IntroductionEach year NIST interacts with a variety of academic institutions, private businesses and government entities in the pursuit of its mission to promote U.S. innovation and competitiveness 1 . Information about the number of interactions among NIST and its partners and customers is important in understanding the breadth and impact of NIST laboratories, measurements, and services across the U.S. economy. Examining the types of interactions, including grants, awards, research agreements, technical services, education and purchased products between NIST and its partners can demonstrate the true size of NIST's footprint.NIST works directly with private businesses, academic institutions and government entities in a variety of ways; therefore, there are many avenues through which NIST can impact actors in the U.S. economy. The total number of annual interactions and the extent to which these interactions are dispersed geographically was previously unknown. In this study, we provide the annual number of NIST's interactions in several categories and the country-wide, geographical distribution of NIST's customers and partners, demonstrating the extent of NIST's reach in the U.S. economy. Key Findings• NIST interacted more than 300,000 times with domestic institutions from fiscal year 2010 through fiscal year 2014.• NIST involved itself directly in 68,478 interactions on average each year throughout the United States.• NIST connected with 6,731 unique, domestic institutions on average each year.

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In Science—The Endless Frontier, Vannevar Bush wrote that reaping the potential benefits of science conducted at federal laboratories requires the discoveries made in the laboratories be transferred to society. In federal laboratories, Offices of Research and Technology Applications (ORTAs) are tasked with transferring laboratory-developed technologies to the market, allowing society to reap the benefits provided by scientific investments. In fiscal year 2016, the Technology Partnerships Office of the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) conducted a first-of-its-kind survey of the ORTAs of more than 50 federal laboratories to obtain information on their organization and operation. We present descriptive analyses of the responses to this survey in two topical areas: organizational characteristics and technology transfer characteristics. We disaggregated the data across the dimension of budget size to describe similarities and differences in responses across the budget categories. Among the relationships we observed, we found that ORTAs with larger technology transfer budgets report higher frequencies of conducting internal technology transfer activities, such as patent prosecution (e.g., drafting patents, filing patent applications, and responding to actions from the patent office) and market analysis. Additionally, we provide context to the data by summarizing the relevant research on ORTAs at universities, and we present potential inferences that may be drawn from that body of research and applied to the data on ORTAs at federal laboratories.

This economic analysis brief summarizes the efforts and results of the data collection and analysis of NIST's patent licensee information. Summary statistics for licensees are provided for fiscal years 2006 through 2015. Included in the analysis are demographically descriptive variables such as the age, location, North American Industry Classification System (NAICS) codes, number of employees and geographic distribution of NIST licensees. Overall, this publication provides demographics of companies that licensed NIST technologies. Key Findings• NIST licensees are geographically well-dispersed across the United States and tend to be in urban/suburban areas.• NIST licensees tend to be with companies at least 5 years old.• The clear majority of NIST licensees have fewer than 500 employees at their locations.