OMB R&D Priorities for Agency FY 2024 Budgets

Each year, the White House’s Office of Management and Budget (OMB) releases a memorandum which directs agencies to focus resources on a specific set of research and development (R&D) priorities for the following fiscal year (FY). Specifically, the memorandum requires federal entities to note the priorities in their budget submissions and hold cross-agency collaborations to advance the R&D activities. According to the latest memo, the priorities “will require Federal investments in R&D; actionable and equitable measurement of program outcomes; science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) education, engagement, and workforce development; research infrastructure; public access to Federally funded research; and, technology transfer and commercialization.”

The following are OMB’s multi-agency R&D priorities for FY 2024:

• Prepare for and prevent pandemics
• Reduce cancer death rate by half
• Tackle climate change
• Advance national security and technological competitiveness
• Innovate for equity
• Cultivate equitable STEM education and workforce
• Promote Open Science and Community-Engaged R&D

These priorities are not a far departure from the ones outlined in the memorandum for FY 2023, revealing a consistency in Biden Administration ideologies. In fact, reducing the death rate from cancer by half is the only clearest addition to the FY 2024 set.

The FY 2024 OMB memo provides additional detail on how agencies should promote technological advances to preserve U.S. competitiveness and national security. Top technologies areas promoted under this R&D priority include trustworthy artificial intelligence (AI); quantum information science (QIS); advanced communications technologies; microelectronics; nanotechnology; high-performance computing; biotechnology and biomanufacturing; robotics; advanced manufacturing; financial technologies; undersea technologies; and space technologies.

Agencies must seek to minimize the bias and discrimination in the R&D of these technology areas, while also sharing non-sensitive data for large-scale analysis to address critical challenges and advance the technologies. Moreover, the memo calls for domestic and large-scale implementation of these technologies, with investments targeting U.S. manufacturing, job creation and economic prosperity. R&D investments, however, must also avert significant risk to the nation’s biological, nuclear and cyber weapons through strengthened cyber infrastructures and sound supply chain processes.

A brief synopsis for each of the remaining priorities is below:

Contractor Implications

The OMB FY 2024 R&D priorities will require an assortment of contractor support. Aside from administrative and programmatic provisions, federal agencies need a stable and secure IT infrastructure to pursue the R&D work ahead.  A bolstered data ecosystem is also required to fulfill the R&D priorities. Areas such as data sharing and accessibility platforms, visualization and analytics are indirect opportunities stemming from the future R&D priorities.