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BLACKSBURG, Va. (WDBJ) - “Just watch, we’ve got some great things coming,” Virginia Tech Corporate Research Center President and CEO, Brett Malone said as he closed the gathering on Wednesday afternoon.

More than 50 Leaders and residents from the Roanoke Valley and New River Valley gathered as the Virginia Tech Corporate Research Center announced a new “GO Virginia” Grant, that will help advance life science research across the region. The grant is for $599,000 and will cover the majority of the $1.1 million project, with partners helping to cover the rest.

“It means importing some of the world class talents to help our early stage biotech startups. It also means that we’re building a whole new product, which is a more accessible lab, a turnkey lab, for people who want to get in and build a life science,” said Malone.

”We have a lot of brilliant researchers who come up with great ideas, publish papers, they speak to their colleagues, they get grants and then they tuck it off and start-up company, the company has nowhere to go. So this is that missing link,” said VP for Health Sciences and Technology at Virginia Tech, Dr. Michael Friedlander.

Click here to read more via WDBJ.com.