Congressmen representing two of California’s centers of innovation — San Diego and Silicon Valley — introduced new legislation Tuesday that would support incubators at colleges and universities across the country.
Rep. Scott Peters from San Diego and Rep.Eric Swalwell from San Francisco’s East Bay introduced the Startup Americas Students Act during a tour of the prototyping facility at UC San Diego’s Qualcomm Institute.
“Millennials are the least entrepreneurial generation America has known,” said Swalwell, who added that the high cost of student loans made it difficult for them to take financial risks. Funding incubators on college campus could help address this situation, he said.
Swalwell is the chair of the Future Forum, a group of the youngest Democratic members of Congress focused on issues and opportunities for millennial Americans.
Peters described Swalwell as “an important ally” on issues involving the innovation economy, and noted that UC San Diego had excellent examples of the new ideas that incubators could produce.
The Congressmen met with students who have formed the Additive Rocket Company to develop light, low-cost rocket engines made by 3-D printers.
“We saw some great demonstrations right here,” Peters said, noting that NASA was also impressed with the students’ work.
The startup bill would use existing funds from the Small Business Administration to start incubators like the one at UC San Diego at at other universities, and even community colleges.
A companion bill, the Building Opportunities for Student Startups Act, would study the role incubators and accelerators, including those based at universities, play in the commercialization of federally-funded research and regional economic development.
A staff member at the UC San Diego prototyping facility noted that there is a big difference between academics and real-world prototyping, where the answers aren’t known in advance.
Peters and Swalwell were also holding a town hall for students and planned to meet with tech entrepreneurs in downtown San Diego.
