From semi-trucks to semiconductors.
From vehicle engines to …. Well, the engine to bringing in more microtechnology manufacturing … and along the way, learning what that is.
Tawny Olore, previously an Osceola County deputy county manager and the county’s “transportation guru” is now in charge of a new way of movement—of bringing more semiconductor advanced packaging to NeoCity as the newly-minted CEO of the Florida Semiconductor Engine. She shared her vision Tuesday at NeoCity’s OC Building with a gathering of local dignitaries, business partners and leaders.
Using funding from the National Science Foundation— NeoCity has been awarded $160 million over 10 years—Olore is tasked with collaborating with industry partners to form a center of research and manufacturing innovation here in Osceola County.
It could be a legacy project— it is the first collaboration of its kind doing work in the microtechnology sector, one of just 10 in the nation, and 800 outfits applied for it.
At a time when she was overseeing some big county transportation projects— expansion of Neptune Road, Partin Settlement Road, Boggy Creek Road, Simpson Road and its intersection at Fortune Road—it would have been easy to see those through, she said. But it was time to build a new ecosystem.
“Building the Engine, for me it’s the building part, seeing the vision, implementing and getting the pieces in place,” Olore said of what moves her. “And there’s still a huge connection with the county.”
And, just like how it takes time for a road project to come together, she noted the same reasons this collaboration will take time.
“With legacy project, there’s a vision, you have to get a coalition together, and going in the same direction,” she said. “Coalitions work with setbacks. Any great project takes a while.
“It’s not an easy transition. Microelectronics is mind-blowing. My interest is building the team and the vision.”
While other projects she’s tackled—engineering the I-4 Ultimate Project and SunRail—had blueprints, the newness of it all creates a clean slate. But Olore said there’s a clear goal.
“Right now, 98 percent of (research and manufacturing) is done offshore. The ‘fab’ (the “clean room at The Center for NeoVation, just across the walk from the OC) is doing that today,” she said. “It’s important to the county’s mission to bring those on shore.”
The county has already brought many of the tech matter experts to NeoCity— Plug & Play, imec, Skywater Technology and university partners UCF, Valencia College, USF and the University of Florida—the latter already having a presence with the Florida Semiconductor Institute, which took up residence in February.
Next week, find out more detail of what and who the Florida Semiconductor Engine will be working with.
