Mature university research centers appear to be healthy. The current disruptions in federal funding notwithstanding, research centers are flush, and in many instances, growing in terms of both the private companies that partner with these centers and the actual physical footprints available for use.
While research centers provide access to faculty and students — a cornerstone of traditional U-I engagement — they also provide something that departments and colleges cannot, or that departments might struggle with — “build-to-suit” development options, flexible leasing that can be adjusted in real time, decision-making at the speed of industry, easier access to external funding, the leeway to coordinate an interdisciplinary response to concentrated research areas, and the ability to incubate and grow companies.
Now a standard resource to major flagship universities, among others, the research center is in the process of further entrenching its value with infill development, outfitting vacant parcels with infrastructure, and creating new research communities complete with food, beverage, hotels, and apartments. Far from losing their appeal, the research park, more accurately described as an urbanized innovation district, is increasingly the destination of choice for private companies — from bootstrap start-ups to Fortune 500 multinationals — looking to partner with a university.
Infill And Urbanization
The secret sauce in Madison has quite a few ingredients. A high concentration of life sciences research, an abundance of NIH research dollars, and an idyllic setting at a classic institution like the University of Wisconsin-Madison are parts of the recipe.
But in Madison, urbanization, an increasing embrace of amenities, and access to a big piece of undeveloped real estate ensure that the sauce is constantly being refined so that University Research Park, now over 40 years old, maintains its appeal for private companies.
Aaron Olver, Managing Director of the research park, describes the strategic process.
“We were largely built out in accordance with the original plan, which was a suburban-style campus, but what we’ve been working on in the last decade is helping the research park to evolve into more of an innovation district,” Olver says. “We’ve updated our covenants, and in the last 10 years, we’ve doubled the scale of the park through infill and new development. We’ve doubled our assets, our revenue, our square feet, and our contribution to the University of Wisconsin-Madison, and that’s ongoing. Right now, we’re working on bringing the first restaurant and the first set of apartment buildings to the park.”
To illustrate the infill process, Olver gets down to the numbers. The research park, for example, acquired a 50,000-SF building on a 10-acre site. They then did a “build-to-suit” project with one of their largest, most successful tenants, and created two more pad sites for additional buildings. When fully built out, that original 10-acre site will host around 400,000 square feet, an eightfold increase over the original footprint.
Olver and his team look to do something similar with a vacant site that is now being outfitted with infrastructure.
“We have 200 acres of raw land right now for a second park in Madison,” he says. “Although we’re working on making our current park denser, and infill is our current focus, we also have a lot of room at our second park. So, if a new company comes to us and says, ‘Look, we need a brand new building,’ we can tell them that we have plenty of space and that we can help them grow.”
The research park, with about 125 companies and 1.2 million square feet in its portfolio, owns half the buildings at the location, with the other half owned privately, either by companies or developers. In the university’s portion of the park, occupancy is at about 90%, which is ideal.
“It’s a nice level because we have enough space to serve a new company when they want to come to the market,” Olver says. “We can help them get started and grow.”
When new companies come calling, people like Olver have a good story to tell. The university is part of the federally designated Wisconsin Biohealth Tech Hub, with all the benefits and opportunities the designation enables. Healthcare software company Epic Systems was founded in Madison in 1979 by a UW graduate and is now located in nearby Verona. The company draws software talent to the area. Finally, there’s Cellular Dynamics, which started in a university lab. It was incubated and grown at the research park and was eventually acquired by Fuji. The company became so big that it’s now in the process of outfitting its own custom lab at an off-campus location in Madison.
“That’s a huge success story in economic development for the state of Wisconsin, to have something go from a noteworthy idea in a professor’s lab to a start-up, a scaling company, and then to get acquired and continue to grow in the community,” Olver says. “That’s exactly what we’re all about.”
With plenty of institutional experience about how a research park works, Olver and his team have the latitude to quickly and decisively reevaluate leases if they are not working for the tenant.
“We can kind of rip up leases whenever we need to,” he says. We really do this mostly to help people grow. If they are trapped in a lease, we can rip it up, move them to a larger location, and do a new lease.”
In terms of construction, the research park employs two basic models — “build it and they will come” and tailored spaces unique to a specific company, developed in partnership with the tenant. Regardless of the construction model, one thing is certain — stagnation has never been, and in the future likely won’t be, an issue.
“We’ve actually had a problem building fast enough to keep up with the market,” Olver says. “It’s been really a great ride.”
A Potential Golden Age
The MicaPlex, housed within the growing Research Park at the Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University in Daytona Beach, is at full capacity. With 15 tenants, all of them there to develop market-grade technology, the MicaPlex offers its partners top-tier access to facilities, faculty, and students. There’s still room for further development at the Research Park, which is positioned for growth.
Located at the northern tip of the Space Coast, which is booming right now and is expected to boom for the foreseeable future, Embry-Riddle’s Research Park definitely benefits from its physical location. Because it’s based within a research park within an aeronautics university, which features an overwhelming abundance of STEM and STEM-adjacent degree programs, companies looking to do business there know what they’re going to get — faculty and students hyper-focused on pushing aeronautical and space technology forward.
That’s a winning formula for the Research Park, which now has 278 student internships, a host of faculty-led start-ups, and an array of industry-sponsored and grant-based research projects that feed into industry’s need to access the expertise of academia.
“We continue to see growth, and we get a lot of interest being in such close proximity to the Kennedy Space Center,” says Ronnie Mack, Director of Operations for the Research Park. “But one of the main reasons why we continue to see interest is our key faculty, which are best-in-class when it comes to aerospace and engineering, and access to our students, from first year to senior year.”
It also helps that the MicaPlex has made it a priority to be business-friendly.
“We’ve done a good job of giving our tenants the equipment and facilities they need to do their work,” Mack says. “We’re shovel-ready so companies can move in without having to do a lot of utility development. And our leasing process is great, too. We have very flexible leases and a very quick leasing process. We try to be easy to do business with.”
The Research Park facilitates in-person collaboration among private partners, faculty, and students. It has a direct line to the research labs in the College of Engineering — the post-COVID need for human interaction is encouraged by MicaPlex.
“What we have experienced is the desire for collaboration and partnership, and our MicaPlex and campus design, not to mention our proximity to campus, have facilitated that in-person, face-to-face partnership,” Mack says.
In addition to the Orlando market, the Space Coast, and the dynamism of Florida in general, the MicaPlex also finds opportunity with an international brand just down the road — Daytona International Speedway — which is looking at any potential overlap between autosport and space.
All the pieces add up to a potential golden age for the MicaPlex and Embry-Riddle’s Research Park.
“We’ve got great weather, we’ve got great research faculty, and we’ve got great students who are focused on being the next generation of aerospace and aviation innovators, and so it’s all coming together right now for us,” Mack says.
Mobilizing The Community
A high-profile example of the Embry-Riddle Research Park’s effectiveness is the recent announcement by French next-gen aircraft designer AURA AERO that it will build a 500,000-SF facility at the Daytona Beach International Airport. AURA AERO, an anchor tenant at the Embry-Riddle Research Park, plans to manufacture and assemble hybrid electric regional aircraft beginning in 2028.
Antoine Blin, Chief of Staff at AURA AERO, got a good look at the US research park landscape, as it evaluated multiple sites before selecting Daytona Beach. What they saw sums up what the research center has become.
“In the US, we can strongly feel the link between university research and the industrial world, with an environment that facilitates applied research, supported by robust academia-industry partnerships,” Blin says. Together, they offer a complementary ecosystem to rapidly turn innovation into market-ready solutions .
“An overall observation is that all the potential locations and research parks we visited strongly promote and value entrepreneurship. They actively invest to shape and provoke their own future, rather than simply adapting to it. Another key strength in the US is how universities act as powerful hubs, bringing together education and industry.”
And it’s that observation about putting the pieces together that won the day for Embry-Riddle and the surrounding region. During the site-selection process, a local consortium made sure AURA AERO knew it was more than welcome to expand its footprint in the area.
“The mobilization of the local community around the project — Daytona Beach, Volusia County, Space Florida, the CEO Business Alliance, universities and colleges — has been the main driving force behind our choice,” Blin says.
Finally, the US itself, home to both the largest economy and the largest research stack in the world, was a major draw for the French company, even as it’s headquartered in Toulouse, the heart of Europe’s aerospace industry.
“From the beginning of the company, it was clear to us that a modern aircraft manufacturer must have a balanced development across the Atlantic,” Blin says. “Both Europe and the US benefit from a long-standing expertise in aerospace, and this heritage is essential to drive the development of innovative aircraft, hence our strategy to develop the company both in Toulouse and in Daytona Beach, supporting two of the biggest markets on earth and offering unique and complementary expertise.”
Unwavering Business Support
Tech Parks Arizona has been in operation for over 30 years. In that time, it’s seen nothing but growth. With recent developments in Tucson, officials there expect more of the same. Based on industry-grade responsiveness to industry needs, purpose-built facilities, access to faculty and students for its partners, and the embrace of amenities, Tech Parks Arizona is an anchor of the southern Arizona economy with over 100 companies and an estimated annual contribution of $2 billion.
Carol Stewart, Vice President for Tech Parks Arizona at the University of Arizona, President and CEO of the UA Tech Park, and President of the UA Center for Innovation, says growth comes in many forms.
“Growth is multi-dimensional,” she says. “We’re seeing increased demand from start-ups and emerging science and tech companies, which translates into both new tenants and expanded buildouts of existing lots. That’s combined with international growth, as we welcome companies through our Global Advantage Soft Landings Program, which fosters foreign direct investment by helping international start-ups establish a US presence in Tucson. This program provides tailored support — including mentorship, access to resources, and immersion into the local innovation ecosystem — positioning the UA Tech Park as a gateway to the US market.”
A key piece in the development and growth of research parks is that they are increasingly catering to what people need outside the workplace and in addition to the lab. That’s certainly the case in Tucson.
“As Tech Parks Arizona enters a new era of growth, strategic investments in amenities are helping us maintain a competitive edge and appeal to today’s innovation-driven businesses,” Stewart says. “That’s why we’re advancing development plans for new parcels at the UA Tech Park, including 415 units of workforce housing — apartments and townhouses — as well as an on-site daycare center. These additions are thoughtfully designed to support a ‘live, learn, work, play’ environment. Enhanced amenities like these are a key draw for companies seeking a vibrant, well-supported workplace for their teams.”
While boom-and-bust cycles happen, consistency is always the goal. To achieve that, the research park has to offer what tenants want. Based on recent development, UA Tech Parks has figured out how to make its partners happy. The park just secured a long-term lease renewal with IBM, a continued partnership that underscores the region’s strength as a center for innovation.
In 2022, UA Tech Parks opened the 65-acre UA Tech Park at The Bridges, which features The Refinery — a multi-tenant innovation and commercialization hub — the Mission Integration Lab, which accommodates balloon-borne astronomy testing and development, and the 110-bed Marriott Springhill Suites.
“Our continued success is fueled by a strong foundation of innovation, specialized facilities, and unwavering business support,” Stewart says. “A hallmark of the UA Tech Park is its commitment to innovation through customized services that meet companies where they are — from launch to expansion. What’s driving our momentum is the rising demand for purpose-built spaces, close proximity to university research, and access to top-tier talent. In today’s hybrid work world, collaboration hasn’t diminished — it’s become more intentional. Growth happens where infrastructure is flexible and industry is deeply aligned with research institutions. That’s exactly what we offer.”