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We Need Hands on Deck to Find Matches For The Critical SC Endowed Chairs Program. Who's We? Well That's the Problem.

I was one of a small group of people who traveled to Austin, TX about eight years ago to visit with George Kozmetski to discuss how he had been the architect of the endowed chair program to launch what has become Austin's knowledge based economy. He said to find where industry needed best in the world talent, build research chairs at the universities to attract and develop that talent, and then when students graduated they would go to work for industry to advance the state. He said numerous times during the day to Focus on the Talent, because the need for world-class talent is what academia and industry have in common.

As a result of this trip, the SC Legislature passed the SC Centers of Economic Excellence Act, to replicate in SC the model that worked so successfully in Austin. From inception the endowed chairs program was designed to be a partnership between the state, the research universities, and strategic industry partners.

The clearest success to date of this program is the Clemson University International Center for Automotive Research. Funding from the state has been matched by BMW and Michelin to create four endowed research chairs at the Campbell Graduate Engineering Center which are at the core of CU-ICAR. As a result of CU-ICAR, SC successfully leveraged our relationship with the BMW Manufacturing Corp to attract the BMW Information Technology Research Center to the state, and Clemson has developed a closer working relationship with the Michelin Research and Development Corporation as well as with Timken, who has now also located a research facility at CU-ICAR.

But the endowed chair program has drifted since it was created, and the private match is no longer required to be from a company that can create jobs and commercialize the university research generated in South Carolina. the Greenville News recently reported that, "The University of South Carolina in April proposed using an $800,000 signing bonus from ESPN for a new broadcast contract as the school's match for an equal amount of a grant from the state's endowed chairs program for solid oxide fuel cell research."

Since this post was first published, the the Greenville News reported that the Endowed Chair Review Board has rejected the ESPN money as a private match for the state's investment. That is the right decision, and hopefully they will stick to their guns.

The idea is to match state money with strategic private money that will result in jobs and commercialization of intellectual property in South Carolina. The USC proposal fails this test. Governor Sanford is right when through his spokesman he says, “It's completely against the intent of this program. The idea of this program is matching public sector dollars with private-sector dollars related to research.”

The Greenville News also notes, "'The Solid Oxide Fuel Cell Center is on the leading edge of R&D and is excellent science, so we would like to move forward with that. In fact, its director, Dr. Ken Rieifsnider, just secured the largest grant ($12.5 million) in the history of the university.'" This is terrific for South Carolina. Now let's put all hands on deck to help USC find a strategic private partner that is the equivalent of BMW and Michelin at CU-ICAR. We need to be scouring the world in partnership with USC and Dr. Rieifsnider to find a strategic private partner to do this endowed chair match correctly. Dr. Rieifsnider's research is an example of the tremendous opportunities the state is missing the opportunity to capitalize on.

The universities have their own economic development resources, and they need to be more accountable for their results. They need to find strategic business partners to match their endowed chair requests. And Governor Sanford shouldn't get off easily in dismissing the Endowed Chair program. The SC Department of Commerce, which reports directly to the Governor, and through them the economic development community across the state, has relationships with industry across South Carolina and around the world. The Endowed Chair program is a perfect opportunity where we need to be proactive in helping our three research universities find private strategic matches for state funds that can grow SC's knowledge economy.

So who is "we." Well that's the problem. No one in the state is in charge of a comprehensive economic development strategy for South Carolina. Our efforts are fragmented, and as a result, we're investing millions of dollars in projects and programs that are not aligned and so do not build on one another. Collectively we have incredible relationships with global corporations around the world. But no one is the quarterback for pulling all these relationships together.

There is low hanging fruit in terms of business that can be approached to partner with our research universities. I recently had a discussion with a leader of a global company with a production facility in South Carolina, but who also is a research and development leader in their industry globally. This executive is well known to the research universities, to the business community, and to the economic development community in the state. Given that this company has a state-of-the-art manufacturing facility in South Carolina, I asked him if anyone had ever approached him about how SC research universities could partner with his company to attract some of his company's R&D to South Carolina to compliment the production they do here. I was stunned that he said no, he had never been asked. It is unbelievable that almost a decade into the Endowed Chair program one of the most prominent businesses in the state has not been asked to partner with the research universities.

The problem with the endowed chair program as it has been executed to date is that the research it supports is too often led by the universities alone, not by a partnership of the universities and industry, as the program was originally designed. But the universities don't know where the viable markets are, like industry does, and so the universities driving the program alone will not be as effective in creating jobs and commercializing the research in SC as they will be if they have a strategic private partner.

The name of the legislation is the SC Centers of Economic Excellence Act. This program is crucial to the future of South Carolina, but we must keep "Economic" at the center of the program to make it as successful as it needs to be in stimulating South Carolina's knowledge economy.