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WILKES-BARRE &mdash; Teri Ooms, executive director at The Institute for Public Policy & Economic Development at Wilkes University, said it is incumbent on regional leaders to continue to promote a culture of innovation and creativity.
				&ldquo;Innovation in regional businesses, healthcare and educational institutions is difficult to measure directly, however,&rdquo; Ooms said. &ldquo;Several datasets presented here are limited, and many innovations in processes or practices occur without being counted.&rdquo;
				Ooms said through entrepreneurship and creative thinking, new ideas can be introduced, applied to real-world problems, and brought into the global marketplace. She said major areas of technology and innovation include research and development, scientific research, medical and pharmaceutical research, and information technology.
				The Technology and Innovation section of The Institute&rsquo;s 2020 Indicators Report identifies important indicators in Pennsylvania and Lackawanna and Luzerne counties, including technology and innovation-related occupations and industries, funding from federal programs supporting innovation (such as Small Business and Innovation Research Awards (SBIR), Small Business Technology Transfer Awards (STTR), and National Science Foundation (NSF) funding), clinical trials, venture capital investments and patents.
				Each of these indicators measures some aspect of technological development or innovation.
				Globally, Ooms said, economic activity is shifting more toward knowledge-based jobs and industries like education, healthcare and finance.
				&ldquo;Even traditional industries such as manufacturing and extraction are increasingly reliant on automation and other new technologies to stay competitive,&rdquo; Ooms said. &ldquo;When businesses innovate existing processes, products, or business models, they enhance their regions&rsquo; competitive advantages.
				&ldquo;Innovation can thus be a major driver of economic growth.&rdquo;
				STEM workforce
				Ooms said a strong STEM workforce signifies a culture of exploration and innovation. In this year&rsquo;s report, three occupation categories were examined &mdash; computer and mathematical occupations; life, physical, and social science occupations; and architecture and engineering occupations.
				Industries with high concentrations of these jobs are analyzed as well.
				In 2018, employment opportunities in STEM occupations generally increased in Luzerne County, yet decreased in Lackawanna County. Total STEM employment in both counties remains stable, however, and STEM jobs are key components of several industries that are prominent in the regional economy.
				Ooms said the area&rsquo;s strength in STEM industries lies not only in engineering, higher education, and research, but also in manufacturing, energy, business, and health care. The latter are the often overlooked laboratories of technology and innovation.
				Data for three STEM occupation categories were analyzed, Ooms said. In 2019, employment in architecture and engineering occupations shrank in both counties &mdash; Lackawanna County saw a larger drop at 5.7 percent, compared to less than one percent for Luzerne County.
				This occupation category employs about 3,150 workers across both areas. Luzerne County has generally seen a growth trend in this occupation category since 2014, while a clear trend is not evident in Lackawanna County.
				Ooms said life, physical, and social science employment has been generally stable in both counties over the past five years. She said despite small fluctuations from year to year, the two counties combined have averaged about 1,360 jobs in those occupations. In 2019, Lackawanna County experienced an employment decline and Luzerne County experienced a small increase.
				&ldquo;This is a continuation of the trend observed in last year&rsquo;s report,&rdquo; Ooms noted.
				Ooms said architectural, engineering and related services had the highest number of STEM jobs as well as the highest percentage of its workforce (62 percent) in STEM fields.
				The computer systems design and related services industry reported 637 of its employment in STEM occupations &mdash; 60 percent of that industry&rsquo;s total workforce.
				Data processing, hosting and related services constitute the third largest STEM industry in the region (535 STEM jobs; 41 percent of the industry workforce).
				Management of companies, colleges and universities, and various other industries also host large numbers of STEM workers.
				Several heavy industries, such as electricity generation, transmission, and distribution, medical equipment manufacturing, and plastics manufacturing are also represented.
				Computer and mathematical occupations have varied more from year to year. Both Lackawanna and Luzerne counties experienced declines in 2018, but followed up with increases of 17.7 and 16.2 percent, respectively, in 2019. The total number of regional workers in these occupations has ranged from just under 4,200 to over 5,100 over the period analyzed, and most recently stood at 4,900.
				Ooms said wages in all three of these STEM occupation groups were higher than wages in the region as a whole. In the two counties, architecture and engineering jobs have a median wage of $72,100 per year, and science occupations have median wage of $65,200 per year. Computer and mathematical occupations have a median wage of $68,600 per year. The regional median wage for all jobs is $35,100 per year.
				&ldquo;The wage gap between STEM and non-STEM workers is apparent across different experience levels for workers, though the size of the differential diminishes among more experienced individuals,&rdquo; Ooms said.
				Small Business Innovation Research
				Ooms said Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) is a competitive grant program run by the U.S. Small Business Administration to support research and development with the potential for commercialization.
				The Small Business Administration also coordinates the Small Business Technology Transfer (STTR) program, which encourages joint ventures between small businesses and nonprofit research institutions.
				Allocations for SBIR awards in Pennsylvania approached $87 million (a small decline from 2017) while the number of awardees grew to nearly 200, Ooms said. STTR awards grew to approximately $14.7 million, with the number of statewide awardees increasing from 32 to 38.
				Ooms said the number of clinical trials is a measure of health care innovation.
				&ldquo;The total number of active clinical trials presented in this report is considerably higher than those appearing in previous reports, as the statistics currently available represent all active trial sites,&rdquo; Ooms said. &ldquo;This involves some duplication of trials underway at multiple hospitals within a health system, for example. Regardless, a number of ongoing trials in the region relate to critical areas of health research, and as of early 2020 the total number of clinical trials counted in this manner is over 200 between the two counties.&rdquo;
				Oom said there are currently 149 active clinical trials in Luzerne County.
				Multi-stage venture capital 
				Ooms said the amount of multi-stage venture capital investments and angel fund investments in the region also highlight how much innovation is occurring in Northeastern Pennsylvania.
				&ldquo;Though there is no single, systematic source for data on venture capital investment, in 2019, over $15.2 million was invested directly by organizations reporting data to The Institute &mdash; including Ben Franklin Technology Partners of Northeastern Pennsylvania in addition to private sources,&rdquo; Ooms said. &ldquo;This is higher than totals obtained in previous years.&rdquo;
				Ooms said in Luzerne County, there was approximately$11.8 million in investment and nearly $4.4 million in Lackawanna County. Known recipients include manufacturers and information technology companies.
				&ldquo;Only known investments were counted, so this number is likely an under-representation of actual venture capital funding that supports innovation and entrepreneurship in the area,&rdquo; Ooms said.

ECONOMIC INDICATORSEconomic activityshifting towardknowledge-based jobs