The first center will be hosted by Stanford University, with a focus on visual computing.
Intel announced plans to invest $100 million
directly into U.S. university research over the next five years to
drive innovations in computing and communications: The company will
open Intel Science and Technology Centers across multiple universities
throughout the year, with a focus on projects in select technology
areas that align with the company's research agenda including visual
computing, mobility, security and embedded solutions.
The company said the new model is expected to result in U.S.
researchers receiving up to five times more funding from Intel Labs
when compared to the previous approach. As an initial step, Intel Labs
also announced that Stanford University would be the hub for the first
center, which will focus on improving visual computing experiences for
consumers and professionals.
Researchers at Stanford will collaborate with a community of
researchers from seven other universities, a company release said. The
recently introduced second generation Intel Core processor with
combined visual and 3D graphics will be a key research and development
platform for researchers to develop innovations which improve the
quality and the way images are captured or created, manipulated or
interpreted and ultimately displayed to the viewer.
"Stanford is honored to be chosen as the host university for the
initial ISTC," said Pat Hanrahan, the lead academic principal
investigator for the ISTC-VC. "This is an exciting new model that will
have huge impact on the future of computing. Stanford looks forward to
working with Intel and our network of seven other universities, to
bring exciting new visual computing experiences to the computer user."
This first Intel Science and Technology Center, as well as those that
will follow later this year, represents a new model of collaboration
for the company. Until now, Intel Labs ran open collaboration centers
near research universities and a substantial portion of the company's
funding focused on operating, maintaining and staffing these
facilities.
The new centers will be Intel-funded and jointly led by Intel and
university researchers. They are designed to provide more dollars in
the hands of researchers, and to encourage tighter collaboration
between academic thought leaders in essential technology areas such as
visual computing, security and mobile computing. For maximum
flexibility, Intel will be able to tune its research agenda across the
research centers over time. Intel said it plans to invite proposals
from the academic community to continue pursuing the creation of
additional science and technology centers.
"Intel Labs has long been a significant investor in university research
and this program is the next step in that critical investment," said
Justin Rattner, Intel's chief technology officer. "The pace of
technology change is getting faster. With today's announcement we are
ensuring that Intel Labs' academic research support is adaptable and
flexible. Our new approach should allow us to quickly and dynamically
invest in the most promising academic work."
Nathan Eddy is Associate Editor, Midmarket, at eWEEK.com. Before joining eWEEK.com, Nate was a writer with ChannelWeb and he served as an editor at FierceMarkets. He is a graduate of the Medill School of Journalism at Northwestern University.
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