September 28, 2021
NineTwelve opens lab at Discovery Park District to spur industry-academic collaboration
WEST LAFAYETTE, Ind. – Leaders in industry and academia will discover new opportunities to collaborate as NineTwelve, an Indiana-based nonprofit organization that operationalizes new technologies and strategy, opens a facility in the Discovery Park District, adjacent to the Purdue University campus.
Chad Pittman, president of NineTwelve, said the location of the NineTwelve Convergence facility serves a strategic purpose.
“The Convergence lab will bridge the gap between academia and industry. It will be a critical partner in lowering development costs, controlling risk and solving the challenge of DevOps,” Pittman said. “It will investigate how industry and education can best collaborate to spur innovation, build businesses and grow economies.”
Tony Fernandes, CEO of UEGroup, a Silicon Valley user experience firm and NineTwelve partner, said the NineTwelve Convergence facility will have a long-term impact on people’s lives.
“By helping bring together ideas from academia and industry, the XCenter aims to reimagine how we work, live, and play five to eight years down the road and to help organizations get there,” Fernandes said.
A grand opening celebration for the NineTwelve Convergence facility will be held 5-7 p.m., Wednesday, September 29 at the Convergence Center for Innovation and Collaboration, 101 Foundry Drive, West Lafayette, IN 47906. The in-person event will feature industry leaders who have successfully innovated with leaders from academia to develop solutions to complex social, environmental and economic challenges.
NineTwelve Convergence is the fifth initiative NineTwelve has launched since 2020. The others are the Indiana 5G Zone, Emerging Manufacturing CoLab Center, Trusted Microelectronics Center and Center for Unconventional Energy.
About NineTwelve
NineTwelve envisions a world that thinks strategically, works collaboratively, and acts sustainably. NineTwelve creates cross-sector collaborative networks that accelerate the design and implementation of emergent solutions by bringing together the key elements of innovation: collaboration, prototyping and experimentation. Its mission-driven team of trusted experts specialize in microelectronics, 5G, emerging manufacturing, unconventional energy, hypersonics, space, sensors and cybersecurity, with a commitment to job creation and sustainable economic development.