Cornerstones: Research Triangle Park

The Research Triangle Park (RTP) is the country’s largest research park, a result of leaders across disciplines coming together to help pull North Carolina out of its economic decline in the mid-1950s. Bordered by Raleigh, Durham and Chapel Hill, and the renowned universities in each of those regions — NC State, Duke and University of North Carolina - Chapel Hill — RTP covers 7,000 acres and hosts more than 300 research, technology and agri-bio companies, alongside government agencies. More than 40,000 people are employed in the park.

Today, RTP is a leading innovation center that was the brainchild of a number of business leaders, with help from then Gov. Luther Hodges, who was known to favor a friendly business climate. At the time, North Carolina, a typical Southern economy, ranked near the bottom in the country in per capita income. It was largely dependent on tobacco, textiles and furniture manufacturing. Leaders in the state, including Robert Hanes, the president of Wachovia Bank and Trust Company, and contractor Romeo Guest, wanted to attract modern industries to ensure North Carolina’s economic future, according to the North Carolina History Project.

It was university sociologist Howard Odum who suggested the state take advantage of the region’s three research universities, NC State, UNC-Chapel Hill and Duke, according to the North Carolina History Project, and with Hodges on board, the Research Triangle Committee was launched in 1956. In 1959, the Research Triangle Foundation was formed to manage RTP, which was home to five companies.

Sociologist Odum’s idea to locate a business endeavor near the universities proved prescient as the surrounding schools provided a continuous pipeline of talent to the companies that were now locating in the park at a rate of about six a year and 1,800 new employees, the North Carolina History Project states. The universities continue to be integral partners to the park, said RTP President and CEO Scott Levitan. “Research Triangle Park was created on the backbone of these three wonderful research institutions: Duke, UNC Chapel Hill and NC State. Over time, we’ve attracted other partners in proximity to the Triangle that are really doing things that are remarkable and add to the area not only in talent but also research.”

Between the talent flow from the nearby universities and the attractive cost of living, RTP had hit on a winning formula based on a collaborative model. By the 2000s, the park had added the NC Biotech Center and Mircoelectronics Center of North Carolina, “the nation’s first state-funded non-profits that promoted small firm success in life sciences and microelectronics,” the RTP website states. Those developments have helped North Carolina become a Top 3 state in bioscience employment and a global leader in vaccine research.