The Center for Innovative Technology announced the release of the Commonwealth Research and Technology Strategic Roadmap for fiscal year 2015, a comprehensive and ongoing evaluation of the Commonwealth’s research initiatives that identifies strategic technology priorities throughout Virginia, including at its universities, federal labs and other institutions.
The Roadmap is the product of ongoing collaboration from a team that includes Virginia’s private sector, led by the Commonwealth’s ten regional technology councils, its colleges and universities, federal labs and other research organizations, and economic development officials. A broad range of senior executives from industry, academia, federal laboratories, other research organizations, economic development offices, and the Research and Technology Investment Advisory Committee (RTIAC) contribute to this examination of Virginia’s strengths and priorities.
Pete Jobse, CIT President and CEO, said, “If Virginia wants to compete in the global economy, we need to continue investing in research and commercialization, as well as the ecosystem that surrounds innovation. The Roadmap leverages the best minds in the public and private sectors to prioritize these investments to build a foundation for an exciting future in the new Virginia economy.”
The R&T Roadmap was established by the Virginia Assembly in 2011 as a comprehensive planning tool used to identify research areas worthy of economic development and institutional focus in Virginia; industry sectors identified in the Roadmap are considered commercially promising and are expected to drive economic growth across the state. In addition, they guide and prioritize Commonwealth investments in research, such as those by the Commonwealth Research Commercialization Fund (CRCF).
The FY2015 Roadmap identified the following sectors as research and technology strengths and opportunities that represent high-priority industries, subsectors and research disciplines with promising out-year growth.
- Advanced Manufacturing, with particular interest in additive manufacturing, semiconductors, unmanned vehicles, robotics, remote monitoring and sensing, advanced materials, and nanotechnology – especially nanoelectronics and nanomedicine
- Aerospace, with particular interest in launch vehicles and commercial space flight
- Communications, with particular interest in developing next-generation broadband networks, wireless telecommunications, and next-generation 911 infrastructure
- Cyber Security, with particular interest in enterprise networks, critical infrastructure security, authorization / authentication / identity management technologies, cloud-based security, data and application encryption and key management, and mobile / device security
- Energy, with particular interest in clean coal, smart grid, nuclear plant safety and support, wind technologies, biofuels, efficiency, and waste-to-energy applications
- Environment, with particular interest in marine science and water and air quality monitoring and control
- Information Technology, with particular interest in data analytics
- Life Sciences, with particular interest in biopharma, health IT, bioinformatics, biomarkers, personalized medicine, remote care delivery, medical devices and software, diagnostics, and computer-assisted drug design
- Modeling and Simulation, with particular interest in energy, transportation, healthcare, and homeland security and defense applications
- Nuclear Physics, with particular interest in advanced manufacturing, energy, environment, life sciences, information technology applications, and a fourth-generation light source
- Transportation, with particular interest in vehicle telematics, vehicle and driver performance monitoring, and intelligent transportation systems
Industry strengths and niche opportunities are profiled in the Roadmap along with a sampling of industry, university and research institute strengths and priorities. These materials are augmented with profiles of Virginia universities and research institutes on CIT’s website, www.cit.org/initiatives/research-and-technology-strategic-roadmap/.
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