ETSU Research Corporation awarded more than $900,000 by Department of Defense
The monies will be used to develop plans for repurposing existing infrastructure into a scale-up bioindustrial manufacturing facility.
The Department of Defense announced on Friday 12 additional awards to bioindustrial firms or organizations via the Distributed Bioindustrial Manufacturing Program (DBIMP). This announcement brings the DBIMP to 25 awards to date totaling $42 million.
Among the recipients is the East Tennessee State University Research Corporation that was awarded $912,000 to develop plans for repurposing existing infrastructure into a scale-up bioindustrial manufacturing facility. The facility would be capable of waste stream valorization and fermentation. Production is expected to occur in Tennessee.
Through agreements with the recipients, the organizations will receive funding to produce business and technical plans that detail construction of domestic bioindustrial manufacturing production facilities under the Defense Industrial Base Consortium (DIBC) Other Transaction Agreement (OTA), a contract vehicle awarded and overseen by the Office of the Assistant Secretary of Defense for Industrial Base Policy. Successful projects that were selected under the competitive announcement can receive follow-on awards that would provide access to up to $100 million to build a U.S.-based bioindustrial manufacturing facility.
“Each DBIMP award demonstrates how DoD is committed to harnessing the innovation and advanced capabilities coming from industry,” said Dr. Laura Taylor-Kale, Assistant Secretary of Defense for Industrial Base Policy within the Office of the Under Secretary of Defense for Acquisition and Sustainment. “Expanding domestic biomanufacturing capacity brings stability to supply chains and furthers our efforts to build a modernized defense industrial ecosystem.”
Back in January in this teknovation.biz article, we spotlighted the work of ETSU in biomanufacturing and its plans for Eastman’s former Valleybrook campus that includes 144 acres, a 72,000-square-foot research and office complex with 29 labs, and 30,000 square feet of warehouse.
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