The new Kentucky Digital Health Tech and Artificial Intelligence Innovation Coalition is backed by one of 60 phase-one planning grants awarded through the . As a finalist receiving phase-one funding, the coalition now will compete for up to $100 million in phase-two implementation funding.

The coalition is led by the Louisville Healthcare CEO Council (LHCC) and includes UofL, the Academy of Music Production ����ֱ�� and Development, Greater Louisville Inc., Kentuckiana Regional Planning and Development Agency, Louisville Metro Government, the Louisville Urban League and Metro United Way.

“This work will be transformative for our city and our region,” said Kevin Gardner, UofL’s executive vice president for . “By bringing together a powerhouse research university and our community partners, we can build on our strengths and past success in health care, innovation and entrepreneurship to make a real impact.”

In phase one, the coalition partners will plan new workforce development, entrepreneurship, research, innovation and commercialization programming and supports centered on digital health care and artificial intelligence.

“Our goal is to establish the Louisville region as a national hub for digital health care and train a high-tech health care workforce,” said Tammy York Day, president and CEO of , which represents 14 of the region’s largest health care companies, including Humana Inc. and Kindred Healthcare.

This new effort builds on previous collaborations between UofL and LHCC to boost regional health care startups and innovation. Together, they run Aging 2.0, which supports programming, training and mentoring for aging and health care innovators and entrepreneurs.

“Louisville already has significant strength in all of these areas — in health care, technology and startups,” said Will Metcalf, an assistant vice president for research and innovation at UofL and a lead on the grant. “With this new funding from the EDA, we hope to build on that success and to promote economic development and equity.”

UofL supports entrepreneurs through its UofL New Ventures office, which works to launch and grow startups built around UofL intellectual property, through LaunchIt, a 10-week entrepreneurship and innovation boot camp and through a rotating roster of entrepreneurs-in-residence — seasoned founders who help guide the university’s research-backed technologies to market.

At LHCC, Aging 2.0 supports programming through the LHCC Corporate Innovation Center, housed on UofL’s downtown entrepreneurship and innovation campus. This includes LHCC’s Chairman’s Circle, a group of former health care executives available for entrepreneurial mentoring, and annual CareTech aging innovation pitch competition.

The Build Back Better Regional Challenge is designed to assist communities nationwide by accelerating the economic recovery from the coronavirus pandemic and building local economies that will be resilient to future economic shocks.

The EDA is calling for a coalition approach, bringing together state and local government, labor and community-based organizations, industry, academia, research institutions, philanthropy and nonprofits. Successful coalitions will build technical assistance and coordination around three-to-eight tightly aligned projects and will receive up to $500,000 for phase 1 concept proposals. They also will be eligible to compete for phase 2 of funding of up to $75 million.

To solicit ideas from the community, Louisville Metro Government and UofL are hosting the public pitch meeting on Tuesday, Aug. 17, from 4 to 6 p.m. at the Main Branch of the Louisville Free Public Library, 301 York St., where attendees will each have five minutes to pitch their ideas. Attendees who wish to pitch a project idea but cannot attend the meeting may submit a concept statement of no more than 50 words to EDABuildBack@louisvilleky.gov by 6 p.m. on the same day.

The best pitches will be asked to submit a one-page, 400-word summary of their proposal, along with a one-page budget summary. Ideas must be responsive to the guidelines specified in the EDA’s Build Back Better Regional Challenge Notice of Funding Opportunity.

Initial applications are due to the EDA on Oct. 19, after which it will award 50 to 60 coalitions up to $500,000 each to draft a more detailed proposal. Those proposals are due on March 15, 2022 and will result in 20 to 30 coalitions receiving grants of between $25 million and $75 million to implement their plans.

UofL has submitted several successful proposals to the EDA over the past few years, including a $750,000 award to launch PRePARE, a new program aimed at solving the long-term health, economic and societal problems resulting from the COVID-19 pandemic.��

“With the Build Back Better Regional Challenge, we hope to build on that track record of success,” said Will Metcalf, UofL’s associate vice president for research development and strategic partnerships. “Together, UofL, the city and our community make strong partners, and this funding would allow us to launch programming that makes an impact.”

The $1 billion Build Back Better Regional Challenge will provide a transformational investment to 20 to 30 regions across the country that want to revitalize their economies. These regions will have the opportunity to grow new regional industry clusters or scale existing ones through planning, infrastructure, innovation and entrepreneurship, workforce development, access to capital and more.

More information about the Build Back Better Regional Challenge and its requirements is .��