UC Irvine’s Beall Applied Innovation celebrates 5-year mark and new location

UCI Beall Applied Innovation has a new home, just in time for a celebration of its fifth anniversary.

The university’s entrepreneurial and innovation platform came about in 2014 as an initiative by UCI Chancellor Howard Gillman to connect students and faculty and help grow Orange County’s entrepreneurial ecosystem.

The result was UCI Beall Applied Innovation, and Executive Director Richard Sudek was brought on in August 2014 to lead the effort.

The program was renamed last year after a multimillion-dollar donation to the university from the Beall Family Foundation.

It relocated in November to a larger facility in the Cove — a hub of state-of-the-art technological facilities and office space at the UCI Research Park — and the university marked the fifth anniversary and the new location with a grand opening Wednesday night, inviting the public for a reception and tours.

The newly renovated Cove, at 5270 California Ave., includes updated event space that can accommodate more than 300 guests and includes 180 degrees of seamless display technology on a 132-foot-long screen, along with meeting and event rooms of varying sizes.

It also includes working spaces such as a “makerspace” with equipment for entrepreneurs to build prototypes.

“We’ve grown dramatically,” Sudek said. “When we started 5½ years ago, we had a much smaller office space. We’ve stood up a number of programs that related to technology transfer, innovation, entrepreneurship and corporate engagement and a lot of activity that connects to the community.”

“Here at UCI, we’re trying to help build a modern American dream, and that involves a number of things,” Sudek added. “It involves ... helping our students, faculty and community realize their dreams through start-ups and entrepreneurial activity.”

Support our coverage by becoming a digital subscriber.