n fiscal year 1995, NASA began a systematic, agencywide process to identify those programs with commercial potential—that is, the potential to yield an innovation that could result in commercial application and benefit. This inventory allows technology transfer and commercialization to be more proactive and better focus its limited resources.

From fiscal year 1995 to fiscal year 1996, NASA identified an additional 16 percent (from 22 percent to 38 percent) of its programs with commercial potential. This represents a 73-percent increase over fiscal year 1995. The programs identified as having commercial potential represent a fiscal year 1996 NASA investment of $4.7 billion. To date, these programs have produced 4,726 individual innovations that may result in commercial applications and benefits.