After nearly a year of renovation, University of Texas Permian Basin’s Center for Energy and Economic Diversification has almost completely transformed.
It will take a few more months to get everything in place and ready for a grand opening, partly due to supply chain issues, but UTPB offered a sneak preview Tuesday. When it’s complete, the hope is it will become a hub for innovative activity, business and events.
It will include 30,000 square feet of innovation space, the Office of Innovation and Commercialization, master of business administration executive classroom, a wetlab, co-working suite, prototype lab (makerspace), the Texas Water and Energy Institute, Advanced Manufacturing Center and a cafe.
Also, a reconfigurable 125-seat auditorium, 40-person multipurpose room, 24-person executive classroom and 12-person board room. The architect is Parkhill and the contractor is MW Builders. The cost of the renovations is about $$4.8 million.
“We had Midland Development Corporation and Odessa Development Corporation coming together to fund this renovation and also renovation at our library at the Odessa campus. They came together to help us dream about something really important in the community, provide the funding. It’s taken a year to get us to this point, to have these beautiful labs and these innovative, creative spaces,” UTPB President Sandra Woodley said.
She added that it will have the Small Business Development Center to help get businesses off the ground.
“It’s really an opportunity to make good on the name of CEED. Economic diversity is something that this work will promote here in the Permian Basin,” Woodley said.
She noted that economic development is a big role that UTPB plays in the community and they want to make sure they support entrepreneurs to have great ideas, connect with other innovators in the community and the faculty to help their ideas come to fruition.
“We’ve done this work for a while, but what this partnership between both cities will do is provide state-of-the-art facilities, a meeting space, a cafe, rental spaces for entrepreneurs who need some incubator space here and, as I said before, the connection with really great faculty members and other entrepreneurs in our cities,” Woodley said.
She added that it should come together by end of summer or early fall.
“Then this place will be hoppin’,” Woodley said.
They said there will be a grand opening sometime in the fall and she estimated that renovations would be mostly completed in the summer.
“It will take a little longer to get the technology equipment in here. Those orders are on lag everywhere across the country, so it will take us a little longer to get all of it outfitted, but it’ll be operational very soon,” Woodley said.
She added that all types of events will be held at CEED such as receptions before performances at the nearby Wagner Noël Performing Arts Center.
“We’re working with potential donors to redo the outdoor space out here, so we have an outdoor patio to go with the cafe. We really do expect there to be a lot of activity here. We’ll have music classes out here and business classes out here. We’re looking at some leadership programs that will be housed out here, as well. So it’ll be an opportunity for lots of people in our community to gather and to innovate with each other,” Woodley said.
The cafe will include a full kitchen with the ability to offer grab-and-go meals, along with catering.
“We think the cafe will be popular beyond our own faculty and staff who are here,” Woodley said.
Brian Shedd, executive director of the Office of Innovation and Commercialization, will be working with the community to make sure that opportunities are widely available for kindergarten through 12th grade students, entrepreneurs, innovators and industry leaders.
“It really will have a wide appeal … for the community,” Woodley said.
Shedd said CEED has been around since 1989.
“This is the first real, substantial renovation that we’ve done in the building. We are adding a lot of new innovation space. We have a new business incubator, a coworking room, additional lab space (and) a makerspace. All of these resources will be available to the community and to industry and definitely the small businesses and start-up companies,” Shedd said.
He added that UTPB saw innovation and entrepreneurship as a way to connect with the community.
“That is really kind of the lifeblood for this building. We have a lot of event space and we’ll be doing a lot of different programs in here to really try to connect what we’re doing in the classrooms with academics to the community and to industry,” Shedd said.
It also offers a way for students to get involved in corporate projects like internships or capstone engineering design projects.
“We want to bring that and give it a home here at the CEED Building,” Shedd said.
