Indiana’s tech hub projects still on track despite federal uncertainty, conference panelist says

About 3,500 people are in Indianapolis this week for the Global Entrepreneurship Congress, a four-day gathering focused on entrepreneurship, innovation and related issues. (IBJ photo/Chad Williams)

Indiana’s three planned technology hubs—for which the state has been selected for up to $350 million in federal funding—are still in the works despite ongoing uncertainties on the federal level, according to the Indiana organization coordinating work on all three projects.

“Those programs are still active,” Applied Research Institute General Counsel Andrew Kossack told a group Tuesday during a panel discussion at the Global Entrepreneurship Congress.

The GEC, which began Monday and runs through Thursday, has drawn about 3,500 attendees from around the world to the Indiana Convention Center for talks, networking and activities aimed at promoting entrepreneurship around the world.

Kossack was one of the speakers on a panel focused on the role public-private partnerships play in innovation.

In 2023, the U.S. Department of Defense selected Indiana’s Silicon Crossroads Microelectronic Commons Hub as one of eight around the country to receive federal funding to support the domestic microelectronics production.

Funding for the microelectronics hubs around the U.S. comes from the CHIPS and Science Act. (CHIPS stands for Creating Helpful Incentives to Produce Semiconductors.) Indiana’s initial funding for Silicon Crossroads was $33 million, a figure Kossack said currently stands at $73.4 million.

The Heartland BioWorks Hub, which will focus on biomanufacturing and is overseen by the U.S. Department of Commerce, was selected in July 2024 as one of 12 federally designated projects to receive funding. Heartland BioWorks is in line for $51 million in federal funding, also from the CHIPS Act.

And in October 2023, the U.S. Department of Energy announced the Midwest Alliance for Clean Hydrogen, or MachH2 for short, had been selected as one of its funded hydrogen hubs. MachH2, a coalition that involves Indiana, Illinois and Michigan, could receive up to $1 billion in total funding, $225 million of which would go to Indiana projects, Kossack said. The federal hydrogen hubs effort, designed to accelerate clean hydrogen production, is funded by the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law passed in 2021.

President Donald Trump has criticized the CHIPS Act, calling the Biden-era legislation “a horrible, horrible thing” in his address to Congress in March. And in April, Trump ordered the creation of the U.S. Investment Accelerator, an entity within the Department of Commerce that would, among other things, oversee the CHIPS Act, with a focus on “negotiating much better deals than those of the previous administration.”

Trump has also criticized the Inflation Reduction Act.

Kossack said his office is in regular contact with the three federal agencies overseeing the three technology hub programs, and personnel in those agencies indicate that Indiana’s three hub projects remain on track.

The funding for each project works on a reimbursement basis, meaning that Kossack’s office incurs project expenses and then asks the appropriate federal agency to reimburse those expenses.

“They’re paying the bills, so that’s a good thing,” Kossack said.

Of the three tech hub programs, Kossack said his office is most closely watching the hydrogen hub program because it has the most uncertainty around it.

The public-private partnership panel was among dozens of discussions, presentations and workshops at Tuesday’s session of the GEC, on topics ranging from venture funding and building entrepreneurial ecosystems to breaking into the U.S. market; building a startup in the space industry; and startup activity in Asia, among others.