WASHINGTON, D.C. — Today the Federation of American Scientists (FAS) calls upon Congress to reach a final agreement by the end of July on H.R. 4521, the America Creating Opportunities for Manufacturing, Pre-Eminence in Technology, and Economic Strength (COMPETES) Act, and S. 1260, the U.S. Innovation and Competition Act (USICA). 

“The need for this legislation is broadly recognized, and delay or failure should not be an option. We believe sensible bipartisan compromises can be reached on many of the outstanding issues and that a final agreement coupled with supplemental funding would bolster U.S. competitiveness, address supply chain issues, and enhance U.S. security,” the letter reads. 

Congress is at the cusp of making major policy improvements and much-needed investments that will enable the U.S. to remain the global leader in science and technology. Without these improvements, however, the U.S. stands to not only lose its status as global innovator, but lose scientific talent seeking opportunity elsewhere.

“American scientific excellence and technological leadership is not magically sustained – it is fostered by policy that nurtures and funds innovation. Congress should make a down payment on American competitiveness, sponsor a generation of world-class technological talent, and let the fruits of that talent make the case for America’s competitive edge,” says FAS CEO Dan Correa.

“The need for a new American investment in research and development is widely recognized, so what better moment for Congress to invest than now? The bipartisan bills before Congress share a similar goal – to supercharge American science. Congress should seize the moment and make the robust investments we need,” says FAS Associate Director of Research & Development and Advanced Industry Matt Hourihan. 

“Congress has a once-in-a-generation opportunity to pass legislation that will strengthen our nation’s commitment to prioritizing science and technology, advancing American innovation and bolstering global leadership. We urge both chambers of Congress to support this bipartisan, bicameral legislation—investment in science and innovation is essential for America’s future,” says American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) CEO Sudip Parikh.

“After nearly three years of bipartisan efforts to craft this legislation, it’s time to finish strong and deliver a final agreement that helps propel American science, innovation, and competitiveness into the next decade and beyond,” says Association of American Universities (AAU) President Barbara R. Snyder.

“Congress is on the brink of passing legislation with the potential to bolster U.S. research and development investments to better support innovations that not only spark new discoveries, but also solve intractable challenges facing our country and world. APLU urges Congress to heed the recommendations of the research university community and pass this critical competitive legislation,” says Association of Public and Land-grant Universities (APLU) President Peter McPherson.

In addition to FAS, the letter is signed and endorsed by over 30 science societies. 

We have reproduced the letter below:

Dear Speaker Pelosi and Leaders Schumer, McCarthy, and McConnell: 

Congress is poised to significantly strengthen our nation’s competitive advantage in science and innovation to the benefit of American economic competitiveness, security, and prosperity. As leading science, engineering, and higher education organizations – representing hundreds of thousands of American researchers and educators – we urge your concerted attention to reach a final enactment by the end of July on H.R. 4521, the America Creating Opportunities for Manufacturing, Pre-Eminence in Technology, and Economic Strength (COMPETES) Act, and S. 1260, the U.S. Innovation and Competition Act (USICA). 

Our global competitors are not sitting idle. The need for this legislation is broadly recognized, and delay or failure should not be an option. We believe sensible bipartisan compromises can be reached on many of the outstanding issues and that a final agreement coupled with supplemental funding would bolster U.S. competitiveness, address supply chain issues, and enhance U.S. security.

Key aspects of the House and Senate bills are quite consistent with each other. While it is routine in Washington to focus on differences, the most striking feature of the science and technology portions of the two bills is how similar they are in their goals and their policy approaches.  

For instance, both bills would:

• Authorize the creation of a flexible new Directorate at the National Science Foundation empowered to creatively  fund research aimed at meeting specific practical goals, including making the U.S. more competitive.
• Authorize significant and needed funding increases for all aspects of the National Science Foundation and for key innovation-oriented programs of the Department of Energy;
• Authorize the creation of a network of regional tech hubs to ensure that the benefits of research and innovation accrue to this nation’s diverse communities and geographies;
• Authorize the creation of a National Engineering Biology Research and Development Initiative to build a diverse bio-workforce and advance innovation; 
• Expand the number and kinds of students and institutions involved in STEM research and education through a variety of measures, including new fellowships and traineeships, and programs to strengthen the success rate of institutions competing for NSF funding; 
• Require assessments of the U.S. position in science and technology globally to enable the development of a comprehensive national strategy for U.S. leadership in critical and emerging domains.

These and other similar measures would strengthen American science and innovation and make the U.S. more competitive and more secure for years to come. We recognize there are still important issues to be worked out, including the research security provisions, but we believe this can be achieved given the agreement on overall goals and approaches.  

It is also vital to ensure that the programs that are strengthened and created by the final bill are not just aspirations. Neither bill would provide the actual funding needed to implement the shared vision articulated in the legislation. We urge Congress to make a down payment on American competitiveness by adding $10 billion in supplemental appropriations for the National Science Foundation, Department of Energy, and the National Institute of Standards and Technology as part of a final agreement. Making this initial investment would jumpstart our nation’s science and innovation enterprise as we seek to reclaim our competitive advantage.

Similarly, we support the bipartisan funding of $52 billion in appropriations for the domestic semiconductor manufacturing industry to ensure U.S. excellence in this crucial sector that is driven by continued advancements in science and engineering. We urge that the CHIPS package remain in the overall legislation and that it not be separated. Intel’s recent decision to delay breaking ground for the Ohio semiconductor manufacturing plant underscores the need to move quickly. Delay in passing a final conference agreement with CHIPS would waste valuable time that competitor nations will undoubtedly use to further challenge U.S. leadership in semiconductors and critical research areas such as quantum information science, artificial intelligence, robotics, cybersecurity, biotechnology, and advanced communications technologies. 

After several years of work, Congress is now on the cusp of making major policy improvements and needed investments that will enable the U.S. to remain the leader in science and technology. The creative, focused approaches in the legislation need to become law, along with the funding to make them a reality. We urge swift action and are committed to working with you to this end.  

Sincerely, 

American Association for Dental, Oral, and Craniofacial Research

American Association for the Advancement of Science 

American Astronomical Society

American Chemical Society 

American Geophysical Union 

American Geosciences Institute

American Institute for Medical and Biological Engineering

American Institute of Biological Sciences

American Mathematical Society

American Physical Society

American Psychiatric Association

American Psychological Association

American Society for Cell Biology

American Society of Agronomy

American Society of Plant Biologists

Association for Psychological Science

Association for Women in Science

Association of American Universities 

Association of Public and Land-Grant Universities 

Association of Science and Technology Centers 

Biophysical Society

Coalition for the Life Sciences

Crop Science Society of America

Ecological Society of America

Federation of American Scientists 

Federation of Associations in Behavioral and Brain Sciences

Geological Society of America

Natural Science Collections Alliance

Optica (formerly OSA) Advancing Optics and Photonics Worldwide

Population Association of America

Research!America

Science and Technology Action Committee 

Soil Science Society of America

The Gerontological Society of America

The Oceanography Society

cc: All Members of the U.S. House of Representatives

All Members of the U.S. Senate

Our roundtable of senior leadership at the White House National Economic Council and U.S. Dept. of Health and Human Services as well as a diversity of viewpoints across political ideologies from Breakthrough Energy, American Compass, MIT’s The Engine, and Employ America discussed competing with China on advanced manufacturing sectors (bioeconomic, semiconductor, quantum, etc.), supply chain resilience, and new visions for industrial policy that can stimulate regional development. This document contains a summary of the event.

Topic Introduction: Advanced Manufacturing & U.S. Competitiveness

The session began with an introduction by Bill Bonvillian (MIT), who shared a series of reflections, challenges, and solutions to rebuilding American manufacturing:

Advanced manufacturing and supply chain resilience are two sides of the same coin. The pandemic awoke us to our over dependence on foreign supply chains. Unless we build a robust domestic manufacturing system, our supply chains will crumble. American competitiveness therefore depends on how well we can apply our innovation capabilities to the historically underfunded advanced manufacturing ecosystem. Other nations are pouring tremendous amounts of resources because they recognize the importance of manufacturing for the overall innovation cycle. To rebuild American manufacturing, an ecosystem is needed—private sector, educational institutions, and government—to create an effective regional workforce and advanced manufacturing technology pipeline.

Panel 1: Framing the Challenge and Identifying Key Misconceptions

Our first panel hosted Arnab Datta (Employ America), Chris Griswold (American Compass), and Abigail Regitsky (Breakthrough Energy). The questions and responses are summarized below:

What would you say are some misconceptions that have posed obstacles to finding consensus on an industrial policy for advanced manufacturing?

Chris Griswold: The largest misconception is the ideological view that industrial policy is central planning, with the government picking winners and losers—that it is un- American. That’s simply not true. From Alexander Hamilton, to Henry Clay and Abraham Lincoln, and through the post-war period and America’s technological rise, the American way has involved a rich public-private sector innovation ecosystem. Recent decades of libertarian economics have weakened supply chains and permitted the flight of industry from American communities.

Arnab Datta: People like to say that market choices have forced manufacturing overseas, but really it’s been about policy. Germany has maintained a world-class manufacturing base with high wages and regulations. We have underrated two important factors in sustaining a high-quality American manufacturing ecosystem: financing and aggregate demand. Manufacturing financing is cash-flow intensive, making asset-light strategies difficult. And when you see scarce aggregate demand, you see a cost-cutting mentality that leads to things like consolidation and offshoring. We only need to look back to the once-booming semiconductor industry that lost its edge. Our competitors are making the policy choices necessary to grow and develop strategically; we should do the same.

Abigail Regitsky: For climate and clean energy, startups see the benefit of developing and manufacturing in the United States—that’s a large misconception, that startups do not want to produce domestically. The large issue is that they do not have financing support to develop domestic supply chains. We need to ensure there is a market for these technologies and there is financing available to access them.

With the recently introduced bill for an Industrial Finance Corporation from Senator Coons’ Office, what would you say are the unique benefits of using government corporations and why should the general public care? And how might something like this stimulate job and economic growth regionally?

Arnab Datta: The unique benefits of a government corporation are two-fold: flexibility in affordability and in financing. In some of our most difficult times, government entities were empowered with a range of abilities to accomplish important goals. During the Great Depression and World War III, the Reconstruction Financing Corporation was necessary to ramp up wartime investment through loans, purchase guarantees, and other methods. America has faced difficult challenges, but government corporations have been a bright spot in overcoming these challenges. We face big challenges now. The Industrial Finance Corporation (IFC) bill arrives at a similar moment, granting the government the authority to tackle big problems related to industrial competition—national security, climate change, etc. We need a flexible entity, and the public should care because they are taking risks in this competition with their tax dollars. They should be able to have a stake in the product, and the IFC’s equity investments and other methods provide that. It will also help with job growth across regions.Currently, we are witnessing rising capital expenditures to a degree not seen for a very long time. We were told manufacturing jobs would never come back, but the demand is there. Creating an institution that establishes permanence for job growth in manufacturing should not be an exception but a norm.

Abigail Regitsky: We need a political coalition to get the policies in supply to support the clean energy agenda. An IFC could support a factory that leverages hydrogen in a green way, or something even more nascent. These moves require a lot of capital, but we can create a lot of economic returns and jobs if we see the long-term linkage and support it.

What would you say might be the conservative case for industrial policy for advanced manufacturing? And what specific aspects of the advanced manufacturing ecosystem specifically do you see opportunities and needs?

Chris Griswold: It’s the same as the general case—it’s a common sense, good idea. Fortunately, there is much more consensus on this now than there was just a few years ago. Some specific arguments that should appeal to both sides include:

1. The national security imperative to bolster our currently vulnerable supply chain and industrial base.
2. Having national economic resiliency to keep up with competitors. It’s almost unanimous at this point that it will be difficult to compete without an effective advanced manufacturing sector and resilient supply chain. Offshoring all of our capacity has diminished our know-how and degraded our ability to innovate ourselves back out of this situation. We can’t just flip the innovation switch back on—it takes time to get our manufacturing ecosystem up to speed with the pace of technological progress.
3. Deindustrialization has hurt working communities and created regional inequality. It has made not just our country weaker in general, but it has harmed many specific working-class local communities. Working class people without a college degree have been hit the hardest. Working class communities of color have been harmed in unique ways. At the heart of these large discussions is a moral imperative about workers and their families. They matter. We must do more to support local economies, which means caring about the composition of those economies.

Abigail Regitsky: It’s the idea of losing the “know-how” or “learning-by-building” phase of innovation. This is crucial for developing solutions to solve climate change. With climate, time is of the essence; when you are able to tie manufacturing to the innovation process, it fosters a faster scale up of new technology. We need the manufacturing know-how to scale up emerging technologies and reduce emissions to zero by mid-century.

Panel 2: Ideas for Action

Our first panel hosted Dr. Elisabeth Reynolds (WHNEC), Joseph Hamel (ASPR), and Katie Rae (MIT’s The Engine). The questions and responses are summarized below:

In the last panel, we heard from a variety of perspectives on this deep and comprehensive issue, what are a few priorities you have for improving the manufacturing base?

Elisabeth Reynolds: The last panel presented the imperative and opportunity of today’s moment perfectly. The administration is working to reframe the nation’s thoughts on industrial policy. All of those problems outlined existed before the pandemic. What we’re addressing now is a new commitment and understanding that this is not just about national security—it’s about economic security. We don’t need to build and make everything here, but we need to build and make a lot here, from commodities to next-gen technology. We have to support small and medium-sized businesses. The administration’s plans compliment the Industrial Finance Corporation bill and the initiatives included in it. There is a real effort to include and support communities, schools, and people who have not been included. We’refocusing on the regional level—we are aiming to have workforce training at the regional level to build a pipeline for the next generation of workers in manufacturing. Another critical component is the climate agenda, which manufacturing facilities should leverage demonstration funding, tax credits, and procurement to facilitate, especially on the latter, with the role of government as a buyer. Finally, each of these issues, must be approached through an equity lens, in terms of geographic, racial, small vs. big business, and more. We need to create a level playing field, that is where America will thrive.

“President Biden recently issued an Executive Order 14017 directing the US government to undertake a comprehensive review of six critical US industrial base sectors. ASPR is the lead for the public health and biological preparedness industry base review. What can you tell us about these efforts to date?”

Joseph Hamel: These efforts are focused on furthering the relationships and leveraging partnerships that were discovered during pandemic response, from the Food and Drug Administration to the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency and National Institute of Standards and Technology, it is important to explore the right level of coordination. We are conducting a review of essential medicines to identify the most critical and relevant, then exploring potential threats and ways to invest andimprove the supply chain for these drugs. We’re bringing in clinicians, manufacturers and distributor partners to ask questions like “what is the most vulnerable item in our global supply chain and how can we act on it? We’re also establishing an innovation laboratory with FDA to evaluate a wide array of products that are subject to shortage and geographic production dependencies. We are also investigating overlooked capacities for the assembly of these products and leveraging opportunities inside and outside of government so manufacturers can realize new capabilities at scale. We need a more resilient global supply chain, as was demonstrated in the pandemic. And we have to think about doing this with lower-cost, lower-footprint environmental impact so that we can become competitive inside a larger ecosystem.

A few weeks ago the Day One Project held a listening session with several startups in cleantech, semiconductor, and bioeconomy industries that governments overseas provide more incentives, from subsidies to more available tools, to manufacture there than in the United States. What is the most important way to make it easier for small and medium sized companies to manufacture in the United States?

Katie Rae: The Engine was founded to go after the world’s biggest problems. Advanced manufacturing is one of them—ensuring foundational industries are built here. This collides with everything, including our supply chains. The impact is not theoretical—how do we get vaccines to everyone? There’s been a lot of innovation, but our current system didn’t want to support the ideas because they were out of favor for investments. We had the ideas, but we didn’t have the financing, this was a market failure. We need funding to bring these ideas to life. When startups begin scaling, they need capital to do so. It is not inherently provided by the private market, so governments are not picking winners and losers but rather ensuring that money goes to a list of potential winners.

Elisabeth Reynolds: The comments about the financing gap are exactly right. We have less support for the scale up of cutting-edge technologies at their later stage of development. We need more time and capital to get these ideas there. Katie’s team is focused on finding this capital and supporting the commercialization into government. We also have a growing shift in the mindset of the country—first thought has been to take manufacturing offshore, but the equalization of the costs is bringing some of this production back to our shores.

If you were to ask the audience to work on a specific domain, what would you challenge them to do?

Elisabeth Reynolds: We should build in on the positive programs we have; Joe’s is a great example. We also can’t forget about the examples of work outside of government. We innovate well across a wide range of places and the government needs to be a partner in supporting this.

Katie Rae: Loan guarantee programs in procurement is a must-have. Other governments will do it and our companies will relocate their headquarters there.

Joseph Hamel: Furthering investments in platform technology development. We need to leverage what is growing as a bioeconomy initiative and use these applications to create end products that we never thought were achievable. We should explore material science applications and innovation in quality by design, up front.

This summer, National Economic Council Director Brian Deese articulated a new vision for a robust and equitable U.S. industrial policy. The strategy seeks to help us reach the full potential of American competitiveness while delivering justice, equity, and prosperity to all citizens.

To inform the Administration’s new strategy, we pulled together a curated set of ideas from our extensive portfolio of nonpartisan, actionable ideas in science and technology policy. These ideas were diversely sourced from more than 300 Day One contributors — including students, academics, activists, industry leaders, local and international government officials, and more.​

Our letter addresses each of the industrial strategy’s core pillars:

Pillar I: Supply-Chain Resilience
Pillar II: Targeted Public Investment
Pillar III: Public Procurement
Pillar IV: Climate Resilience
Pillar V: Equity

​We hope that these ideas help advance the vision of a modern industrial policy that benefits all Americans.

Summary

President Biden made advanced manufacturing a major policy priority during his campaign, including calling for a significant expansion of manufacturing programs to reach 50 communities through new manufacturing-technology hubs. Expanded manufacturing programs will invest in our nation’s long-term competitive innovation capacity. However, building these programs successfully requires a thoughtful and practical implementation plan. This memo presents two categories of recommendations to improve the U.S. advanced-manufacturing ecosystem:

1. Improve the existing Manufacturing USA institutes. Some new institutes are needed, but the Administration should concentrate first on strengthening support for the 16 existing Manufacturing USA Institutes, renewing the terms of institutes that are performing well, and expanding the reach of those institutes by launching more workforce-development programs, regional technology demonstration centers, initiatives to engage small- and mid-sized manufacturers and build regional manufacturing ecosystems.

2. Implement a multi-part strategy for collaboration among the Institutes: First, the Administration should create a “network function” across the Manufacturing USA Institutes because firms will need to adopt packages of manufacturing technologies not just one at a time. This could be supported by the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) and would combine the advances of different Institutes and package them to be integrated and interoperable for easy adoption by firms. Second, a NIST-led traded-sector-analysis unit should be created to evaluate the manufacturing progress of other nations and inform Institute priorities. Third, the Administration should provide research and development (R&D) agencies with resources to build manufacturing-related R&D feeder systems (e.g., an expanded pipeline of manufacturing technologies) that aligns with Institute needs. Fourth, the administration should establish an Advanced Manufacturing Office within the White House National Economic Council to coordinate and champion all of the above, as well as numerous other manufacturing programs.

Summary

America faces a host of daunting problems that demand forward-looking solutions. Addressing these challenges will require us to unleash the full potential of our research and development community, leveraging new approaches to innovation that break through both technical and institutional barriers and initiate wholly new capabilities. The Advanced Research Projects Agency (ARPA) model has resulted in exactly this kind of high-impact innovation in defense, intelligence, and energy. This model can be applied to other critical societal challenges such as climate, labor, or health. But an ARPA must have the right core elements if it is to create the fresh solutions the country needs.

The ARPA model is distinctly different from other federal agencies in mission, operations, and culture. ARPA organizations are part of a much broader ecosystem that spans from research to implementation. Their role is to create breakthrough, paradigm-shifting solutions and capabilities. In order to position a new ARPA for success, Congress, the Administration, and the agency’s founding leaders must understand the unique properties of an ARPA and the process by which ARPAs approach and manage risk to develop game-changing advances.

To establish a strong foundation for a new ARPA to do this work, Congress and the Administration will need to address four factors:

• Purpose: Clearly and succinctly define the vital national purpose for the new ARPA.
• Operations: Set the agency up to function autonomously, with its own budget, staff, and operating practices.
• Authorities: Give the new ARPA flexible hiring and contracting authorities to draw new and extraordinary talent to the nation’s challenges.
• Leadership: Appoint an exceptional leadership team, hold them to a high standard for impact, and create room for them to deliver on the full potential of the ARPA model.

Over the course of a few years, a new ARPA can grow into a powerfully effective organization with people, practices, and culture honed to create breakthroughs. If well implemented, new ARPAs can be extraordinary additions to our R&D ecosystem, providing unimagined new capabilities to help us meet our most essential societal challenges.

Challenge and Opportunity

America faces some daunting problems today. Many millions of Americans are unable to access our nation’s rich opportunities, leaving all of us poorer without their contributions. Dozens of other countries have longer life spans and lower infant mortality rates, although we spend more per capita on healthcare than any other country. We are not yet on track to contain the damages of a changing climate or to manage its impacts. Global competition has resulted in more and more U.S. research advances being used to create jobs elsewhere. R&D alone won’t solve any of these problems. But every one of these challenges demands creative new solutions.

However, America’s phenomenally productive R&D ecosystem—with its half a trillion dollars spent annually by the public and private sectors—is not aimed at these large, society-wide challenges. How do we create a generational shift in our innovation ecosystem so that it contributes as much to meeting this century’s challenges as it did for those of the last century? What can we learn from our successful R&D history, and what approaches can we adapt to address the problems that we now face?

One part of the answer lies in the Advanced Research Projects Agency (ARPA) model for innovation. This kind of innovation knocks down both technical and institutional barriers to create transformational new capabilities. ARPA organizations are part of a much broader ecosystem, spanning from research to implementation, in which their role is to create breakthrough solutions and capabilities that fundamentally change what we define as possible. In pursuit of revolutionary advances, they accept and manage a level of risk for which companies and other government agencies have no incentive.

The first ARPA, the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), was launched in 1958 at the height of the Cold War. DARPA shifted military capabilities from mass bombing to precision strike with GPS, stealth technologies, and integrated combat systems. These innovations recast defense systems, changed military outcomes, and shaped geopolitics over decades. Meanwhile, DARPA’s programs in enabling technologies also seeded artificial intelligence, developed advanced microelectronics, and started the internet. In recent years, DARPA programs have built the first ship able to navigate from the pier and cross oceans without a single sailor on board,¹ created a radical new approach to reconfigurable military capabilities to outpace global adversaries,² developed the first systems—now in operation by the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey—for cities to continuously monitor for dangerous nuclear and radiological materials,³ and created a rapid-response mRNA vaccine platform⁴ that enabled the astonishingly fast development⁵ of today’s mRNA vaccines for COVID-19.

We are also starting to show that the ARPA model can be successfully adapted to other national purposes. In 2006, the Intelligence Advanced Research Projects Activity (IARPA) was formed to serve the intelligence community. One of IARPA’s programs has developed methods to overcome individual cognitive biases by weighting and synthesizing the judgments of many analysts. This approach provides important gains in prediction and is a new paradigm for forecasting events in a complex world. In 2009, the Advanced Research Projects Agency–Energy (ARPA-E) launched in the Department of Energy. Its programs have created new power semiconductors, new battery technologies, and new methods to improve appliance efficiency, making vital contributions to our clean energy future. Both ARPAs have invigorated R&D communities by connecting them to hard, important problems and giving them a pathway to drive impact.

Implementing the ARPA model to meet other critical challenges could have enormous impact. Indeed, President Biden has already proposed ARPAs for health and climate,⁶ and others have advanced visions for ARPAs for agriculture,⁷ labor⁸ and education. In addition, the Endless Frontier Act⁹ takes inspiration from the ARPA model in its vision for an expanded technology function at NSF to address economic competitiveness.

Behind each call for an “ARPA for X” is a yearning for R&D that throws open new doors to radically better solutions. But the ARPA model is very different from other federal agencies and unlocking its potential will require much more than affixing the name. The starting point is an understanding of how ARPAs generate their outsized advances.

Though specifics vary according to the mission of a new ARPA, the essential operating model is based on these elements:

• An ARPA designs and conducts programs that run for limited periods, typically 3-5 years. Each ARPA program sets out to achieve a specific, bold goal that may seem impossible but that, if demonstrated, can initiate a major advance. Each ARPA program contracts with companies, universities, and other organizations to execute R&D efforts. It also engages the parties who can implement and scale successful program results.
• An ARPA requires exceptionally talented program managers with a rare combination of expertise, vision, and the ability to execute and deliver results.
• ARPA leadership approves a series of individual programs, constructing and overseeing a full and diversified portfolio.

ARPA Programs

An ARPA generates major advances through intelligently managed risk-taking. The fundamental unit of work for an ARPA is a solutions-oriented R&D program that aims at achieving a previously unimaginable goal. Each program has a fixed term, typically 3-5 years, and each is designed, executed, and transitioned by an ARPA program manager.

Design

The program manager designs the program to achieve a bold goal—one that may seem impossible but that, if demonstrated, could catalyze a major advance. They build a rigorous plan to achieve the goal. A set of questions known as the Heilmeier Catechism¹⁰ (from an iconic DARPA director in the 1970s) guides program development:

• What are you trying to do? Articulate your objectives using absolutely no jargon.
• How is it done today, and what are the limits of current practice?
• What is new in your approach and why do you think it will be successful?
• Who cares? If you are successful, what difference will it make?
• What are the risks?
• How much will it cost?
• How long will it take?
• What are the mid-term and final “exams” to check for success?

These questions are easy—even obvious—to ask, but surprisingly difficult to answer well. Program managers typically grapple with them over 6-12 months to design a strong program, and agency leaders use them to guide their judgement about the potential of a new program for approval. The questions also guide program execution.

Execution

Once a program is launched, the program manager contracts with whichever organizations are needed to achieve the program’s goal. That typically means companies, universities, nonprofits, other parts of government, and other organizations with the talent and capacity to conduct the necessary R&D. Contracting this work has the obvious benefit that the ARPA doesn’t have to hire staff and provide facilities for this R&D. But even more important is the fact that this approach mobilizes individuals and organizations. Over the course of the program, these participants become a community that not only delivers the program vision but can help drive it forward beyond the term of the ARPA program.

The work of the program is to weave the threads of research from multiple domains together with lessons from the reality of use and practice in order to develop and demonstrate prototype systems or capabilities. The program rigorously evaluates how well its innovation works, how it works in specific environments, and how it can be scaled. 

An ARPA program often draws on basic research and often generates fresh research, but research is an input rather than the objective. Unlike the management of basic research, these programs drive to a specific goal. They may sometimes resemble product development, but for a prototype product that serves a public purpose rather than a visible market opportunity. Often, they require a much higher degree of risk than product development because they reach for a barely feasible goal. 

An ARPA program aims to demonstrate that a powerful new approach can work despite the risk inherent in trying something radically different. This requires actively managing the multiple efforts within the ARPA program. An ARPA program manager accelerates lines of work that show great promise and redirects or stops work that is not yielding results. They nimbly reallocate resources to keep wringing out risk and driving to the program’s objective.  

Transition

In parallel, the program manager engages the decision makers who can advance, adopt, implement, and fully scale the results of the program. If the breakthrough will require commercialization, that could include additional companies, investors, and entrepreneurs. If full-scale implementation requires changes in policies and practices, that means engaging regulators, policy makers, and community organizations. Understanding the needs and realities of implementers is important from the early stages of program design. It is sometimes the case that these implementers are skeptical about the program’s bold goal at the start. As the program unfolds, they are invited to program reviews and demonstrations. The program strives to address their concerns and may even provide support for their internal analyses, evaluations, and trials. When these engagements work well, the ARPA program manager is able to bring implementers along on the journey from wild dream to demonstrated reality. Successful transition starts when they change their minds about what’s possible. And the ultimate societal impact of the ARPA program comes when these implementers have fully scaled the ARPA breakthrough. 

A fully successful program ends with a convincing demonstration of a new capability; a community that can carry it forward; and decision makers who are ready to support and fund implementation in products, services, policies, and practices.

ARPA program managers

None of this can happen without exceptionally capable program managers. An ARPA organization hires program managers on fixed terms to design, manage, and transition these high-impact programs. ARPA leadership coaches program managers, helps build partnerships and remove obstacles, and approves and oversees all programs. But it puts enormous responsibility and authority on the shoulders of program managers. 

ARPA program managers come from backgrounds in companies, universities, nonprofits, and other parts of government, and they serve at different times in their careers. They bring a “head in the stars, feet on the ground” blend of these key characteristics: 

• The program manager is an expert in a relevant area. 
• They see the big picture and navigate easily from details to strategic outcomes. 
• They are driven to achieve a major impact. Sometimes this is manifested as a constructive impatience with the limitations of conventional organizations and approaches. 
• They are able to project a vision. 
• They are able to build and lead a community to accomplish goals. 
• They have a sound ethical core. 

ARPA portfolios

ARPA leadership approves a series of individual programs, constructing and managing a full portfolio that is diversified to maximize total impact despite the risk inherent in each program. Every program learns, not all succeed, and failure is accepted as integral to the mission.

Plan of Action 

Based on these core elements of a successful ARPA model, we offer four recommendations for policy makers as they establish new ARPA organizations. 

Purpose

Clearly and succinctly define the vital national purpose for the new ARPA. An ARPA exists to create breakthroughs for an important public need. For DARPA, this is national security. For ARPA-E, it is economic and energy security, and for IARPA, it is national intelligence. 

Operations

Set up the agency to function autonomously, with its own budget, staff and organization, and operating practices. An ARPA is a deliberate counterpoint to work already underway, originating from a recognition that something more and different is needed to achieve our national goals. An ARPA will not succeed if it is tightly integrated into its parent organization. Ironically, it may be more difficult to start a successful new ARPA in an area that already has robust federal research, because of the inclination to fit the square-peg ARPA into round-hole traditional research methods. The ARPA model is completely different than our well-honed approach to sponsoring fundamental research. The ARPA solutions-driven approach would not work well for greatly needed and highly valued basic research, and conversely, funding methods for fundamental research will not lead to ARPA-scale breakthroughs for our societal problems. This work is different, and it will require different people, different practices, and a different culture to succeed. 

Independent funding is also necessary. To develop a portfolio of programs with the potential for high impact, an ARPA requires funding that is sufficient to achieve its programs’ objectives. ARPA programs are sized not just to generate a new result, but to convincingly demonstrate a new approach, often across a variety of circumstances, in order to prove that the method can succeed and scale. 

The agency’s chain of command and Congressional authorizers and appropriators provide important oversight. However, the ARPA organization itself must bear the responsibility for designing, selecting, managing, and transitioning its programs. A new ARPA should report directly to the cabinet secretary to maintain independence and secure the support needed to achieve its mission. 

Authorities

Give the new ARPA flexible hiring and contracting authorities to draw new and extraordinary talent to the nation’s challenges. Flexible hiring mechanisms have proven to be very valuable in allowing ARPAs to attract the rare combination of expertise, vision, and execution required in great program managers. In addition, program managers must be able to contract with exceptional people and teams in companies, universities, nonprofits, and other government entities to achieve their aggressive program goals. ARPAs have used flexible contracting mechanisms to move fast and work effectively with all kinds of organizations, not just those already designed to work with government.

Flexible hiring and contracting authorities are extremely helpful tools for an ARPA organization. It’s worth noting, though, that flexible authorities by themselves do not an ARPA make. 

Leadership

Appoint an exceptional leadership team, hold them to a high standard for impact, and create room for them to deliver on the full potential of the ARPA model. A new ARPA’s director will be responsible for building an organization with people, practices, and culture honed for the mission of creating breakthroughs. This person must bring fresh and creative ways of looking at seemingly impossible problems, a rigorous approach to managing risk, a drive to achieve outsized impact, and an ability to lead people. A strong ethical orientation is also essential for a role that will grapple with the implications of powerful new capabilities for our society. 

The person to whom the ARPA director reports also plays an essential role. This individual must actively prevent others from trying to set the agenda for the ARPA. They enable the ARPA organization to hire program managers who don’t look like other department staff, undertake programs that conventional wisdom decries, manage programs actively, and develop a culture that celebrates bold risk-taking in pursuit of a great national purpose. They hold the ARPA organization accountable for the mission of creating breakthroughs and create room for the unconventional methods needed to realize that mission. 

Note that these four recommendations about purpose, independence, authorities, and leadership are interconnected. All are necessary to build the foundation for a successful new ARPA, and cherry-picking the easy ones will not work. 

Conclusion

A total of 87 years of experience across three different ARPA organizations have provided many lessons about how to build and run an organization that creates breakthroughs for an important national purpose. In establishing any new ARPA, both Congress and the Administration must create the space and allocate the resources that will allow it to flourish and realize its mission. 

Like its programs, a new ARPA will itself be a high-risk, high-reward experiment. If our challenges were modest, or if our current innovation methods were sufficient, there would be no need to try these kinds of experiments. But the problems we face today demand powerful new approaches. Adapting the ARPA model and aiming it at the most critical challenges ahead can create breakthroughs that redefine what is possible for our future. Let’s do everything possible to start new ARPAs on the right track/

Summary

The next administration should launch national Place-Based Public-Private Partnerships for Innovation (P4I) to supercharge American innovation by leveraging the power of proximity and partnerships, and in so doing, lay the foundation for a new and more inclusive era of American prosperity.

The P4I initiative will catalyze the formation and growth of vibrant Innovation Zones (IZs), creating powerful points of convergence that weave together place-based investments with educational, research, entrepreneurship, and economic supports to advance inclusive economic development from the American heartland to the coasts. IZs will catalyze the public-private development of mixed-use innovation hubs that house and support: training programs to prepare diverse and resilient labor forces; advanced research and development (R&D) activities undertaken by partnerships between universities and industry; and, incubators, accelerators, and investor groups to incubate, grow, and retain high-tech businesses.

P4I should be implemented by an interagency committee convened by the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP) under the auspices of the President’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology (PCAST). An interagency initiative will be critical for success, mobilizing federal agencies that share responsibility for all aspects of innovation and economic development policy, including STEM R&D, formation and growth of U.S. innovation industries (small to large), and innovation-based economic and workforce development.

Summary

The history of the United States is replete with examples of how foundational new technologies can transform the economy and create jobs. From the automobile to the transistor to recombinant DNA, foundational technologies have enabled an expanding middle class and prosperity for millions of Americans. The federal government played a vital role in providing and enabling early market development and applications for these technologies. The United States must rededicate itself to promoting new technologies beyond the research and development phase, if it is to maintain a position of global economic leadership and successful transition to the 21st century economy. 

The U.S. government should create a Foundational Technology Development and Deployment Office within the Department of Commerce that retains flexible financing authority to support market-pull programs for early-stage commercialization of innovative firms. An annual $50 billion authorization, for five years, would spark nascent strategic industries (e.g., new energy production and distribution, advanced manufacturing, synthetic biology, materials, robotics, mobility, space exploration, and next-generation semiconductors), and would be critical to transitioning the U.S. workforce for the 21st century economy. With the success of such an office, the U.S. will cement itself as the global locus of frontier technology industries. The country could also ensure that the economic spillovers from innovation are distributed more equally across socio-economic groups, through the creation of more domestic, advanced manufacturing that creates middle-skill jobs.

Summary

The United States government needs to radically change our national approach to the commercial growth of frontier tech technology companies (e.g., new energy production and distribution, advanced manufacturing, synthetic biology, materials, robotics, mobility, space exploration, and next-generation semiconductors). Frontier tech startups can advance our nation’s future global competitive advantage, providing an opportunity to create high-tech and low-tech jobs and reshore other jobs. Coupling investment in the frontier tech innovation ecosystem with workforce training will allow the U.S. to reinvent and revitalize aspects of our declining or offshored industrial sectors and rebuild the country’s manufacturing capabilities.

The U.S. government should create a $500M fund and an administration authority that allows relevant government agencies to create public-private partnerships. This requires collaboration with private capital providers that utilizes public funding to incentivize private investment in early stage frontier tech companies. The goal is not to subsidize private investment capital in areas where the current free market system is working, but rather to identify those critical national industrial base areas where private capital is insufficiently investing and use matching grants to spur early stage private investment. This early partnership will allow increased access and collaboration between historically siloed government and venture capital innovation ecosystems. For frontier tech companies, whose growth requires both public and private capital, the U.S. must utilize our resources more efficiently to create a globally competitive future economic base.

Summary

Manufacturing is a critical sector for American economic wellbeing. The value chains in the American economy that rely on manufactured goods account for 25% of employment, over 40% of gross domestic product, and almost 80% of research and development spending in the United States. Yet U.S. leadership in manufacturing is eroding, leaving a large part of our working class behind an ever-advancing, upper-middle class. To restore U.S. leadership in manufacturing and rebuild manufacturing as a route to quality jobs for Americans, the federal government should double down on advanced manufacturing nationwide. This proposal outlines a series of steps to leverage existing infrastructure and efforts with the Advanced Manufacturing Institutes to reboot U.S. manufacturing.