WASHINGTON NEWS
FROM THE FEDERATION OF MATERIALS SOCIETIES
JANUARY 5, 2004

"ONE-STOP SHOPPING” FOR GOVERNMENT GRANTS

The Bush Administration has launched one of the showpieces of its E-Gov initiative which aims at “harnessing internet-based technology to make it easy for citizens and businesses to interact with the government, save taxpayer dollars and streamline citizen-to-government communications.”

A new web site, Grants.gov, will contain information about finding and applying for all federal grant programs. It was unveiled by the Department of Health and Human Services, which was designated the lead agency for the initiative because it awards more than half of all the competitive grants across the federal government. The site currently has information on more than 800 available grant programs involving all 26 federal grant-making agencies, which together award more than $360 billion in grant funds. The site provides information in a standardized format across agencies and includes a “Find Grant Opportunities” feature to help applicants find potential funding opportunities. It also contains an “Apply for Grants” feature that simplifies the application process by allowing applicants to download, complete and submit applications for specific grant opportunities from any federal grant-making agency. At the beginning of 2004, application packages had been posted to the Grants.gov site by five agencies – the Departments of Commerce, Education, Energy, Justice, and HHS. This will be expanded in the coming months to include the Departments of Agriculture, Defense, Homeland Security, Housing and Urban Development, Labor, and Transportation, as well as the National Science Foundation.

The site is located at http://www.grants.gov

The National Science Foundation is establishing a National Nanotechnology Infrastructure Network (NNIN) – 13 university sites that will form an integrated, nationwide system of user facilities to support research and education in nanoscale science, engineering and technology. Led by Cornell University, the NNIN is to be funded at $70 million for a five-year period beginning in 2004. Joining Cornell will be Georgia Tech, Harvard, Howard, North Carolina State, Stanford and Pennsylvania State Universities, and the University of California at Santa Barbara, the University of Michigan, the University of Minnesota, the University of New Mexico, the University of Texas at Austin, and the University of Washington. NSF expects to hold future open competitions to expand the scope of the NINN by adding new sites and capabilities as the need arises, providing flexibility within the program.

According to Lawrence Goldberg, NSF senior engineering advisor, the NNIN will not only provide users across the nation with access to leading-edge tools and instruments, but also will contribute to a new workforce skilled in nanotechnology and the latest laboratory techniques. “NNIN will implement, on a national scale, innovation in education that will impact all levels from professional through K-12, include outreach efforts to non-traditional users, reach underrepresented groups, and disseminate knowledge to the wider technical community and public,” Goldberg said. “It will also develop the intellectual and institutional capacity needed to examine and address societal and ethical implications of nanotechnology.”

The Industrial Research Institute has released its annual forecast for research and development spending. Written by IRI's Research-on-Research Committee Chair Albert R. Johnson (Corning, Inc.), the report concludes that foreign companies are outspending U.S. companies as measured by “research intensity.” Japanese companies traded on U.S. stock exchanges spend over 4 percent of each sales dollar on R&D, the data show, compared with the 1.7 percent spent by U.S. counterpart companies. “This might have strategic implications for U.S. companies on global markets, because even though U.S. companies lead the world in innovation, if present trends continue this soon will not be true,” the report says. “They are outspent and as non-U.S. economies develop and mature the U.S. companies will likely be out-sold.”

Comparing the results of this year's survey of IRI member companies with previous years, the report forecasts decreases in total company R&D expenditures, R&D professional personnel, hiring new graduates, licensing technology from others, and the R&D-to-sales ratio. “All of these indices are at their lowest levels since the year 2000,” the report states. It also notes that “not only are companies predominantly planning on spending less, but also…for many companies that spending is a shrinking share of shrinking industrial revenue.” Finally, the IRI survey respondents reported that they intend to increase activity in precompetitive university research consortia and to increase contacts with government labs, as well as to participate in more joint ventures and alliances for R&D. Also, the trends are for decreasing outsourcing to other companies and licensing technology from others. “This combination of strategic activity confirms…that companies will put more emphasis on working with others and less emphasis on outsourcing in which they pay others to do research under contract,” the report states. “Companies will likely focus collaborations on current and new relationships in which contract terms are most reasonable – the observed decrease in intent to partner with universities implies that significant factors such as contract terms, technical performance or strategic preferences do not support increases,” IRI concludes.

Further information is available from IRI at http://www.iriinc.org