Red River Valley Research Corridor

(FARGO, ND) With unmanned aircraft systems, or remotely piloted aircraft, increasingly being viewed as a major component in the next generation of aerial war-fighting and commerce alike, the Unmanned Aircraft Systems Action Summit “UAS 2020 – Looking to the Future” presented by honorary co-hosts U.S. Senators Kent Conrad and John Hoeven in collaboration with the Red River Valley Research Corridor, will look at initiatives and programs that directly relate to the emergence of UAS in addressing issues and concerns on a national and international level.

Kicked off by AUVSI Executive Director Michael Toscano, the Summit will provide key insight by industry giants including Northrop Grumman, General Atomics, and General Electric, the Summit will provide stakeholders and industry partners alike with high level information about emerging trends in mitigation efforts, sensor use and applications, maintenance issues and initiatives related to UAS access to the National Airspace and overviews of current platforms and projects that impact the ability of UAS to make an impact in our everyday lives.

Military and Homeland Security program overviews will be presented by Col. James Gear, the Director of USAF RPA Task Force and Maj. Gregory Fortier, leading the US Army Aviation Flight Test Directorate, and the Department of Homeland Security. Insight to the recent FAA Reauthorization – and information about the (potential) development of test sites for accessing the national airspace will presented by FAA regulatory and air traffic experts Richard Prosek and Dean Fulmer (invited).

“This summit will highlight the extraordinary initiatives being pursued by individual companies, university research centers, local government, and the federal government to advance the unmanned systems industry. There is a lot going in North Dakota and Minnesota which has positioned the region to become a hub of UAS activity.” said Delore Zimmerman, Executive Director of the Red River Valley Research Corridor.

Registration and more information regarding the event can be found on the Web by visiting www.theresearchcorridor.com/

The Red River Valley Research Corridor Coordinating Center
is run by Praxis Strategy Group – a Flint Group sister company www.praxissg.com

CTO is the world’s largest cleantech business competition and entrepreneur incubator created to find, fund and foster entrepreneurs with big ideas.  It offers entrepreneurs MBA quality training, CEO mentors, seminars and clinics, investors pitch and feedback, and more. CTO has:

• Helped to raise $300 M for 100 firms since 2006
• All 4 North Central CTO Finalists in 2010 have received funding
• CTO funding amounts range from $100,000 to $30 Million
• 80% of participants remain economically viable today
• More than 2,000 new clean technology jobs have been created.

Focus areas:

• Renewable Energy
• Energy Efficiency
• Green Building
• Air, Water & Waste
• Transportation
• Smart Power

Visit:www.cleantechopen.com

Calling All Entrepreneurs – Innovators – Economic Catalysts to a

Cleantech Open Briefing
April 21, Grand Forks, ND

Cleantech Open in the North Central Region is in search of entrepreneur applicants for this year’s competition, company mentors, judges, and partners.   Attend our briefing luncheon in Grand Forks on April 21 to find out more about CTO and how to participate.

The North Central Region Cleantech Open Competition in conjunction with the Red River Valley Research Corridor, Innovate ND, NDSU Research & Technology Park, Marketplace of Ideas & the UND Center for Innovation.

- APPLY, NETWORK & CREATE NEW COLLABORATIVE PARTNERS -

Praxis Africa
Praxis Africa is an agricultural enterprise development & rural community development enterprise headquartered in Accra, Ghana. Praxis Africa works with leaders and entrepreneurs in business, communities and government to develop and implement action-oriented development initiatives and business ventures.

Our approach focuses on understanding the assets and strengths of a business or community – then helping to build the relationships and networks necessary to get things done.

• Working with farmers to identify and reach markets for their products.
• Working with traditional leaders and government agencies to achieve local sustainable development.
• Working to source equipment, machinery, expertise and capital to improve productivity and profitability.
• Working with farmers and agri-business to tell their story.

Praxis Africa is allied with Praxis Strategy Group and AdFarm in the United States and Canada. The two companies share ownership and have a long relationship of working together on agricultural and rural-focused development and strategic planning initiatives.

Praxis Strategy Group is a partner with the Flint Group

Mr. Joel Kotkin

An internationally-recognized authority on global, economic, political and social trends, Joel Kotkin is the author of a new book, THE NEXT HUNDRED MILLION: America in 2050, published in February by The Penguin Press. The book explores how the nation will evolve in the next four decades. It has received rave reviews from The New York Times, Wall Street Journal, the Globe and Mail, and National Public Radio.

Mr. Kotkin is Distinguished Presidential Fellow in Urban Futures at Chapman University in Orange, California and an Adjunct Fellow with the Legatum Institute based in London, UK. A highly respected speaker and futurist, he consults for many leading economic development organizations, private companies, regions and cities. Joel is also a Senior Fellow with the Center for an Urban Future in New York City; and a Senior Consultant with the Praxis Strategy Group in Fargo, North Dakota.

The Charlie Rose Interview

Praxis Strategy Group is a partner with the Flint Group of Companies

This is an excerpt from “Enterprising States: Creating Jobs, Economic Development, and Prosperity in Challenging Times” authored by Praxis Strategy Group and Joel Kotkin. The entire report is available at the National Chamber Foundation website, including highlights of top performing states and profiles of each state’s economic development efforts.

States throughout American history have done everything they can to cultivate, attract, retain, and grow the businesses that comprise the most fundamental building blocks of their economy. Even in today’s volatile global economy states with severe unemployment and budget woes can point to policies, programs, and investments that foster new economic opportunities and create jobs.

Read the full report.

Read part one in this series: The Jobs Imperative: Power to the States

Many state economic development organizations were originally established with business recruitment and attraction as their primary focus. But today’s mix of state approaches to economic development has moved well beyond earlier, sometimes singularly focused attempts to lure footloose businesses with huge financial incentives and/or by offering a business climate based on cheap labor, low taxes, and lenient regulations.

States, nonetheless, still compete with each other for companies in “traded sectors” and jobs in the global economy, either directly or by virtue of unique assets and resources, and this sometimes involves financial incentives and tax abatements. But there is growing momentum among governors and state legislatures to grow their economies from within by creating a new set of competitive advantages that include building human capital through workforce development and training, harnessing the power of science and technology assets, making strategic investments in infrastructure, reaching out to global markets, developing opportunities related to energy and the environment, and spurring entrepreneurship and innovation.

Generally, state economic development efforts include an interrelated array of policies, programs and investments, falling into three major categories: (1) an entrepreneurial approach focusing on new business and technology-based development, oftentimes with a focus on bolstering productivity and innovation; (2) recruitment, expansion, and retention strategies emphasizing financial incentives or investments and other programs, including international trade and export promotion; and (3) “fertile soil” policies28 that create the conditions for growth that will benefit almost any type of business by streamlining governmental regulation, optimizing taxes, investing in infrastructure, and/or by providing a better-educated, more highly skilled work force.

While it is up to state governors and legislators to set the environment for development to flourish, ultimately economic development success is defined by execution at the local and regional level. With well designed state-implemented development tools, effective workforce development and skills training systems, and strong infrastructure, states can give local economic developers the power to assist the growing businesses, to broker the key partnerships, and to lead the key initiatives that create the jobs needed to sustain our growing population.

Most of all, states must carefully weigh policy to refrain from constructing barriers to private enterprise growth. Many of the most effective economic development initiatives start from grassroots efforts or private sector business leaders, so supporting these efforts from the state level is imperative.

Measuring the States: A List of the Top Performers
A primary goal of any state economic development program is not only to increase the number of jobs in the state, but to improve the quality of jobs and the overall prosperity of the state’s residents.

This study combines metrics for each economic development policy area to measure overall high performers in each policy topic area. States are compared in each metric and top states are determined by a composite comparison of all metrics in overall performance and in each policy area. For a full description of all metrics and results for each state as well as top performers in exports, innovation, workforce development, infrastructure, and tax and regulation, see the full report.

To establish the overall best performers we combined measures of Job growth rate since 2000 and since 2007; Gross State Product (GSP) measures: real GSP growth since 2000, GSP per job 2008, Growth in GSP per job 2000-2008; and income: per capita personal income growth 2000-2009 and median four person family income adjusted for cost of living, 2009.

Top Overall Growth Performers

Growing Jobs: How Do They Do It?

A review of which states are high performing shows a diverse group—some big, some small; some rural, some urban; some inland, some coastal—but a closer examination shows a shared pattern of policies by these high performers.

There is no such thing as single a silver bullet strategy for job creation. Among our top ten performers, all ten have seen at least 4% job growth since 2002 in mid-level jobs requiring at least long term on-the-job training but less than a four-year degree. Five of the ten states increased those jobs more than 10%. At the same time all ten increased science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) jobs by at least 4% over the same period, with 7 of 10 growing STEM jobs at least 14%.29

An assessment of top performing states, regardless of by what measure, eventually gets down to a state’s ability to execute successful initiatives. Aside from minding the basics of primary education and supportive infrastructure, success begins with an understanding of a state’s economy and demographics, including its strong points and its gaps. States that can mobilize the relevant partners to put together the strategic networks to build upon those strengths while addressing the weaknesses will be winners in the long run.

Adequately financing any initiative is paramount to its success. Top performing states have come up with winning formulas often based on combining state funding with federal programs and private sources. As regional workforce skills gaps become more acute, non-governmental agencies and private enterprises more are willing to join new collaborative development projects.

Programs such as Kentucky’s “Bucks for Brains” which requires universities to match state funds with donations from philanthropists, corporations, foundations, and other non-profit agencies, or Florida’s use of American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) funding in combination with existing state funds to tackle major infrastructure programs illustrate unique solutions to sufficiently financing winning initiatives.

Examples of strong partnerships featuring open communication are especially evident in high performing export states. Export programs are based upon effective communication between the importing country, the exporting manufacturer or business, and the state program helping to facilitate the connection.

The TexasOne program creates promotional materials to market the state and its manufacturers to importing countries and leads trade missions to importing countries and hosts reverse trade missions to the state. Nevada works with a network of trade representatives in targeted markets throughout Asia, North America and Europe, focused on cultivating distribution channels and facilitating opportunities for foreign direct investment in Nevada enterprises.

Many high performing states offer an array of corporate, manufacturing, and land tax programs. So too, many states are shying away from direct subsidies for promised job growth in favor of highly targeted tax credit programs that require direct investment by the firm or venture investors wherein the tax benefits are only realized after new jobs are in place. Other credit programs target historically underdeveloped geographical regions.

Other states such as North Dakota, Florida, and Mississippi have turned to comprehensive tort reform as another key element enterprise-friendliness. Whether these reforms are specific to a particular industry or issue, they ultimately help businesses, large and small, remain competitive and free of excessive burdens from excessive litigation.

Private sector and academic collaboration is one of the most readily identifiable attributes of high performing states across all measures. Whether it is successful innovation and entrepreneur programs such as Montana’s TechRanch, Oregon’s Innovation Council, Rhode Island’s Center for Innovation and Entrepreneurship, or job creation and economic development initiatives such as Momentum Mississippi, these private and academic partners are providing critical input, oversight, and resources to bolster the effectiveness of state efforts.

Many states are locating business incubators adjacent to universities in partnership with the schools while others are building laboratory spaces and other specialized infrastructure to offer to growing companies on an a la carte basis. In either case, this business and scientific infrastructure can reduce start-up costs for new enterprises and provide students the chance for experiential learning while earning their degrees.

While there are obviously other policies or initiatives that high performing states share there are some commonalities: building on momentum; delivering adequate funding for initiatives; developing strong relationships and communication strategies; enterprise-friendly tax and regulation systems; and vigorous collaboration between business, government, and education institutions.

Read the full report.

Praxis Strategy Group is an economic development, analysis, and strategic planning firm and a partner with the Flint Group

Joel Kotkin is executive editor of NewGeography.com and author of The Next Hundred Million: America in 2050

This article originally appeared in NewGeography.com and joint Joel Kotkin and Praxis Strategy Group publication

This year’s summit will focus on developing and strengthening the Red River Valley’s burgeoning life sciences industry.  Presenters including entrepreneurs, financiers, researchers, and scientists from the region and around the nation will discuss and explore actions the region can and is taking to foster strong, sustainable growth in the life sciences sector.

More about the Life Sciences Action Summit

Register Now

River Valley Research Corridor Action Summits

The Red River Valley Research Corridor and U.S. Senator Byron Dorgan work in cooperation with leading economic, science and technology-based organizations in North Dakota and the Great Plains region to organize action summits.

Action summits are high-impact conferences that have a razor-like focus on specific research and technology development opportunities in the region. The summits are intended to:

1. Facilitate learning, networking and collaboration in the region.
2. Connect with key partners in business and government from outside the region in a highly focused and purposeful manner.
3. Showcase science and technology-based capabilities and initiatives in the Corridor.
4. Engage key players inside and outside the region to put a focus on what do we do now and in the future to make the Red River Valley Corridor an epicenter of research, development and/or production in this particular science and technology field.

Previous Research Corridor action summits have focused on hydrogen energy, venture capital, radio frequency identification (RFID) technologies, polymers and coatings, life sciences, animal identification systems and unmanned aircraft systems.

The Red River Valley Research Corridor is an independent non-profit corporation committed to catalyzing and promoting science, technology and engineering initiatives that create new opportunities in the region

Red River Valley Research Corridor Coordinating Center

Dr. Delore Zimmerman, President & CEO of Praxis Strategy Group in Grand Forks, Fargo & Los Angeles, California was named to serve as the Coordinator. Delore has over twenty years experience working with companies in technology and information industries, universities and local development groups. Since its founding Praxis has been awarded 8 Small Business Innovation Research Awards.

Praxis Strategy Group is a partner with the Flint Group.

THE NEXT HUNDRED MILLION: America in 2050
By Joel Kotkin

Release date: February 4, 2010. Published by The Penguin Press

Read more about The Next Hundred Million

In stark contrast to the rest of the world’s advanced nations, the United States is growing at a record rate and, according to census projections, will be home to four hundred million Americans by 2050. This projected rise in population is the strongest indicator of our long-term economic strength, Joel Kotkin believes, and will make us more diverse and more competitive than any nation on earth.

Drawing on prodigious research, firsthand reportage, and historical analysis, The Next Hundred Million reveals how this unprecedented growth will take physical shape and change the face of America. The majority of additional hundred million Americans will find their homes in suburbia, though the suburbs of tomorrow will not resemble the Levittowns of the 1950s or the sprawling exurbs of the late twentieth century. The suburbs of the twenty-first century will be less reliant on major cities for jobs and other amenities and, as a result, more energy efficient. Suburbs will also be the melting pots of the future as more and more immigrants opt for dispersed living over crowded inner cities and the majority in the United States becomes nonwhite by 2050.

The Next Hundred Million provides a vivid snapshot of America in 2050 by focusing not on power brokers, policy disputes, or abstract trends, but rather on the evolution of the more intimate units of American society—families, towns, neighborhoods, industries. It is upon the success or failure of these communities, Kotkin argues, that the American future rests.

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Joel Kotkin is executive editor of NewGeography.com and is a presidential fellow in urban futures at Chapman University. He is author of The City: A Global History and is finishing a book on the American future.

Joel serves as a Senior Consultant with Praxis Strategy Group a partner with the Flint Group