Cortland County will be partnering once again in 2003 with NASA's Space Alliance Technology Outreach Program (SATOP), designed to make the engineering resources of the US space program available to small to medium sized businesses and encourage economic growth.

The Cortland BDC joined the SATOP Alliance in 2002 and will continue to oversee the implementation of the program in Cortland County.

"This is a great joint partnerships between government, educational institutions and the private sector to solve problems and innovate technical solutions," noted BDC Executive Director Linda Hartsock. "We have already had some success stories here in Cortland."

Businesses facing technical challenges may be able to receive up to 40 hours of free confidential engineering support from SATOP. The program is intended to help solve technology challenges which cannot be resolved by a company's own internal resources, or by commercially available services. Areas of expertise include, but are not limited to, mechanical, manufacturing, industrial, materials, structural, facilities, chemical, electrical, electronics, and environmental engineering.

The BDC serves as the point of contact for linking local companies with the technical resources of SATOP. To utilize the free service, a company with a specific technical need can contact the BDC who will work with SATOP to connect it with an engineer at NASA or a participating NASA contractor for resolution. Participating companies providing free technical services through NASA for this project include Lockheed Martin, Boeing, Sensis and many others. Also participating as providers of free technical consulting are educational institutions such as Syracuse University.

For more information on SATOP, call the BDC at 756-5005, or visit the SATOP web site at http://www.spacetechsolutions.com.