Mayor Bloomberg recently announced that the city had received 18 responses to its Request for Expressions of Interest seeking academic institutions to develop an applied science and engineering research campus in New York City, with proposals coming from Stanford University, Carnegie Mellon and many other institutions from around the world. The city's idea for attracting a new engineering campus was greatly influenced by our 2009 Building New York City's Innovation Economy report, which found that while New York has the scientific excellence that can provide the foundation for a larger technology sector, the city lacks the engineering prowess that is often critical to converting breakthroughs from the lab into real world applications. Our report showed that compared to technology hubs like Boston, San Francisco and the Research Triangle, New York City has a small overall engineering presence and lacks a first-rate engineering school that exhibits across-the-board excellence and depth across the full spectrum of disciplines and applications. For instance, our report noted that only one NYC-based institution was ranked among the top 100 institutions for engineering R&D (Columbia, at #50).

The Center's Jonathan Bowles appeared on NY-1's "Inside City Hall" to discuss the city's proposal and was recently quoted in an article in Crain's about the idea.