25 Nov UW Helps Form New NSF Hub for Innovation
The University of Washington and seven other universities have been awarded an I-Corps Hub Grant by the National Science Foundation (NSF). The 5-year, $15-million-dollar award will support innovator training through the I-Corps curriculum. The Northwest Hub, one of three new hubs announced, will be led by UC Berkeley, and will also include University of Alaska – Fairbanks, Oregon State University, and the University of California campuses in Davis, San Francisco, Santa Cruz, and Irvine.
With the new funding, UW will continue with quarterly 5-week workshop-based courses, administered by UW CoMotion, that introduce researchers to key fundamentals of customer discovery. Beginning in 2025, additional options will be offered through partnering institutions thus expanding the range of training available to teams across the Northwest Hub region. Access to these new options will give UW entrepreneurs access to a wider group of mentors and investors than ever before, giving them improved odds of success on the road to commercialization.
Now numbering 13, NSF I-Corps Hubs provide experiential entrepreneurial training to researchers across all fields of science and engineering. I-Corps Hubs form the operational backbone of the National Innovation Network (NIN), a network of universities, NSF-funded researchers, entrepreneurs, entrepreneurial communities, and other federal agencies, that collectively help researchers learn to investigate the commercial potential of their discoveries. The NSF I-Corps Hubs work collaboratively to build and sustain an innovation ecosystem that engages all people across the United States.
“The goal of the I-Corps program is to deploy experiential education to help researchers reduce the time necessary to translate promising ideas from laboratory benches to widespread implementation that in turn impacts economic growth regionally and nationally,” said Erwin Gianchandani, the NSF’s assistant director for Technology, Innovation and Partnerships.
“In effect, we are investing in the next generation of entrepreneurs for our nation.”
Since its establishment in 2011, over 3,600 NSF I-Corps teams have participated in the I-Corps program, which is designed to nurture the commercialization of deep technologies, which grow from discoveries in fundamental and use-inspired science and engineering.
