reportPublic funding
3.2 Public Funding of Nanotechnology: Trends and Development
This report is produced in early 2009, nearing the end of a decade in which billions of Euros have been committed by public funding agencies, national governments, and multinational organisations to the development of nanotechnology. The rest of this report contains a more detailed look at the activities of a number of countries, both inside and outside Europe. Before looking at individual cases, it is possible to extract some of the key themes that mark the development of public funding of nanotechnology.
Globally, public funding is yet to peak
Looking globally, it is clear that public funding of nanotechnology has yet to peak. Significant new funding is coming from countries which had yet to elaborate a nanotechnology strategy; Russia being the clearest example. Countries which have had longer funding commitments are continuing to increase their investment, albeit at slower rates of growth; US funding increased by 2.4% to US$ 1,527 million in 2009.
The uncertainty on the horizon is the effect of the current economic downturn. In some cases stimulus packages have increased the amount of funding available, though this affects nanotechnology indirectly - improving university buildings, or increasing the market for solar power. However, a combination of increased public spending and decreasing tax revenue may place a squeeze on public funding in the mid term, and any large public funding programme will be under greater pressure to justify its existence and generate tangible returns.
Individual national programmes are coming to an end
Some of the longer running European nanotechnology programmes are coming to an end; NanoNed in 2009, and Finland's FinNano in 2010. The question of what will follow these large and broadly successful initiatives is understandably preoccupying organisations in those countries. What seems clear is that there is commitment that the gains; the networks, the research base, the facilities, should not be abandoned. Developing models to sustain these, in the case that public funding input decreases in those countries, is a key challenge.
Developing industrial investment and commercialisation remains the primary challenge
The concern of almost every policymaker is how to develop the commercialisation of nanotechnology research, and specifically how to ensure that public funding acts to leverage increased industrial investment in nanotechnology. Even Japan, the country with second highest absolute amount of industrial investment, still reports some frustration about inefficiencies in the technology transfer process.
Countries are approaching this in different ways. Russia arguably has the most direct model; direct equity investments into promising companies, at a lower cost of capital and with longer term agreements than the private sector would offer. France is directly a very large sum of money (around €450 million) to single industry/research partnership, the Nano2012 programme. This is then being matched with a funding commitment from the companies involved.
Another model is to make funding more focused on the development of whole value chains. The Inno.CNT programme in Germany is an example of this; 80 partners are organised into 18 projects which are each targeted to a specific nanomaterial application (e.g. CarboInk, developing electrically conductive inks for solar panels). Finland is increasingly directing funding to industry clusters, which are largely technology agnostic - the metal industry cluster would seek to develop all range of relevant technologies, whether or not they are classically ‘nano'.
Health, safety and environmental issues are receiving some attention
Funding agencies are also keen to mention that they are paying attention to HSE and ethical concerns. Austria has a NanoTrust programme, and the Netherlands directed €5 million of the NanoNed budget to a technology analysis project which studied the intersections between technology and society. An argument has been made that whilst HSE concerns are mentioned, research in this area accounts for a low share of total funding. This situation may also be changing; EHS research in the US National Nanotechnology Initiative accounted for 2.9% of the total 2005 budget, rising to 5% in 2009 (US$ 76.4 million).
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Tags: Trends, Public Funding, Economics