Outsourcing Innovation

Alliance for American Manufacturing (Eckert) - The National Science Foundation (NSF) has released their initial results from the Business R&D and Innovation Survey.  In 2008, manufacturers, as a whole, offshored approximately 20% of their R&D. Motor vehicle manufacturers offshored the largest percentage of their manufacturing at 39% followed by textile and apparel at 33%. Many American citizens have expressed concern over sending manufacturing jobs overseas, but what some don’t realize is that when manufacturing goes, R&D is often quick to follow. Without our innovative capabilities, the United States risks losing any semblance of an economic advantage in the global marketplace. Mike Mandel says in a blog post on the results:

“My view is that we suffer from an “information deficit” rather than an “information overload.”  We know far too little about the important things, and far too much about the unimportant. One of the notable gaps in our knowledge has been reliable statistics about R&D spending.  The economy  is driven by innovation, but we knew very little about who was doing the innovating and where.  In particular, we had absolutely no idea how much R&D was being offshored by U.S.-based companies.”  Read More