Virginia Tech opens its doors to business collaborations as it expands the land-grant mission
by Su Clauson-Wicker
John S. Phillips (MBA '96) left the vice-presidency of a local bank in February to, as he puts it, "become the front door to Virginia Tech." In the new position of economic development officer for a university that can intimidate outsiders with its size, Phillips will help businesses find information, assistance, and potential partnerships within the university and coordinate economic development activities at Tech.
"I'm here to connect us to business and industry, to raise awareness of university resources," he says. "We're really doing what we've done all along, but we want to get credit for the help we've been giving and to become more accessible to the business community."
Virginia Tech has always interpreted its land-grant mission in terms of research and educational outreach to make agriculture more productive and efficient. Farms were the backbone of American society. Now Virginia Tech President Paul Torgersen is broadening Tech's outreach mission to support many industries in addition to agriculture and to play a more visible role in the state's economic development efforts.
Last fall the university created two new economic development committees, one internal and one composed of business leaders throughout the state, to review initiatives and recommend programs at Virginia Tech that enhance economic development. Both are chaired by President Torgersen.
"The university, in its essence, seeks to develop human capital," Torgersen says. "Our research centers work closely with their business counterparts. We will expand and make easier for public entry, but not fundamentally change, our efforts."
Phillips, the new economic developer, can produce a stack of descriptions of successful Tech/industry collaborations the size of a New York City telephone book. They range from the recent development of a portable multimedia system by the Virginia Technical Information Center and Center for Wireless Telecommunications (that created 30 new jobs and generated $9 million in sales for the Chesapeake client in the first year) to a faculty member's swift analysis of an electrical situation and go-ahead to a company considering building a high-tech plant under high-tension lines at a Smyth County site.
Almost two years ago President Torgersen himself played a pivotal, behind-the-scenes role in enticing a major semiconductor industry to build a plant in Virginia. Interestingly, Motorola was considering a location near Richmond, at least four hours from the Virginia Tech campus.
At the request of Wayne Sterling, Virginia's senior economic development official, Torgersen flew to Richmond for a private dinner with top Motorola officials. His role, Torgersen says, was to describe Tech's engineering capabilities. "Our ability to provide graduate education definitely would be an asset to their operation," he says.
Not long after Torgersen assured Motorola that Tech would assist Virginia Commonwealth University in starting an engineering school and would collaborate in offering graduate engineering courses in the Richmond area, Motorola gave Virginia a thumbs up. A Motorola-Siemans joint-venture, semi-conductor plant is under construction in Henrico County, and Motorola has announced plans to build an anchor site for future expansion in Goochland County.
Recently the Virginia Tech College of Engineering was one of four schools nationwide selected for a research and student-recruitment partnership with Motorola. Tech's courses in integrated circuit design and participation in the five-school Virginia Microelectronics Consortium were cited as advantages by Motorola Vice President Jim George (electrical engineering '64).
Virginia Tech's educational resources also figured as an important part of the commonwealth's package that persuaded Volvo GM to go forward with a $200-million plant expansion in Dublin rather than move to North Carolina. As part of that deal, Virginia Tech is acting in partnership with New River Community College to offer management and employee training to plant employees.
With over 1,500 industry-sponsored projects underway at a given time, it is possible only to give examples of how cutting-edge research at Virginia Tech is solving problems and contributing to Virginia's economic development.
A futile search for the right nail, for instance, led a Missouri pallet manufacturer to professors Mark White and George Stern at Virginia Tech's Brooks Forest Products Center in 1987. Together, the Libla Co. and the professors developed several new nails that hold pallets together better than any previous product. The nails were so successful that Libla recently sold off its pallet plant to concentrate on manufacturing nails through its Mid Continental Nail division. Libla built a new plant close to Virginia Tech in Radford and is still working with Tech to design and test new nails.
"Our association with Virginia Tech was a major factor in the decision to locate our newest plant in the Radford area," says company president David Libla. "We have used the expertise of Tech's Sardo Pallet Lab and its staff in the research and testing of our product, as well as in the training of our employees."
Eagle Eye Technologies, a Fairfax County company, was already developing a satellite-based, two-way paging device president Matthew Schor jokingly refers to as "Big Brother in the Sky," but needed product-development assistance. When the company applied for a grant, the Virginia Center for Innovative Technology (CIT) put Eagle Eye in touch with Warren Stutzman of the Virginia Tech Satellite Communications Group.
The Eagle Eye System, officially called SpaceTrack, uses low earth orbiting communication satellites to instantly relay the position of any person wearing the wrist-watch sized tag. The device has numerous military applications, such as downed pilot rescue, and can be used in the civilian sector for monitoring children, Alzheimer's patients, mountain climbers, and parolees.
Schor says the prototype should be ready by December.
Jim Rock, president of the Hearthsafe Co. of Norfolk, worked with the Virginia Tech entomology department years ago, when Tech tested his non-toxic roach powder, sold now as Getum. Now Tech entomologist William Robinson will soon run tests for another Hearthsafe collaboration, a bugless kitchen cabinet, which uses a carob attractant and a sticky substrate on exterior panels to keep cockroaches out of homeowners' food.
The project began when a Virginia cabinet company received the offer of a federal contract if it could develop a bugless cabinet. A CIT representative put the company in touch with Rock, who shot down their initial idea of coating the cabinets with pesticide as impractical. "The cabinets would have to bear an EPA label warning customers not to put food or food containers inside. They'd never sell," he says.
Three hours later, Rock proposed his baited coating idea, and they decided to collaborate. Virginia Tech will soon be testing the strength of the sticky substrate to hold cockroaches and the attractiveness of carob.
While it is not possible to include all the projects in which Virginia Tech is collaborating with the private sector to further knowledge and improve the quality of life, these examples hint at the diversity of the undertakings. Some projects come in through the Pamplin College of Business' Business Technology Center, which helps young technology oriented businesses. Others originate in classes, such as those taught by Y.A. Liu in chemical engineering and Doris Kincade in clothing and textiles, where teams of students consult with an industry, recommending ways to improve manufacturing processes, modernize plants, and cut costs.
"Yes, we'll use some of these recommendations," says Alliant Tech Systems plant manager Kenneth Dolph in Radford, whose company has hired several of those chemical engineering students. "We are extremely fortunate to have a resource like Virginia Tech in our own backyard."
Five Virginia Tech centers have been sponsored by the Center for Innovative Technology (CIT) as Technology Development Centers and often develop research collaborations with companies referred to them by the CIT.
The Center for Wireless Telecommunications is recognized as one of the nation's leading centers for wireless research. It supports the Virginia wireless industry through research, consulting and education, and is undertaking several new initiatives that include programs that focus on small and start-up businesses and defense conversion. In related activity, Virginia Tech's Mobile and Portable Radio Research Group is developing, along with Grayson Electronics of Lynchburg, a wireless modem that will provide low-cost, high-speed data transmission.
The Center for Advanced Ceramic Materials is targeting research on environmentally benign processes for manufacturing and applications of ceramics. The center's approach is to reduce the cost of environmental compliance by altering the quantity and characteristics of industrial waste streams, boosting competitiveness and protecting the environment. For example, the center developed a high temperature ceramic candle particulate filter that has been described as "the most cost-efficient pollution control device ever devised for advanced coal-fired power generating plants."
The Biobased Materials Technology Development Center focuses on developing technology to convert wood and agricultural residues to high-value materials such as absorbent fibers and chemicals, biodegradable plastics, high-performance adhesives, and specialty polymers. Projects include development of sorbents for clean-up of hazardous chemicals, assays for determining the biodegradability of materials, and cellulose beads to recover and purify proteins. The latter process was patented and licensed to Biotage Corp. of Charlottesville to manufacture and market.
The Center for Coal and Minerals Processing has developed the commercially available microbubble flotation technology to remove impurities from coal, again protecting the environment as well as extending the useful life of coal reserves This technology is now licensed to Kaiser Engineering.
The Technology Development Center for Fiber and Electro-optics is a part of the largest fiber-optic research and education center in the nation. Research in this field is sponsored by more than 30 companies, and six inventor patents are now licensed by Virginia companies.
The Power Electronics Technology Development Center is one of the largest power electronics centers in the international arena. Its University-Industry Partnership program enrolls more than 70 members. The VPEC was instrumental in attracting Delta Power Electronics Lab to Blacksburg, and has provided support for IBM of Manassas, GE Drive Systems of Salem, and others. Virginia Power Technologies Inc. of Blacksburg is a VPEC spin-off company.
If you have a computer and use the Internet, you can link to the experts at Virginia Tech.
The Virginia Tech Expertise Database (http://vted.rgs.vt.edu) contains information about the research interests and accomplishments of faculty members who are available to respond to your queries.
You can search by name, department, topic, or a keyword from a list provided. Entering a name will give you an individual's record. Entering a department name will give you all the records of faculty members in that department who have submitted data.
Tech's industry program development specialist also compiled a page (http://industry.research.vt.edu/areas/default.html) that will link you to experts and centers conducting research in interdisciplinary areas, such as Advanced Materials, Intelligent Transportation Systems, Technology Education, Virtual Reality, Food Processing, Biotechnology, or Waste and Environment Management.
The Business Resources Guide, maintained by Virginia Tech, lists Virginia Tech centers and other resources to help businesses to solve problems, as well as information on training, human resources, and a guide to key offices at Virginia Tech. The guide is located at: http://www.unirel.vt.edu/busres/homepage.html.
by Netta S. Smith
The Corporate Research Center (CRC) recently was cited by the National Council for Urban Economic Development for "best practice for technology transfer and research centers" in a competition across eight states.
"This designation is very significant because it recognizes our phenomenal success and establishes us as a benchmark for other localities," says CRC president Joe Meredith. High-profile competitors included the Research Triangle Park in North Carolina and Penn State Research Park.
The center, which provides high-tech facilities to companies performing research and development, attracted new tenants from six other states in the last year. Since the first building was opened in 1989, eight more have been completed and two others are under construction. A combined total of 258,000 square feet is occupied, with more than 1,000 people employed.
The complex is home to 55 private companies and 10 public entities, including the Center for Transportation Research, a branch of the National Weather Service, and the Center for Innovative Technology. About half of the center's occupants are university related.
Meredith says the CRC, located on a 120-acre research park adjoining the Virginia Tech airport, is ideally suited for Tech research/business partnerships. "The proximity to campus allows the firms to be in on breaking research."
To facilitate interaction between the center and university, all research and office buildings in the CRC are connected by fiber optics to the Virginia Tech telecommunications system and the Internet. Tenants also have access to the university's large-scale computing or client-server systems.
"The Corporate Research Center is the type of industry that is every community's dream," says Blacksburg town manager Ron Secrist. "It's composed of high tech, high paying, entrepreneurial companies and individuals who are providing cutting-edge research and products in a very clean, environmentally sensitive manner."
The center is home to many software, computing, and Internet-related companies, but the list doesn't stop there. Services and products range from biotechnology and waste consulting to polymers, power supplies, transparent ceramic coatings, and a full-service bank. Other businesses are designed around laser-band technology, library-automation products, composite materials, digitized maps, communications, business services and consulting, and genetic engineering. Firms catering to entrepreneurs include legal services for new and start-up corporations, assistance with commercialization and legal protection of technologies, technical assistance, venture capital funding, and support services.
Information about the Corporate Research Center can be found on the World Wide Web at http://www.vt.crc.com.
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