Western Mass Is Building the Next Economy. Now We Need to Connect It.

Western Massachusetts innovation is taking shape across research, manufacturing, food, climate and talent.

Something important is happening across Western Massachusetts.

Not in one city. Not on one campus. Not within one industry.

And that is precisely the point.

Across Hampden, Hampshire and Franklin counties, researchers are developing new technologies. Entrepreneurs are turning ideas into companies. Manufacturers are solving increasingly complex problems. Major employers are adopting artificial intelligence. Food and climate innovators are moving technologies toward market. Colleges and workforce organizations are preparing people for jobs that continue to change.

Each of those stories matters on its own.

Western Massachusetts already possesses many of the ingredients of a sophisticated innovation economy.

Start with what is already here

At UMass Amherst, researchers were awarded approximately $235 million in sponsored projects during 2025-26, and the university received 22 U.S. patents in FY2026.

Those are more than academic statistics. They represent ideas, discoveries and intellectual property with the potential to become technologies, partnerships, companies and jobs.

UMass is also home to one of our region’s most differentiated assets. Its Department of Food Science is ranked No. 1 in the United States and No. 5 globally, while Agricultural Sciences ranks No. 1 nationally and No. 8 globally.

That research is already moving beyond the laboratory. UMass researchers Lili He and Yuzhen Zhang developed BactiSee, a smartphone-based bacterial-detection technology built on more than a decade of research and now being moved toward commercialization.

The university is also doing significant work in quantum information science. Don Towsley, director of UMass Amherst’s Quantum Information Systems Institute, is one of the leading researchers in quantum networking, with UMass helping design architectures and protocols for future quantum networks through the National Science Foundation’s Center for Quantum Networks.

And in Springfield, Western New England University’s Center for Quantum Hardware Development adds another important piece to the regional quantum ecosystem. The Center is designed to help companies validate products, shorten development cycles and strengthen the Massachusetts quantum supply chain. In 2025, WNE received a $500,440 state investment to expand quantum hardware development and commercialization, strengthen testing and packaging infrastructure, build workforce capacity and launch a Quantum Jumpstart seed-grant program for small businesses.

Then travel only a short distance to Holyoke.

The Massachusetts Green High Performance Computing Center supports more than 20,000 faculty members and students from its university partners and other institutions across the Northeast. In 2025, MGHPCC launched the AI Compute Resource as part of a planned $120 million public-private investment from the Massachusetts AI Hub and MGHPCC’s six principal university partners.

Then look at what happens when research meets companies and manufacturing

Myrias Optics, built on research developed at UMass Amherst, announced an additional $2.1 million financing round in February 2026 to accelerate commercialization of its wafer-level metaoptics technology.

In Holyoke, Clean Crop Technologies is using cold-plasma technology powered by air and electricity to treat seeds, targeting pathogens while supporting crop performance without synthetic additives or residues.

Also in Holyoke, Cofab Design develops physical products and the manufacturing strategies required to move hard-tech ideas toward commercial production.

And in Westfield, Peerless Precision manufactures complex, tight-tolerance components for aerospace, defense, medical and commercial optics applications.

These organizations may appear to operate in different worlds. Economically, they can be pieces of the same opportunity.

A technology developed in a university laboratory eventually has to leave that laboratory. It has to be engineered. Prototyped. Tested. Manufactured. Sold. Scaled.

Food innovation offers another distinctive regional opportunity

The same pattern appears when we look at food and agriculture.

Start with nationally leading research at UMass. Add technologies such as BactiSee and companies such as Clean Crop.

Then move north to the Franklin County Community Development Corporation and Western Massachusetts Food Processing Center, which help food entrepreneurs move from ideas toward commercialization through product development, prototyping, processing, regulatory support, manufacturing, storage and distribution assistance.

Connect that infrastructure to farms, food manufacturers, distributors, institutions and buyers throughout Western Massachusetts.

Seen separately, those are important organizations and businesses.

That is not simply a good story. That is an economic-development opportunity.

Climate technology is moving toward market here, too

Western Massachusetts is producing similarly compelling signals in climate and energy technology.

Western Mass-founded florrent raised an oversubscribed $9.5 million Seed-2 round to scale its next-generation materials for supercapacitors and is expanding its pilot-scale manufacturing capabilities in South Deerfield. A $402,175 state manufacturing grant is supporting equipment to mill, filter and process waste biomass into activated carbon, a core component of its supercapacitor technology.

And in August, the Massachusetts Clean Energy Center announced commercialization awards that included $331,050 for Amherst-based Amel Energy to demonstrate a safer, lower-cost process for manufacturing lithium-ion batteries and $239,012 for Deerfield-based Xflow Energy to demonstrate lower-cost vertical-axis wind technology for farms and businesses.

Those companies need more than good technology. They need places to demonstrate it. Customers willing to evaluate it. Manufacturing partners. Capital. Workers. And relationships that help them move from promising ideas to growing companies.

Our largest employers are part of the innovation economy, too

Innovation is not limited to startups.

Springfield-headquartered MassMutual ranked 10th overall in the 2026 Evident AI Index for Insurance and third among the 30 insurers evaluated for innovation.

Baystate Health is undertaking a major digital transformation involving AI-powered clinical, data and operational technologies across a health system serving more than 800,000 people.

And Tech Foundry is adapting workforce pathways as technology changes employer needs. In 2026, it announced a four-year $2.35 million award, the largest in its history, supporting workforce training, participant stipends and stronger data systems.

Those connections matter.

Our largest institutions can be more than employers. They can be customers for emerging technologies. Pilot environments. Mentors. Investors. Workforce partners. And sources of real-world challenges that entrepreneurs and businesses here may be able to solve.

Growth also depends on the conditions around innovation

Innovation and business growth do not happen in isolation. Companies also need the conditions that allow people to build careers and lives here.

That includes housing.

The demand for Western Massachusetts is already visible. In April, Realtor.com ranked the Springfield metro the hottest housing market in the country for the second consecutive month, with listings attracting 3.6 times the national average views per property. Amherst Town-Northampton also ranked among the nation’s top 20 markets.

That demand is an advantage, but it also reinforces the importance of housing supply.

If we want more graduates to stay, more workers and families to choose the region, and more employers to grow, Western Massachusetts needs a broader range of housing options across our cities, town centers and rural communities.

Massachusetts’ Housing Development Incentive Program already explicitly connects new construction and substantial rehabilitation in Gateway Cities with residential growth, economic development and neighborhood stabilization. We should also continue examining approaches such as modular and off-site construction as builders and communities look for ways to address cost, time and workforce constraints.

Housing is one part of a larger equation that also includes infrastructure, transportation, talent and quality of place. Seeing those connections is part of seeing the economy as a whole.

Three counties. One economy.

These are not rigid definitions. Innovation does not stop at a county line.

The challenge is not simply whether the assets exist. It is whether we see them clearly enough, connect them intentionally enough and make them easier for businesses, entrepreneurs, workers, investors and partners to navigate.

The greatest opportunity may exist in the spaces between organizations

Innovation rarely moves neatly from invention to economic impact. The path often looks something like this:

Western Massachusetts has organizations capable of supporting every stage.

But having the pieces is not the same as having a connected system.

A researcher may need an entrepreneur. An entrepreneur may need a manufacturer. A startup may need its first customer. A manufacturer may need specialized talent. An employer may have a challenge that a company 20 miles away is already trying to solve. A growing company may need capital, space, infrastructure or a connection to state or federal resources.

And that is where I believe the Western Mass Economic Development Council can provide unique value.