Funding for Nanotechnology Initiative Reaches US$27 Billion

The National Nanotechnology Initiative (NNI) has released a supplement to the US President’s 2019 Budget where it was revealed that cumulative funding for the initiative since 2001 is now almost US$27 billion.

Established in 2001 and authorised in 2003, the total funding amount includes the additional US$1.4 billion request from President Trump for 2019.

NNI, a US government research and development initiative that involves 20 federal and independent agencies to advance research and development of nanoscale projects, said in the document that investments in 2017 and 2018 were higher than the requested levels.

As noted by NNI, the investments in 2017 as reported by participating agencies under the agency’s umbrella were US$1.55 billion, which was higher than the requested investment of US$1.44 billion. The initiative reasoned that the core investments are targeted at research and development (R&D) where success rate of proposals can’t be anticipated.

Further, NNI said that the support from the government reflected the importance of the investments required to advance the complex field.

“The NNI investments in 2017 and 2018 and those proposed for 2019 reflect a sustained emphasis on broad, fundamental research in nanoscience to provide a continuing pipeline of new discoveries that will enable future transformative commercial products and services,” reads the statement.

NNI said the 2019 Budget supports nanoscale science, engineering and technology R&D at 12 agencies. The five federal organizations with the largest investments are the Department of Health and Human Science (HHS), the National Science Foundation (NSF), the Department of Energy (DOE), the Department of Defense (DOD) and the Department of Commerce (DOC).

In the document, NNI also gave a breakdown of how the funding would be spent with the initiative awarding 39 percent to foundational research, 28 percent to applications/devices and 16 percent to infrastructure and instrumentation.

The organizations and institutions under NNI progress towards four common goals, including: advancing a world class nanotechnology research, fostering the transfer of new technologies into products for commercial and public benefit and supporting responsible development of nanotechnology.

As noted by NNI, nanotechnology ‘affects all aspects of life’–with NNI supporting more research and transformation of nanotechnology into commercial products, many companies and investors stand to gain from it in the future.

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Securities Disclosure: I, Bala Yogesh hold no direct investment interest in any company mentioned in this article.