Clemson University announced that it has been designated a CUDA Research Center by NVIDIA Corp., an international developer and manufacturer of integrated circuits and computer graphics processing units. Only nine institutions globally have achieved such a designation, which is conferred based on research and development in computer graphics. Johns Hopkins University and Northeastern University are the only other American universities to receive the designation. The other institutions are in Australia, Ireland, Norway, Singapore, Spain and the Czech Republic. Clemson and the other centers conduct research with CUDA — compute unified device architecture — which is a parallel computing architecture developed by NVIDIA for graphics processing units. A complex photon transport model which requires 30 minutes of execution time on a high-end CPU can be executed on a high-end NVIDIA CUDA platform in two seconds. Computing professors Robert Geist, Don House and Jerry Tessendorf will be principal investigators for the CUDA research center. Tessendorf, winner of the Academy Award for Technical Achievement in 2008, recently was named director of Clemson’s Digital Production Arts program, a graduate program for professionals in the film, video and gaming industries. The complete press release can be found here.
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Akram Benbarek, senior vice president of investments for Advanced Equities Financial Corporation (AEFC), a privately held financial services company, is an expatriate Egyptian living in California and he was recently in the Middle East looking for potential investors interested in sharing in the development of US late stage technology companies. He spoke to John Foster of Private Equity & Hedge Funds Middle East about the development of a Middle Eastern knowledge economy and the opportunities for VC investors in later stage technology. The entire interview can be found here but the final Q & A are noted below:The governments of the region are trying to build up a knowledge economy. How do you see that developing? The moves by the UAE and the Saudi government to build up a knowledge economy and invest in their people, the local residents, are very encouraging. However, building a knowledge economy takes a lot of time and a lot of money. It does not have the quick turnover of say, an apartment block in another ‘luxury’ development. The government and the private sector need to understand that to make this region prosper, not just five years into the future, but long term, it will require a lot of time, effort and patience and no small amount of money. It takes a generation to build a knowledge economy, as it is the boys and girls that are in junior school who will be the leaders and entrepreneurs of the future. It is in these children that the region needs to invest. Success will not be instant. It is not like buying a luxury goods brand with surpluses from the oil boom. This time around, the profits from the oil boom must be spent in the region, on the people in the region and investing in the future of the region. The SCRA USC Innovation Center, Columbia is Open for BusinessFour SCRA Knowledge Economist Awards to be Presented During the Ceremony COLUMBIA, SC – August 19th, 2010 – SCRA, the University of South Carolina (USC) and the City of Columbia are holding a grand opening ceremony today for the SCRA USC Innovation Center, Columbia, at 1000 Catawba Street. The fully-renovated facility houses knowledge-based companies emerging from research at the University of South Carolina and the general marketplace which are entering commercialization and advanced manufacturing stages. The facility is situated and designed to stimulate and sustain clean, next-generation manufacturing, along with related development and support services. Rest at http://midlandsbiz.com/articles/6022/ Need I say more? Montréal, Quebec, August 6, 2010 — Researchers in Quebec and across Canada will benefit from new facilities and equipment, and universities will have more opportunities to develop and attract top scientists, thanks to a major investment by the Government of Canada. The announcement was made by the Honourable Gary Goodyear, Minister of State (Science and Technology), and the Honourable Christian Paradis, Minister of Natural Resources, while touring a lab at McGill University. “Science powers Canada’s economy,” said Minister of State Goodyear. “This investment will create jobs and improve the quality of life of Canadians. It will also help our universities develop, attract and retain some of the best scientific minds on earth.” The federal government will invest in the Canada Foundation for Innovation’s (CFI’s) Leaders Opportunity Fund (LOF). The fund is designed to help Canada’s universities continue to attract and retain the world’s best researchers at a time of intense international competition for leading faculty. This funding will enable institutions to strategically set priorities and acquire new infrastructure to support these exceptional researchers and improve labs and facilities. “In the global economy, knowledge, research and innovation are at the heart of economic growth and success,” said Minister Paradis. “Canada’s Economic Action Plan demonstrates the government’s commitment to creating jobs and strengthening our knowledge economy, here in Montréal and across Canada.” Rest at Industry Canada U.S. Commerce Secretary Gary Locke has announced the members of the National Advisory Council on Innovation and Entrepreneurship, a group that will support President Obama’s innovation strategy by helping to develop policies that foster entrepreneurship and identifying new ways to take great ideas from the lab to the marketplace to drive economic growth and create jobs. Locke made the announcement at a U.S. Department of Commerce University Innovation Forum at the University of Michigan, where participants discussed the role of universities in innovation, economic development, job creation and commercialization of federally funded research.
Rest at Commerce The university start-up typically involves a research lab discovery being turned into a new product or service that makes life better in some way. But in many ways the knowledge-based economy stretches into parts of the globe that are a long way from MIT and Stanford. On a micro level, it can be found in the transfer of knowledge (education) that occurs in a slum where young people want to learn if it can help them earn a living and give them a way out. You should listen to what Charles Leadbeater has to say about radical new forms of education: Ohio State University President E. Gordon Gee talks about the Midwest being a “knowledge belt” rather than a “rust belt” and how Ohio State’s economic, social and cultural programs are moving Ohio forward. Along with the role of higher education, partnerships such as those created through the Third Frontier program, are vital to the state’s success.
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