More than 200 attend JVIC opening

Hundreds gathered outside the center to hear from local and state officials who said JVIC would help Springfield and Missouri chart its economic future by commercializing innovative products developed at JVIC.

“This is not some ivory tower-type research center,” said JVIC Executive Director Ryan Giedd, who is also an MSU physics professor. “All the focus is on developing commercial products.”

JVIC research will primarily focus on material science, biotechnology and nanotechnology, said MSU President Michael Nietzel.

Blunt said the transformation of the former Missouri Farmers Association mill complex on Boonville Avenue into JVIC “reflects a great transition” from “a place that stored grains to a place for brains.” Ongoing research at JVIC, where nearly 50 people came to work on the first day, will mean high-paying jobs for Springfield, Blunt said.

“These are jobs – in a great and diverse economy – we haven’t had before,” he said.

JVIC research scientists are involved in more than 20 ongoing projects, many of them defense-related, said Jim Baker, vice president of research and economic development at MSU.

JVIC’s senior corporate research partners are St. John’s, Brewer Science, Crosslink Polymer, Nantero, Applied Systems Intelligence and Carbon Nanotechnologies. Brewer, Crosslink and Nantero each occupy a floor at JVIC. Springfield-based U.S. Photonics is also a project affiliate.

Dignitaries at JVIC’s grand opening honored Blunt with a replica of the plaque now hanging inside the facility’s main entrance. The plaque bears a sketched portrait of Blunt, who helped the city acquire the abandoned mill being renovated for JVIC.

Officials broke ground on the $12.4 million first phase in November 2005. The second phase, which encompasses renovations to the three-story east wing, is expected to begin soon and will create at least 200 new jobs, officials said.

In fiscal years 2005 and 2006, MSU received more than $12 million from the Department of Defense for first-phase renovations of the main 12-story structure. Another $2.6 million from DOD has been allocated in the 2007 budget for JVIC’s second phase.

Also in 2005 and 2006, Blunt helped earmark more than $14 million for defense-related research at the Center for Applied Science and Engineering housed at JVIC and helped allocate another $8 million in funding for CASE projects in fiscal 2007.

St. Louis-based architecture firm Ross & Barruzzini designed JVIC, and general contractor DeWitt & Associates of Springfield built the center’s first phase.

See SBJ's June 4 issue for more on JVIC's opening.[[In-content Ad]]