Forum for Innovation

The Forum for Innovation (Forum), the public policy think tank of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce Foundation, provides research and insight into the emerging issues impacting the free enterprise system and the business community. Through its Scholars & Fellows program, the Business Horizon Quarterly, the Business Horizon Series, and other content platforms and programmatic offerings, the Forum seeks to inform business and government leaders as well as proactively drive public debate in a future-leaning manner.

OUR PROGRAMS

The Forum aims to be the first place that business leaders, policymakers, and other vested stakeholders go to for high-level discussions on and exploration of issues, challenges, and ideas that will shape the future of free enterprise and entrepreneurship. Among other research activities, its offerings include:

• The Scholars & Fellows Program, which brings together noted thinkers to identify emerging issues and conduct original research for the American business community;
• The Business Horizon Quarterly, a journal devoted to highlighting the work of thought leaders on the future of business and related emerging issues;
• The Business Horizon Series, which examines emerging topics, trends, and industries through in-depth research and surveys, events, and publications; and, 
• The Emerging Issues series, which includes a set of forward-looking programs, such as Emerging Issues Dinners, Books that Drive the Debate, and the Business Horizon Retreat.

HISTORY

Previously known as the National Chamber Foundation, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce Foundation and its research arm, the Forum for Innovation were founded on January 1, 2013. NCF was created in 1967 to provide in-depth analyses of critical economic and policy issues facing the nation. NCF founded a number of programs to address emerging critical issues. In the early 1980′s, NCF established the Center for International Private Enterprise (CIPE) in response to President Reagan’s Democracy Initiative. Today, CIPE continues to strengthen the democracy around the globe through private enterprise and market-oriented reform. It became a stand-alone affiliate of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce in 1985.

During the next twenty years, NCF founded several other programs including the Investment for Growth initiative (now the Center for Capital Markets Competitiveness) to response to the complex regulations of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act in 2004, and the Intellectual Property initiative, which become the Global Intellectual Property Initiative (GIPC) in 2008.