A new federally backed high-tech hub to be hosted at N.C. State will have a mission of addressing worker skills as well as adoption costs for new technology.
The Obama Administration named NCSU as the host of a southeast hub for the new Smart Manufacturing Innovation Institute.
“We’re pleased that the federal government has again tapped NC State as a key partner in efforts to enhance the nation’s advanced manufacturing capabilities,” said NC State Chancellor Randy Woodson in a statement after Obama announced the initiative at the White House.
“We look forward to working with a broad coalition of leaders in academia, industry and government to strengthen the regional and national economies through innovative practices focused on technology transfer and workforce development,” Woodson added.
NCSU also hosts a federally backed initiative focused on semiconductors and the power industry called PowerAmerica.
The NCSU hub is one of five making up the SMII, which will be based in Los Angeles and will work with the Department of Energy.
The private-public partnership will develop smart sensors to make all types of manufacturing more efficient, Obama said at a conference designed to showcase investment opportunities in the United States.
The U.S. manufacturing sector has added over 800,000 jobs since February 2010. The industry has benefited greatly from lower natural gas prices. Obama said the creation of the manufacturing hub highlights how the United States is “running up the score” when it comes to the innovation edge companies enjoy when doing business there.
“The world is smaller than it used to be because of innovation,” Obama said, adding: “that is something that can work for everyone if we do it right.”
Administration officials said the manufacturing industry consumes about a third of the nation’s energy. Chemical production and steel manufacturing are examples of two industries with large energy costs that could benefit through new technological breakthroughs.
“One should realize that the future’s manufacturing jobs are fundamentally IT jobs,” Energy Secretary Ernest Moniz said.
Obama said he recognized that people are concerned about how innovation and trade are leaving some people behind, but globalization also leads to opportunities for nations to learn from each other. He said “innovation spreading and connecting the globe promises prosperity and reductions in poverty and, ultimately, less likelihood of war and violence and conflict.”
According to NCSU, the southeast hub “is charged with solving issues of rising energy and technology adoption costs and the lack of skilled workers in a geographic region where manufacturing growth has been particularly strong over the last few years. The NC State-led hub will include a technical focus on the energy-intensive pulp and paper industries, carbon fiber, primary metals, chemicals, pharmaceuticals and other industries.”
Other hubs will be located at the University of California, Los Angeles; Texas A&M University; Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute; and Pacific Northwest National Laboratory.
Southeast partners for the project include Virginia Tech, the University of Virginia, Clemson University, University of Louisville, Purdue University and Georgia Tech, the Oak Ridge and Savannah River national laboratories and 15 industry partners.
(The Associated Press contributed to this report.)
