The spatial distribution of public support for AI research

Abstract A spatial distributional analysis of the population of Phase II research projects funded by the US SBIR program in FY 2020 shows differences across states in projects focused on artificial intelligence (AI). AI is a relatively new research field, and this paper contributes to a better understanding of government support for such research. We find that AI projects are concentrated in states with complementary AI research resources available from universities nationally ranked in terms of their own AI research. To achieve a more diverse spatial distribution of AI-related technology development, the availability of complementary AI research resources must be expanded. We suggest that the National Science Foundation’s National AI Research Institutes represents an important step in this direction.