Unlikely partners create fledgling weather enterprise
By Randall Turk
The Norman Transcript
Officials say the new National Weather Center and associated private research companies popping up on the University of Oklahoma’s south campus are not random accidents of good fortune.
Academicians emphasize the research campus taking shape is an outgrowth of new federal priorities and a changing relationship between state universities and Oklahoma government.
The model being used to build OU’s Research Campus is the “clustering” concept recognized for building regional high-tech centers and pumping new life into old line industries throughout the country. In the process, academic researchers, government agency workers and employees private companies abandon old stereotypes and work together.
“In the early 1990s, the federal government changed all the rules on intellectual property and collaboration with private sector companies,” says Jeff Kimpel, director of the National Severe Storms Laboratory. The NSSL, which has internationally acclaimed experience in developing radar, can conduct cooperative research and development agreements, he said. That results in licensing companies to produce new products or working with them on research projects,
Chamber key player
“We want to expand and grow our economy,” says John Snow, dean of OU’s College of Atmospheric and Geographic Sciences. In recent years, universities have taken on a new mission of assisting in the state’s economic development, Snow said. “In the last decade, state universities have become challenged to be proactive.”
The Norman Chamber of Commerce has served as a catalyst for cooperation on the new research campus. The chamber organized the “Weather Committee,” a group of university and federal agency representatives and business leaders that meets monthly to discuss the future of the research campus.
Among the Weather Committee’s goals is creating a development fund to help weather agencies and private sector weather companies collaborate to convert research activity into services that benefit weather-dependent businesses. The committee is working to develop a national weather museum and science center to attract tourism and increase national interest in OU-based weather activities.
Recent Weather Committee meetings have featured a roundtable discussion on “building the Oklahoma commercial weather enterprise” and a presentation on “cluster-based economic development” by John Snow, dean of the College of Atmospheric and Geographic Sciences.
‘Engineers’ wanted
The newly completed National Weather Center consolidates federal weather agencies and university weather research programs in one location. The center’s 700 research and administrative personnel work on a broad spectrum of projects — ranging from observing and measuring weather phemomena to developing “decision support systems” to aid weather forecasters, emergency management, agriculture, transportation, defense and homeland security.
“The challenge is to move research to practical applications,” Snow said. “There are plenty of ‘weather scientists,’” but few ‘weather engineers’ to bridge the valley of death to reach practitioners and users.”
The goal of Central Oklahoma’s weather cluster is to “exploit university strengths and the large federal weather presence to enhance local and regional economic development and help build the ‘silicon prairie,’” Snow said.
Several private sector weather companies have already moved to facilities built for them on the research campus. WeatherNews, a worldwide private weather forecasting company, was the first to locate there. Vieux & Associates, a Norman-based hydrological forecasting company, also has moved to the research campus.
Compete, cooperate
Among future research campus tenants are Weather Decision Technologies, a Norman company that designs specialized forecasts for private industry, and Atmospheric and Environmental Research Co., a company moving here from Tulsa.
Industry clusters are geographic concentrations of businesses that are both competitive and cooperative, Snow said. They compete among themselves for business, but also are interdependent and “have common needs for talent, technology and infrastructure.” Such clustering is not new.
Earlier examples of it are the insurance and finance markets in Hartford, Conn., the tourism industry in Florida, Hollywood’s film industry and the wine industry in California.
High-tech clusters, more recent, include Research Triangle Park in central North Carolina, the Silicon Road along Route 128 in Massachusetts and Silicon Valley around San Jose in California.
Kimpel said Norman’s “Mile of Cars” serves as his local model for an industry cluster. He said car dealerships located on the Mile of Cars cooperate in selling cars, while at the same time competing for sales. “It helps every one of them,” he said.
OU programs small
Snow said clustering “fosters linkages in terms of technology, skills, information, marketing and customer needs that cut across firms and industries.” Such clustering recasts the traditional roles of government, the private sector, associations and universities, he said.
He said today’s academic weather programs at OU currently are too small and too focused on research to sufficiently leverage government investment. He believes clustering will help speed converting weather technology into services private businesses can use — and may help develop new lines of business. That will be aided by OU’s unique partnership with the state of Oklahoma, he said.
“There is no other partnership in the country like this…We want to develop data-rich programs that attract meteorology firms,” Snow said. He said actively recruiting companies should result in more job opportunities and research.
Recruiting for OU’s research campus has been one of the key functions of the Norman Economic Development Coalition (NEDC), a partnership of the university, the City of Norman and the Norman Chamber of Commerce. “We have the beginnings of a [weather industry] cluster, said NEDC Director Don Wood. “The weather industry is maturing, but small. A lot of small companies are competing for the same dollar.”
New learning function
Wood said the NEDC’s function is to provide information to companies that may locate to the research campus and others that may be customers for weather technology. It can be a challenge, he said.
“We have to learn how to play well together, not beat each others’ brains out in competing for projects,” Wood said. “The big customers are corporations.” He said there is danger of getting “painted into a corner” in competitive bidding for contracts. “We need to grow the enterprise, not watch it implode,” he said.
Diversity required
Another danger is posed by the local culture, Snow said. He cites the work of Richard Florida, a professor of public policy at George Mason University, best known for developing his concept of the “creative class.”
“Florida’s work is highly insightful from the human perspective,” Snow said. “Economic success in the high-tech world of today comes to communities that are open and welcome to all sorts of people. Tradition-bound, closed-minded communities will continue to wither as the best and brightest migrate to greener and more open pastures.”
Snow said the research campus may result in some immediate benefits to Norman, but cautioned “the real benefits will come over two or three decades. One has to keep the faith, stay the course and have patience.”
The Norman Transcript
Officials say the new National Weather Center and associated private research companies popping up on the University of Oklahoma’s south campus are not random accidents of good fortune.
Academicians emphasize the research campus taking shape is an outgrowth of new federal priorities and a changing relationship between state universities and Oklahoma government.
The model being used to build OU’s Research Campus is the “clustering” concept recognized for building regional high-tech centers and pumping new life into old line industries throughout the country. In the process, academic researchers, government agency workers and employees private companies abandon old stereotypes and work together.
“In the early 1990s, the federal government changed all the rules on intellectual property and collaboration with private sector companies,” says Jeff Kimpel, director of the National Severe Storms Laboratory. The NSSL, which has internationally acclaimed experience in developing radar, can conduct cooperative research and development agreements, he said. That results in licensing companies to produce new products or working with them on research projects,
Chamber key player
“We want to expand and grow our economy,” says John Snow, dean of OU’s College of Atmospheric and Geographic Sciences. In recent years, universities have taken on a new mission of assisting in the state’s economic development, Snow said. “In the last decade, state universities have become challenged to be proactive.”
The Norman Chamber of Commerce has served as a catalyst for cooperation on the new research campus. The chamber organized the “Weather Committee,” a group of university and federal agency representatives and business leaders that meets monthly to discuss the future of the research campus.
Among the Weather Committee’s goals is creating a development fund to help weather agencies and private sector weather companies collaborate to convert research activity into services that benefit weather-dependent businesses. The committee is working to develop a national weather museum and science center to attract tourism and increase national interest in OU-based weather activities.
Recent Weather Committee meetings have featured a roundtable discussion on “building the Oklahoma commercial weather enterprise” and a presentation on “cluster-based economic development” by John Snow, dean of the College of Atmospheric and Geographic Sciences.
‘Engineers’ wanted
The newly completed National Weather Center consolidates federal weather agencies and university weather research programs in one location. The center’s 700 research and administrative personnel work on a broad spectrum of projects — ranging from observing and measuring weather phemomena to developing “decision support systems” to aid weather forecasters, emergency management, agriculture, transportation, defense and homeland security.
“The challenge is to move research to practical applications,” Snow said. “There are plenty of ‘weather scientists,’” but few ‘weather engineers’ to bridge the valley of death to reach practitioners and users.”
The goal of Central Oklahoma’s weather cluster is to “exploit university strengths and the large federal weather presence to enhance local and regional economic development and help build the ‘silicon prairie,’” Snow said.
Several private sector weather companies have already moved to facilities built for them on the research campus. WeatherNews, a worldwide private weather forecasting company, was the first to locate there. Vieux & Associates, a Norman-based hydrological forecasting company, also has moved to the research campus.
Compete, cooperate
Among future research campus tenants are Weather Decision Technologies, a Norman company that designs specialized forecasts for private industry, and Atmospheric and Environmental Research Co., a company moving here from Tulsa.
Industry clusters are geographic concentrations of businesses that are both competitive and cooperative, Snow said. They compete among themselves for business, but also are interdependent and “have common needs for talent, technology and infrastructure.” Such clustering is not new.
Earlier examples of it are the insurance and finance markets in Hartford, Conn., the tourism industry in Florida, Hollywood’s film industry and the wine industry in California.
High-tech clusters, more recent, include Research Triangle Park in central North Carolina, the Silicon Road along Route 128 in Massachusetts and Silicon Valley around San Jose in California.
Kimpel said Norman’s “Mile of Cars” serves as his local model for an industry cluster. He said car dealerships located on the Mile of Cars cooperate in selling cars, while at the same time competing for sales. “It helps every one of them,” he said.
OU programs small
Snow said clustering “fosters linkages in terms of technology, skills, information, marketing and customer needs that cut across firms and industries.” Such clustering recasts the traditional roles of government, the private sector, associations and universities, he said.
He said today’s academic weather programs at OU currently are too small and too focused on research to sufficiently leverage government investment. He believes clustering will help speed converting weather technology into services private businesses can use — and may help develop new lines of business. That will be aided by OU’s unique partnership with the state of Oklahoma, he said.
“There is no other partnership in the country like this…We want to develop data-rich programs that attract meteorology firms,” Snow said. He said actively recruiting companies should result in more job opportunities and research.
Recruiting for OU’s research campus has been one of the key functions of the Norman Economic Development Coalition (NEDC), a partnership of the university, the City of Norman and the Norman Chamber of Commerce. “We have the beginnings of a [weather industry] cluster, said NEDC Director Don Wood. “The weather industry is maturing, but small. A lot of small companies are competing for the same dollar.”
New learning function
Wood said the NEDC’s function is to provide information to companies that may locate to the research campus and others that may be customers for weather technology. It can be a challenge, he said.
“We have to learn how to play well together, not beat each others’ brains out in competing for projects,” Wood said. “The big customers are corporations.” He said there is danger of getting “painted into a corner” in competitive bidding for contracts. “We need to grow the enterprise, not watch it implode,” he said.
Diversity required
Another danger is posed by the local culture, Snow said. He cites the work of Richard Florida, a professor of public policy at George Mason University, best known for developing his concept of the “creative class.”
“Florida’s work is highly insightful from the human perspective,” Snow said. “Economic success in the high-tech world of today comes to communities that are open and welcome to all sorts of people. Tradition-bound, closed-minded communities will continue to wither as the best and brightest migrate to greener and more open pastures.”
Snow said the research campus may result in some immediate benefits to Norman, but cautioned “the real benefits will come over two or three decades. One has to keep the faith, stay the course and have patience.”
