EDO Accomplishments
Last Updated July 2007
Since 1967, 127 businesses, most in the Northwest, got started directly as a result of technology or personnel from PNNL.
- Over the past 13 years, PNNL's economic development programs have added more than 1,100 jobs and millions of dollars to the economic base of the region.
- PNNL has provided nearly 800 technology assistance projects to more than 500 technology businesses nationwide since 1994, many of them contributing directly to new products or commercial processes. This represents more than 31,000 hours of work by PNNL staff at no cost to the companies. Many of these projects benefit the Northwest, with more than 680 projects at over 420 businesses in Washington, Oregon, and Idaho since 1994. Businesses receiving this help consistently gave PNNL a 93% satisfaction rating, with 85% saying they implemented or will implement the assistance results in their businesses.
- PNNL has provided business assistance, including business planning help and connections to strategic partners and sales channels, to more than 50 businesses since the 1990s, most of them in the Tri-Cities.
- To help local technology-based businesses explore new product concepts, PNNL supported 46 marketing studies conducted by MBA students at Washington State University Tri-Cities since 1995. These studies have helped entrepreneurs find market niches and partners, identify desirable product features, and rule out unpromising product ideas.
- About 3,500 subscribers nationwide--and the 10,000 people to whom they forward the information--receive free, regular e-updates about a $2.2 billion annual source of federal R&D funding for small businesses. The Small Business Innovation Research/Small Business Technology Transfer (SBIR/STTR) Alerting Service has won Congressional and Vice-Presidential honors. The Technology Index Report for the Tri-Cities consistently ranks our area number 1 or 2 per capita in the state for SBIR/STTR awards from federal agencies. PNNL facilitates SBIR/STTR participation among local businesses, sometimes including technology partnering with PNNL.
- PNNL was one of the partners to establish a successful, self-sustaining Tri-Cities incubator for high-tech companies, the Applied Process Engineering Laboratory.
- PNNL is working with community partners and developers to create a new master plan for the area surrounding the PNNL campus in north Richland. This area contains 85 businesses and other organizations with more than 5,000 employees, including PNNL and the Washington State University Tri-Cities campus, totaling more than 3.4 million square feet of office space. A seperate plan described how the Research District should be developed and marketed over the next few years to sustain and build on the area's distinctive technology vitality.
- In PNNL's Technology Entrepreneurship Programs with the University of Washington, Washington State University, and the University of Oregon, students evaluate technologies for commercial potential and develop business plans for the most promising ones. Since 2001, seven business plans based on PNNL technologies placed more than 15 times in the top levels of regional, national, and international competitions. Six new companies were formed based on business plans developed in the program.
- PNNL has received 23 awards for its economic development programs and tools, including being named a national model of economic development by the U.S. Department of Commerce. And for ten consecutive years, starting in Fiscal Year 1996, PNNL's economic development programs have received the highest possible rating, "outstanding," from the Department of Energy.