construction zoneThis November 11 photo shows progress of the interior construction in the Joyce Entrepreneurship Centre.

Joyce Entrepreneurship Centre nearing occupancy

Construction of the interiors of the Joyce Entrepreneurship Centre is continuing apace.

The building, located on Wyandotte Street in front of the campus parking garage, houses a branch of the Windsor Family Credit Union and will soon be home to offices of the Entrepreneurship Practice and Innovation Centre (EPICentre), Campus Police and Parking Services, the Office of the Vice-President Research and Innovation, the Office of Research and Innovation Services, Technology Transfer Office and Research Finance.

“We are very excited with the progress of the work,” says Heather Pratt, executive director of research and innovation and a member of the building’s steering committee. “Furniture is being delivered and installed this week in EPIC Innovation, the business incubator space, which we anticipate will become an engine of economic growth for the entire region.”

The space will encourage collaborative entrepreneurial student and youth enterprises, collaboration with industry, technical research and business expertise, Pratt says.

“We have partnered with the Odette School of Business to support the entrepreneurial training and awareness across campus and the space at EPIC Innovation will provide our youth ventures further support and space to develop their business plans and products to move their ideas to commercialization,” she says. “We aim to make the corner of California Avenue and Wyandotte Street the address for innovation in Windsor-Essex.”

Pratt says the construction should be complete by the end of November, and a grand opening is being planned for early in 2015. For further information on space within EPIC Innovation, contact Pratt at hpratt@uwindsor.ca.