COLUMBUS -- Ohio State University President William E. Kirwan today called for an investment of between $1 and $2 billion over five years to position Ohio as a leader in the Information Age. Speaking to the Columbus Metropolitan Club, Kirwan proposed that funds be divided among the state, the private sector and the federal government through competitively funded research grants.

"These are not ordinary appropriations to support ordinary operations," Kirwan said. "They literally are investments in the future of Ohio and its people.

"They are targeted investments in hiring exceptional faculty talented in key areas of science and technology, they are investments in building state-of-the-art research facilities, they are investments in venture capital funding to support innovation and entrepreneurship and they are investments in information age infrastructure for our communities. They also are investments in keeping our best students here in Ohio, both for their schooling and their careers."

Research universities play an important role in boosting a state's economy, Kirwan said. "Every study of successful high-tech communities -- from Silicon Valley to Route 128 in Boston -- attributes much of their success to the presence of a major research university."

Ohio, along with the state's research universities -- institutions like the University of Akron, Case Western Reserve, the University of Cincinnati and Ohio State -- can recreate that same success, Kirwan said.

Kirwan said that until the mid-1980s, Austin, Texas, was a quiet state capital and college town known more for quality of life and football than high technology, Kirwan said. Today, it is one of the savviest high-tech centers in America.

Among the leaders of this transformation was the state's flagship public research university, the University of Texas at Austin. UT/Austin contributed in many ways: It acquired a 275,000-square-foot manufacturing facility and surrounded it with a new 92-acre research park, and invested tens of millions of dollars in centers for high-performance computing and microelectronics.

Texas provided funds for 32 new $1 million endowed chairs and professorships to attract the best faculty in microelectronics, electrical engineering, computer engineering and computer science. With help from the state and the private sector, the university also developed a technology business incubator and has created many successful businesses, launched initial public offerings and created thousands of jobs.

"In short, the university accelerated research programs, provided space and facilities along with access to faculty and graduate students, and offered incentives for technology commercialization," Kirwan said. "It's a prime example of how a research university can positively affect a state's economy."

Georgia also is working to improve its economy through government-university partnerships, Kirwan said. Starting in 1990 with the formation of the Georgia Research Alliance -- a partnership among government, business and research universities that has raised roughly $1 billion -- Georgia now leads the nation in high-tech growth.

Kirwan said Ohio State already has started down this path with SciTech, iMEDD and the Ohio MicroMD Laboratory.

SciTech, a cooperative venture on Ohio State's West Campus, is related to, but separate from, the university. SciTech provides an environment for world-class research and technology enterprise and now is forming a Technology Commercialization Corp. to help start and finance new technology companies. SciTech's Business Technology Center, a technology business incubator for start-up companies, will soon double its size.

In April, SciTech obtained a new tenant when a start-up company named iMEDD announced that it is moving from Silicon Valley to Columbus. iMEDD is developing leading-edge "nanomechanical" drug delivery technology developed by Ohio State's Mauro Ferrari, a world-class leader in this emerging field. The nanoscale is about a thousand times smaller than micro.

The same techniques that create computer microchips can produce tiny medical devices which may revolutionize the world's medical drug delivery systems. iMedd will explore products that may replace diabetics' frequent insulin injections with a one-time implantation of tiny silicon capsules beneath the skin. The same technology may give rise to cancer treatments that deliver drugs directly to a tumor, without subjecting patients to the often-debilitating effects of chemotherapy.

Ohio MicroMD Laboratory, now under construction on the university Science Village complex, will complement the work of iMEDD by allowing academic and industry researchers to work side by side, developing new products based on nanotechnology -- starting with a new generation of tiny medical machines that can be implanted or injected into the body that contain medicine to cure disease.

"Ohio State's goal is to be one of the nation's top universities -- transforming knowledge and innovation into new technologies and translating those technologies into economic benefit for companies, communities and citizens of Ohio," Kirwan said. "Ohio State also can help advance our economy by investing a small portion of our resources in seed and early-stage venture capital funds. Such commitments will attract increased financial interest in our scientific expertise and our capacity to innovate."

But Ohio's research universities cannot function alone, he said. They need local, state and private sector commitments to make the necessary investments to implement the agenda.

"It's an investment offering high returns for many years," Kirwan said. "It's an investment in prosperity, jobs and quality of life for the people of Ohio. It's an investment that we simply have to make. And with the Information Economy already here, there's no time to waste."

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