UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. – Eric Spiegel, president and CEO of Siemens Corp., will visit the University Park campus on Jan. 24 to officially inaugurate a strategic partnership between his firm and Penn State.
The alliance -- the first of its kind between Siemens and an American university -- includes research collaborations, an enhanced recruiting relationship and engagement across a range of University programs.
As part of the visit, Spiegel will talk to engineering students about innovation and entrepreneurship at 11:30 a.m. in 125 Reber Building. Spiegel’s talk is free and open to the public.
The agreement between Penn State and Siemens, signed late last year, includes collaborations in health care, infrastructure, energy, people development and sustainability.
Spiegel’s previously scheduled visit to campus last year to kick off the partnership was canceled due to Hurricane Sandy.
The agreement is the latest chapter in a long history of Penn State-Siemens collaborations. The University and firm have previously worked together in research and development, health care, engineering and sustainability. In June 2010, Penn State and Siemens Corporate Research signed a master agreement. The company also signed a strategic alliance agreement with the Milton S. Hershey Medical Center focusing on medical imaging technology. Other collaborations include constructing a turbine test facility to investigate turbine cooling and studies on wind turbines.
In health care, Siemens has sponsored work in the Center for Integrated Healthcare Delivery Systems.
In engineering, the company will fund an introduction to engineering design class for first-year engineering students that will emphasize team-based learning, communication skills and computer-aided analysis tools. Siemens also is sponsoring capstone design projects for senior engineering students.
Within sustainability, Siemens Building Technologies has supplied energy-saving technologies used in buildings at Penn State’s University Park, Mont Alto and Capital campuses.