Ohio State breaks ground on Timashev Technology Tower in Columbus Innovation District
Shared labs, flexible offices and coworking space will give technology and life sciences startups room to grow alongside university researchers and students. JobsOhio plans a low-interest loan for the project, which will also house ventures emerging from the BuildX student startup program.
The Ohio State University broke ground Oct. 20 on the Timashev Technology Tower, an eight-story, 103,000-square-foot building designed to bring technology and life sciences startups together with corporate partners, researchers and students.
The project will expand the Columbus Innovation District with shared laboratory facilities, flexible coworking space and dedicated offices. It will also provide a dedicated home for startups emerging from BuildX, Ohio State’s initiative that guides student founders through the process of launching a company.
JobsOhio intends to provide a significant low-interest loan for the tower as part of its $100 million investment commitment to the Columbus Innovation District. The agency did not disclose the proposed loan amount in its announcement.
Ohio State graduate and software entrepreneur Ratmir Timashev and his wife, Angela, made a gift through the Timashev Family Foundation to support development of the tower and the Center for Software Innovation’s educational programming.
Lowering startup costs
A central feature of the tower will be a shared wet lab curated and managed by Ohio State. According to JobsOhio, the facility will allow early-stage teams to access laboratory benches, equipment and meeting space within days, without raising millions of dollars to build their own testing facilities.
The combination of laboratory and office space is intended to help companies move ideas toward commercial applications while working near university talent and research.
Ohio State President Ravi V. Bellamkonda said the building’s mix of occupants is central to that approach.
“It will be a mix of startups, large companies, the Center for Software Innovation, students, researchers and employees intermingling,” Bellamkonda said. “An incredible vision of creating collisions for innovation of all different kinds.”
Beyond student-founded companies, the university expects the tower to accommodate other ventures from central Ohio and across the state and attract more companies to locate on campus.
Expanding the innovation district
The tower will join the Energy Advancement and Innovation Center and the Pelotonia Research Center in the district. Clean-energy company Koloma, industry organization Ohio Life Sciences and cancer-research organization Pelotonia have established headquarters in those facilities.
Ohio State has also announced a Google partnership intended to connect faculty and students with Google Cloud engineers, Google DeepMind research capabilities, advanced AI models and computing resources.
The Columbus Innovation District is part of the Ohio Discovery Corridor, a network connecting nine research and health institutions across Columbus, Cleveland and Cincinnati. JobsOhio and the state committed in 2020 to support innovation districts in the three cities, with an emphasis on STEM talent, research and commercialization.
A broader ambition for Columbus
For Timashev, the tower connects entrepreneurship education with a larger effort to build central Ohio’s technology economy.
“We want to create something special for our students so that they are prepared for this fast-changing world of AI and innovation and life sciences,” Timashev said. “This is how I give back to them.”
“Ohio State and Angela and I, we share the same vision,” he said. “We want Columbus and Ohio State and central Ohio to become the next Silicon Valley, the next technology hub where people and innovation come together.”
