LIVERMORE, Calif. — California’s Business, Transportation and Housing Agency has selected i-GATE (Innovation for Green Advanced Transportation Excellence) as one of six applicants to be recognized as inaugural members of the California iHub demonstration program.
i-GATE was submitted by the city of Livermore (iHub coordinator) in close partnership with Sandia National Laboratories/California (Program Lead), Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory and several others, including two University of California campuses. Its mission is to maximize the economic impact of green transportation and clean energy technologies through expedited technology transfer, entrepreneurial assistance, collaboration opportunities, academic alliances and a technology incubator for the development of high-growth green businesses.
“This represents an exciting opportunity to both advance technology in the transportation arena and to increase our partnerships with the city of Livermore and local businesses,” said Rick Stulen, vice president at Sandia/California.
The i-GATE hub will be leveraged by the Livermore Valley Open Campus (LVOC), a joint venture between Sandia and LLNL that will promote greater collaboration between the world-class scientists at those labs and their partners in industry and academia. According to Energy Secretary Steven Chu in a press release last year, the LVOC will maximize the return on the nation’s investment in nuclear security.
“By leveraging the groundbreaking research of our nuclear security labs through private sector collaborations,” said Chu, “we will bring breakthroughs to the market faster and find new solutions to the energy problem.”
The i-GATE effort is designed to drive the Livermore Valley as the core of an energy research cluster that will rapidly expand to benefit the regional economy and the state of California, create jobs, mitigate climate change, increase energy security, educate the future technical workforce and form an interlocking innovation web. In addition to the LVOC, the iGATE plan leverages several current initiatives, including the National Energy Systems Technology (NEST) incubator and the i-GATE Academic Alliance.
The state’s iHub program is designed to spur economic recovery and growth by showcasing and supporting California’s most promising hubs of innovation. Six applicants were selected, including hubs in Orange County, Sacramento, the Coachella Valley and San Francisco’s North Bay (Sonoma) and Greater Mission Bay regions.
The state is now working to secure seed funding for the iHub program and is working with entities such as the U.S. Department of Commerce to pursue funding grants and other resources.
Following is the list of confirmed i-GATE partners:
City of Livermore (iHub Coordinator)
| Sandia National Laboratories (i-GATE program lead) | Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory |
| Joint BioEnergy Institute (DOE) | Scion Group (New Zealand Crown Research Institute) |
| California Fuel Cell Partnership | East Bay Economic Development Alliance |
| University of Michigan | University of California, Berkeley, CITRIS (UC Institute for Science & Innovation) |
| University of California, Davis | California State University, East Bay |
| Las Positas Community College | Small Business Development Center |
| NewLine Ventures, LLC | Livermore Chamber of Commerce |
| City of Pleasanton | City of Dublin |
| City of Tracy | City of San Ramon |
| City of West Sacramento | Tri-Valley Business Council |
| Workforce Incubator | Alameda County One Stop (job training) |
| Alameda County Workforce Investment | Bridgelux, Inc. |