Reagan Wants U.S. Technology to Aid Business

President Reagan signed an executive order on Friday to remove obstacles to the transfer of federally developed science and technology to private business.

The order, aimed at promoting cooperation among government, private business and academia, is the latest move in Reagan’s push to improve America’s ability to compete internationally.

“It is important . . . to ensure that we maintain American pre-eminence in generating new knowledge and know-how in advanced technologies,” Reagan said in a statement released in Los Angeles by press aides accompanying the President on his California visit.

A Vigorous Enterprise

“I believe a vigorous science and technology enterprise involving the private sector is essential to our economic and national security as we approach the 21st Century,” the statement said.

Among other things, the executive order will:

--Encourage federal laboratories to collaborate with state and local governments, universities and business through cooperative research and development agreements.

--License intellectual property rights developed through cooperative research and development agreements.

--Encourage “science entrepreneurs” to act as conduits among federal laboratories, universities and private business.

In a speech Thursday to students and faculty at Purdue University, Reagan said federal laboratories “are among the largest and most productive centers of scientific research in the world. But in the past, there have been roadblocks set up between what was going on inside (the government) and the commercial world outside.”