“Mobility equals freedom.”

Victor Fishman
Executive Director
Texas Research Alliance
.…on why championing advanced mobility technologies is part of the TRA’s mission in North Texas.

The Texas Research Alliance helps businesses, public agencies, and governments engage with North Texas’ robust higher education research infrastructure to advance a wide range of goals. And yes, that includes mobility—which is why the TRA developed the North Texas Center for Mobility Technologies, a collaboration among industry, the North Central Texas Council of Governments, UNT, UTA, SMU, and UTD to develop advanced mobility technologies in North Texas.

“Mobility equals freedom—freedom to achieve—but right now, many communities have mobility challenges that restrain people,” Fishman said in a recent blog post. “How do you fix that within the confines that exist – public transportation and funding for example?” 

Founded in 2014 by the Arlington Chamber of Commerce, the Dallas Regional Chamber, the Fort Worth Chamber, and the Richardson Chamber of Commerce, the TRA creates regional collaborations between universities and companies, municipalities, public agencies and non-profit partners.

Its mission? To help solve problems, meet regional challenges, and grow research capacity and technology commercialization by advancing partnerships with North Texas’ research universities—especially in endeavors that are priorities for the region.  

Per the TRA, here are some ways it’s working with academic researchers across a variety of research initiatives:

VPR Network :: As a regional convener in the industry-university space, the TRA established the “vice-presidents of research” network (VPRN) to facilitate collaboration and information-sharing. The VPRN allows universities to share their strategic initiatives, find ways to work together on major proposals and provide updates on new facilities, capabilities and resources. It represents faculty from the UNT, UTA, UTD and SMU. 

AI Alliance :: The TRA established the AI Alliance to support faculty collaboration across universities for proposals on major initiatives in AI. Since establishing the AI Alliance, universities have collaborated on proposals for AI Institutes through the National Science Foundation.  

Texoma Logistics Innovation Alliance :: The TRA established the collaboration that won the Phase 1 Award of $1 million. 

Texoma Semiconductor Tech Hub :: The TRA wrote the commercialization section of the winning Phase 1 Award of $500,000. 

You can learn more about the TRA’s mission in the blog post here.

For more of who said what about all things North Texas, check out Every Last Word.

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