The American University of Sharjah (AUS) is following the lead of world renowned universities and hopes to establish a new elite business district in Sharjah through its Research Technology and Innovation Park.
Under the plan, the park will span 1.8 million square metres of land donated to AUS by His Highness Dr Shaikh Sultan Bin Mohammad Al Qasimi, Supreme Council Member, Ruler of Sharjah and President of AUS.
The existing campus sits on 1.3 million square metres of land.
"It is an enormous piece of land and it will take some time to develop, but the easiest way to think of the park is as a place we want to attract businesses of the quality that are interested in employing our students," said Dr Peter Heath, Chancellor of AUS.
The idea for the park was inspired by the likes of the Tri-Centre Industrial Park in North Carolina in the US, which surrounds North Carolina State University, the University of North Carolina and Duke University.
"We hope to create a virtuous circle of us providing students who do well in these companies; who will then in turn offer research projects for our faculty and students to engage in," Dr Heath said.
Certain strata
The park will be next to the AUS campus in what is currently the Falah Military Camp.
"The military camp has been demobilising for some time and the first phase of three will be available to us soon," Dr Heath said.
The project was still in its development stages and was expected to roll into the master planning stage early next summer, when design parameters and standards would be laid out, he said. "When we say ‘research park', people tend to think there will be labs all over the place," Dr Heath said.
"It's more fair to think of this as a high quality business park with all sorts of firms and sectors involved, but of a certain strata, more white collar professionally orientated," he added.
Community service
It was the park's location in Sharjah's University City that Dr Heath said he thought would attract reputable firms to the area. "If you think of wealth not in terms of money but in terms of brain power, we have a reservoir of brain power here [in University City] with not only AUS but Sharjah University and the Higher Colleges of Technology," he said.
"What we want the companies to do is provide a place where that brain power can exercise and expand some of its outcomes."
Dr Heath said he believed such opportunities offered an advantage to companies, AUS students and faculty, and the community at large.
And while he admitted the park's location in the heart of Sharjah's industrial area may act as a hindrance to its success, it was also an attraction.
"If companies are thinking in terms of where the money is, then Sharjah may not be at the top of the list," he said. "[But] if companies think in terms of having a base where their employees will want to live and be happy because of the pleasant family environment with good schools nearby, which will result in employee retention rates, then I think we have advantages."
With housing and retail projects planned for the same area by external developers and AUS' primary and secondary school in the pipeline, Dr Heath said the area would develop into an attractive family community.
