particularly with respect to the reality of imperfect international competi 7 For an excellent review of the role of government support in nurturing the computer industry, see National Research Council, Funding a Revolution: Government Support for Computing Research, National Academies Press, Washington, D.C., 1999. ~ David B
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Accordingly, these topics were taken up by STEP in a study earned out in conjunction with the Hamburg Institute for Economic Research and the Institute for World Economics in Kiel which produced the 1996 report, Conflict and Cooperation in National Competition for High-Technology Industry. One of the principal recommendations for further work emerging from that study was a call for an analysis of the principles of effective cooperation in technology development, to include lessons from national and international consortia, including eligibility standards and assessments of what new cooperative mechanisms might be developed to meet the challenges of international cooperation in high-technology products.~3 In many high-technology industnes, the burgeoning development costs for new technologies, the dispersal of technological expertise, and the growing importance of regulatory and environmental issues have provided powerful incentives for public-pnvate cooperation.
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.~6 The rapid expansion of these cooperative programs encountered significant opposition, rekindling the national debate on the appropriate role of the government in fostering new technologies. Indeed, broader philosophical questions about the appropriate role for government in collaborating with industry have tended to obscure the need for policy makers to draw lessons from current and previous collaborative efforts.
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21 Cohen and Noll stress that political capture by distributive congressional politics and industrial interests are one of the principal risks for government-supported commercialization projects. In cases such as the Supersonic Transport project, they extensively document the disconnect between declining technical feasibility and increasing political support (see op.cit., p.
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They can be classified in a number of ways, such as by the economic objective of the partnership, that is, to leverage the social benefits associated with federal R&D activity, to enhance the position of a national industry, or to deploy industrial R&D to meet military or other government missions.27 The program taken up in this symposium, the Small Business Innovation Research Program (SBIR) , falls under the latter category.
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A1though these individuals have provided constructive comments and suggestions, it must be emphasized that responsibility for the final content of this report rests entirely with the STEP Board and the NRC. 28 Other volumes in this series include a companion volume on SBIR entitled The Small Business Innovation Research Program: An Assessment of DoD's Fast Track Initiative, National Academy Press, Washington, D.C., 1999; A Review of the Sandia Science and Technology Park Initiative.
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From page 11... ...
PREFACE 11 Given the quality and number of presentations at this symposium, summarizing the proceedings was a challenge. Every effort was made to capture the main points made during presentations and ensuing discussions, within the constraints imposed by the nature of a symposium summary.
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