Elected officials and tech executives gathered to officially open a new office and testing facility for Aurora on the Montana State University Innovation campus.
The 42-acre parcel west of the university once was home to a dairy farm. Now, commercial development along streets like Technology Blvd., and Invention Dr. are attracting tech companies.
Governor Greg Gianforte, who also once founded a tech company in Bozeman, helped cut the ribbon and toured the new facility, which currently employs 70 people. The Governor said the technology sector is the fastest growing industry in Montana.
“As an electrical engineer and tech geek, I think what you're doing is really cool. This is the future, and it’s being authored and manufactured here in Montana,” Gianforte said.
Aurora is a self-driving technology company headquartered in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania that is working to outfit freight-hauling semi-trucks with technology that would allow them to drive location to location without a person at the wheel.
The company’s new campus in Bozeman designs and manufactures laser sensors called LiDAR, a critical component that is able to detect objects and their movements more than four football fields away from the truck.
On a tour of the facilities, Senior Director of LiDAR Research & Development Zeb Barber pointed out high-tech testing and development labs where employees wear electrostatic discharge lab coats.
“This lab here behind these doors is our environmental test lab where we have thermal chambers and some vibration tables," Barber said.
Barber also showed off a small museum in the building with all the models of laser sensors made in Bozeman over the last decade.
“We have our Io, Europa and Titan units in different generations,” Barber said.
The clear display cases have empty space where the smaller, newer models may end up one day.
