The 5G Open Innovation Lab (5G OI Lab) has opened its first office, making the Global Innovation Exchange (GIX) building in Bellevue’s Spring District its home and giving the lab a physical foothold in an emerging area of the booming Eastside city.
GIX, a partnership between the University of Washington and Tsinghua University in Beijing, is a graduate school focused on technology and innovation located in a 96,000-square-foot facility. It is backed by a $40 million investment from Microsoft and opened in 2017 with UW offering a Master of Science in Technology Innovation (MSTI) degree there, including a new robotics track introduced last year.