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Science and Technology in the Economy
Quartiles | Findings | Description
Average SBIR program award dollars per $1 million of gross state product: 2001–03
Average SBIR program award dollars per $1 million of gross state product: 2001–03
Quartiles
Average SBIR program award dollars per $1 million of gross state product: 2001–03*
| 1st Quartile ($721–$161) |
2nd Quartile ($158–$84) |
3rd Quartile ($83–$47) |
4th Quartile ($46–$21) |
|---|---|---|---|
| Alabama | Arizona | District of Columbia | Alaska |
| California | Connecticut | Florida | Arkansas |
| Colorado | Delaware | Hawaii | Georgia |
| Maryland | Maine | Idaho | Illinois |
| Massachusetts | Michigan | Kansas | Indiana |
| Montana | Minnesota | Nevada | Iowa |
| New Hampshire | New Jersey | New York | Kentucky |
| New Mexico | Oregon | North Carolina | Louisiana |
| Ohio | Pennsylvania | North Dakota | Mississippi |
| Utah | Rhode Island | South Carolina | Missouri |
| Vermont | West Virginia | South Dakota | Nebraska |
| Virginia | Wisconsin | Tennessee | Oklahoma |
| Washington | Wyoming | Texas | |
| *States in alphabetical order, not data order.
SOURCES: U.S. Small Business Administration, Office of Technology, SBIR Program Statistics, various years; and U.S. Department of Commerce, Bureau of Economic Analysis, Gross State Product data. See |
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Findings
- Significant growth has occurred in the SBIR program in recent years as total awards have increased from $590 million in 1992–94 to $1.5 billion in 2001–03. The value of SBIR awards is not evenly distributed but is concentrated in relatively few states; the total of annual state awards may range from under $1 million to more than $300 million.
- Many of the states with the highest rankings on this indicator are locations of federal laboratories or well-recognized academic research institutions from which innovative small businesses have emerged.
- States with a high ranking on this indicator also tend to rank high on the high-technology and venture capital indicators.
Description
Funds awarded through the federal Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) program support technological innovation in small companies (i.e., companies with 500 or fewer employees). Awards are made to evaluate the feasibility and scientific merit of new technology (up to $100,000) and to develop the technology to a point where it can be commercialized (up to $750,000).
Because of year-to-year fluctuations, this indicator is calculated using 3-year averages. The average annual SBIR award dollars won by the small businesses in a state are divided by the average annual gross state product. A high value indicates that companies in a state are doing cutting-edge development work that attracts federal support.
