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The White House
Washington
September 25, 2000
Members of Congress:
I am pleased to forward with this letter Information Technology: The 21st
Century Revolution, a report prepared by the Interagency Working Group
on Information Technology Research and Development of the National Science
and Technology Council's Committee on Technology. This report supplements
the President's FY 2001 Budget and highlights the Information Technology Research
and Development (IT R&D) program's FY 2000 accomplishments and FY 2001
plans.
Our Nation is enjoying unprecedented prosperity and possibilities, built primarily
on decades of Federally-funded innovations in science and technology that
were translated by U.S. businesses into new products and services. The case
for adequate and sustained Federal investments in R&D is made most dramatically
in the information technology sector. Since 1995, more than a third of all
U.S. economic growth has resulted from IT enterprises. Today, more than 13
million Americans hold IT-related jobs, which are being added six times faster
than the rate of overall job growth.
Today's Federal IT R&D program enables the advancement of the technologies
needed in software, information infrastructures, and applications in support
of both the Nation's scientific and socio-ecomonic goals. These advances will
foster development of a world-class educational system, high-quality health
care, as well as ensuring continued economic growth and a strong national
defense. New computing and information infrastucture technologies will provide
for the secure and confidential delivery of the tomorrow's IT-related products
and services to our homes, schools and businesses.
This report describes all aspects
of the interagency IT R&D program -- the base High Performance computing
and Communications (HPCC) Program, the Next Generation Internet (NGI) initiative,
as well as the new activities begun under last yearŐs Information Technology
for the Twenty-First Century (IT2) initiative, and our proposed
FY 2001 increment -- as a single integrated program. As in previous years,
this portfolio is a well-coordinated multi-agency investment that leverages
expertise across eleven agencies so to maximize returns, both financial and
technical.
Proposed new areas of IT R&D focus on developing technologies for improved
software designs and enhanced productivity in software development, and to
better understand and respond to the socio-economic implications of the information
technology revolution. Our current activities are expanded in high-end computing
R&D and high-end computing infrastructure and applications, large scale
networking (including the Next Generation Internet (NGI) initiative), human-computer
interfaces and information management, ad high confidence software and systems.
these activities will further our progress toward the goals for long-term,
high-risk R&D identified in the 1999 report of the President's Information
Technology Advisory Committee.
As we embark upon the 21st century,
the Administration looks forward to working with Congress to continue investing
in America's future and ensure its continued prosperity by furthering our
commitment in information technology research and development.
Sincerely,
Neal Lane
Assistant to the President
for Science and Technology
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