Bellevue City Councilmember John Chelminiak says the University of Washington is eyeing the Bel-Red corridor to site a new innovation center proposed to pair students and faculty with companies and organizations to tackle global design and technology challenges.

In his annual address on Oct. 15, UW President Michael Young announced the appointment of Vikram Jandhyala as vice provost for innovation, a new position to the university, to lead UW’s new “innovation agenda.”

Young wrote in a Seattle Times column the next day that agenda calls for a center in Bellevue that will attract faculty and students worldwide here to collaborate with companies and organizations “in solving some of the globe’s biggest design and technology challenges.”

Young states UW is now negotiating with top research universities around the world to participate. Chelminiak said Monday that includes a Chinese university and Councilmember Conrad Lee added another in Europe may be involved in partnership discussions. Official announcements are expected to be made once memorandums of understanding are finalized, Chelminiak said.

“I think we are finally coming to realization,” said Lee of the complex project.

Redmond-based computer and software giant Microsoft is a founding partner in the innovation center, and will also be one of those companies Young described as providing hands-on projects for UW students.

“I also have a little skin in the game with the Bel-Red plan,” said Chelminiak, “and it looks like that might be the location for it.”

The City Council adopted a vision and revised zoning for the Bel-Red corridor after nearly five years of planning that aims to create 10,000 jobs and 5,000 new housing units there by 2030 while leveraging future light rail to drive economic development. The $2.3 billion Spring District mixed-use development has been the most publicized project in Bel-Red, and will have light rail service running through it and into Redmond in 2023.

Jandhyala,  director of the applied computational engineering lab at UW and  former chairman of the Electrical Engineering Department, has been actively involved in promoting the university’s innovation agenda in his new vice provost role, Young said.

“Dr. Jandhyala is already working to create platforms to integrate innovation through cross-disciplinary teams best practices and access and collaboration with community innovators to make learning and experiences in the area of innovation available across the entire university and beyond,” said Young in his Oct. 15 address.