At Wake Technical Community College’s Advanced Technology Center, the focus is on workforce education. Built for the era of Industry 4.0, the fourth industrial revolution transforming manufacturing through automation, data, and smart technologies, the 80,000GSF facility gives a real-world learning environment. Students pursuing careers in engineering, biopharmaceuticals, and microelectronics gain vital hands-on experience, preparing them for the future workplace.

Labs like the BioPharmaceutical Simulation Suite, the Systems Integration Lab, the High-Bay Fabrication Maker Lab, and the Mechatronics Teaching Lab give students hands-on experience with industry workflows. Students learn to enter and gown in cleanroom areas, practice processes in simulated pharmaceutical manufacturing environments, and gain skills in high-bay fabrication, digital and analog electronics, and mechatronics systems.

At Carnegie Mellon University’s Robotics Innovation Center, innovation moves from classroom to prototype. The 150,000GSF facility houses high-bay robotics testing, a drone cage, and rapid prototyping laboratories that allow researchers to design, build, and test in one continuous process. It’s a space where exploration and experimentation fuel advancement and where robots for healthcare, defense, and agriculture are created, tested, and refined.

More specifically, the three-story High-Bay Testing Space allows for full-scale vehicle and robotic testing, supported by continuous drive-through bay and outdoor testing fields. Inside, a 6,000GSF Drone Cage and Motion Capture Laboratory enable precise tracking and flight experimentation, while the Wet Lab expands testing to aquatic and hybrid environments. A Fabrication Skills Laboratory, electronics shop, and rapid prototyping spaces let students and researchers design, build, and refine technologies in real time. Whether developing autonomous vehicles, robotic arms, or underwater drones, students gain hands-on experience across air, land, and water, advancing robotics from concept to real-world application.

These projects represent the foundation of the advanced manufacturing ecosystem. They are where the theory meets application and where the next generation of engineers, designers, and makers gain the skills to lead an automated future.

This design philosophy is central to our work as well. “We design flexible, adaptable environments for cross-disciplinary collaboration. Students and researchers are exploring robotics, advanced manufacturing tools, and real-world workflows, all while preparing for tomorrow’s technologies,” says Principal David Vargo, CTS-D, CTS-I.

As industries continue to progress, so do the environments that train and support them. Advanced manufacturing begins long before production – it starts in the labs and classrooms where exploration and industry evolution take shape. The ideas, tools, and skills developed in these spaces shape the work happening in factories, startups, and innovation hubs worldwide, preparing the workforce of tomorrow to lead the industries of the future.