Innovation District starting to make its case nationally

Last December, two of the city’s leading developers, Gardner Tanenbaum and Robinson Park Investments, announced plans to build two facilities within the Innovation District near NE 8th and Interstate 235 that will, when finished, comprise more than 400,000 square feet of useable space. The project is aimed at bringing together research and development from Oklahoma City’s leading industries in order to share ideas that will lead to the creation of new companies, new inventions and other technological breakthroughs.

Katy Boren, president and CEO of the Innovation District, and her team have been busy lately as they continue the work of promoting the district and its potential to help transform Oklahoma City’s economy. She said a key feature in the district will be a space dedicated to an Innovation Hall.

“We are on a path to create an ecosystem in our city where people have an identifiable source, an identifiable epicenter and a location where they know to go plug in to collaborate, innovate and commercialize ideas. And with additional state-of-the-art and public facilities and development in that area, that just enhances that ecosystem and those assets to where we will meet, and even exceed, those expectations,” Boren said.

Boren said in years past, bioscience researchers and entrepreneurs in the Innovation District typically remain in the labs or offices with little opportunity to collaborate on similar projects or technologies with diverse industries like aerospace and energy. There was no ecosystem that just organically happened around cross-cutting technologies related to the region’s leading industries, she said.

“You can walk into another city like Austin, Texas, and know immediately where to plug in. You physically know where to go to be in the central hub for collaborators and innovators, find the programming and events to connect, and access the ecosystem built around the research, academics, industry and talent, but we did not have that here in Oklahoma City,” she said.

She and her team have been busy promoting the Innovation District locally and nationally in recent months – speaking on various nationwide panels and presenting to conferences and associations – to tell the Innovation District story and communicate the great assets, including facilities and expertise, Oklahoma City possesses. They have even ramped up their own programming by providing a variety of social and subject-matter-driven events both in the daytime and evening. There is a monthly newsletter, as well as a social media presence to keep stakeholders apprised of their events and other newsworthy accomplishments.

“Across the country the Oklahoma City Innovation District is becoming known for our leading research, as well as the clusters of assets and experts and talent we have here. They are also interested in the state-of-the-art facilities we currently have or that are coming. It is a very compelling package with all of the elements that appeal to entrepreneurs and investors that will drive our next-generation economy” Boren said.

This article originally appeared in the July 2021 edition of the VeloCity newsletter.