Institute for Progress

We hope everyone had a lovely Independence Day weekend! Last month, we launched a few major projects: The Atlas of Innovation, a tool to help funders navigate the world of innovation funding mechanisms. As funders answer questions about their innovation goal, the Atlas guides them to one of 13 funding approaches in the innovation library, explaining when the approach works well and how it can fail.

It was a packed month at IFP! We helped launch a new Focused Research Organization to accelerate the development of new medicines, published a to-do list for a great Congressional housing bill, and put a price tag on national AI readiness. One big announcement to flag upfront: we’re hiring a Member of Technical Staff. We’re looking for a full-stack software engineer to give our 35-person team the leverage of a think tank 10 times its size.

We're excited to once again be co-hosting the Progress Conference with the Roots of Progress Institute, October 8–11 in Berkeley, CA. The event will sell out, so be sure to apply by the May 31 deadline if you want to attend. Hewson Duffy joined as an Editorial Fellow. Previously, Hewson was a summer fellow at the Centre for the Governance of AI, studied Computer Science and History at Harvard, and was a Magazine Chair at The Crimson.

Financial Times, Politico, and NBC News quoted Alec Stapp, Saif Khan, and Tim Fist discussing the Pentagon’s designation of Anthropic as a supply chain risk, arguing the move will discourage AI companies from working with the federal government.

Brielle Hill joined us as our Director of Operations. Previously, Brielle was the Chief of Staff for the Economic Security and Technology Department at CSIS and Associate Director for the Wadhwani AI Center. The New York Times quotes Tim Fist on the shortcomings of China’s chip industry: “Chinese companies will most likely make just 2% as many AI chips as foreign firms do this year.” The Washington Post mentions IFP’s work on building energy capacity fast to power AI development.

The Launch Sequence is now open for new pitches: With more than $25 billion flowing into AI resilience and AI-for-science from funders like the OpenAI Foundation and the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative, we’re building a collection of concrete projects to accelerate science, strengthen security, and adapt institutions for advanced AI. Submit a short pitch, and we’ll help develop your idea, connect you with funders, and get it built. We’re offering a $10,000 honorarium for published proposals.

Hi friends, There were two major announcements in the world of science policy recently, pointing in a bold new direction for the NSF and NIH: The National Science Foundation announced Tech Labs, a new initiative that will invest up to $1 billion over five years in large-scale, long-term funding to scientific teams working outside traditional university structures. It’s one of the most significant experiments in federal research funding in decades. Reps.

We’re hiring for our editorial team. If you’re an eagle-eyed editor with a passion for counterfactual policy impact, apply here. The deadline is January 19th, with a minimum salary of $110,000 (and potential for more based on experience). DC or NYC preferred, but open to remote candidates. Remember: We are offering a $3,000 bounty to whoever refers our hire. The deadline to apply for our PhD-level course on the Economics of Science, Ideas, and Innovation is today. Apply here.

We launched Factory Settings, a newsletter focused on lessons learned from the CHIPS Program Office, which was tasked with deploying $39 billion in public money to reshore semiconductor manufacturing. Subscribe for weekly insights on industrial policy and state capacity from the original CHIPS leadership team: Mike Schmidt, Todd Fisher, and Sara Meyers. We also relaunched the Macroscience newsletter, now helmed by Andrew Gerard.

Hope you had a fun Halloween! We have a few open roles right now that you should be aware of: • We’re hiring a Director of Operations to improve and oversee the internal systems that power IFP’s work — from finance and compliance to HR and organizational planning. This role will be the senior-most operations role in the organization and includes managing the operations team and ensuring the organization’s day-to-day operations are seamless, compliant, and scalable.