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The Florida Institute of Technology is opening a center for advanced manufacturing and design. It will serve both students and business.

The center will create a space where students, technology and business can create, test and build a product virtually. And once it’s just right, go out and actually make it.

This process saves businesses money and gives students experience, said the center’s Executive Director Mike Grieves. “The whole idea here is do as much as you can from a digital basis,” he said, “because that takes a huge amount of the cost out of classical manufacturing.”

Grieves said the digital work will begin in the next few months, with the actual center opening up in phases over the next two years.