Butler County Community College’s campus has an opportunity to assist the future of unmanned military equipment.

The opportunity was presented to BC3’s board of trustees Wednesday, June 18. The community college could potentially see a partnership with the NEYA Group, a robotics company that develops unmanned military vehicles.

The proposal would expand on the already existing relationship between BC3 and the NEYA Group. The company currently has a rental agreement to use Lot 5, located in the back left corner of BC3’s campus near its baseball field, to test equipment.

The company, founded in 2009, is based out of Warrendale, Allegheny County.

According to its website, NEYA designs, develops and tests autonomous systems that “solve some of the toughest outdoor challenges in both the defense and commercial industries.” The company is a subsidiary of Applied Research Associates, an international engineering company.

Brian McCafferty, a member of BC3’s board of trustees who’s on the facilities committee, said the robotics company has an interest in even more space to test its equipment. The company is specifically interested in both paved track and off-road testing sites.

McCafferty said BC3 has a lot of unused land on its campus that could be used by the NEYA Group for additional company needs. He said looking into a partnership like this is a way of “thinking outside of the box” for growing opportunities at BC3 in the future.

“We looked at a lot of topographical maps for our Butler campus. We have a lot of undeveloped land up in there, a majority of our property is undeveloped. There’s some potential sites that could work for this company,” McCafferty said.

According to the board of trustees’ agenda, the NEYA Group’s long-term vision for increased usage space includes a facility with office space, a garage and a welcome center.

The company is also exploring an expanded partnership with BC3’s work development and STEM programs.

The partnership was facilitated by Mark Gordon, Butler County’s chief of economic development and planning, who pitched the idea of a partnership to BC3 president Megan Coval and Jake Friel, vice president for administration and finance. Gordon confirmed talks between BC3 and the NEYA Group are in very early stages right now,

Gordon said he was introduced to the NEYA Group and its work by state Rep. Stephenie Scialabba, R-12, who serves as chair of the PA artificial intelligence opportunity task force. Scialabba has recently spoken on the importance of taking advantage of opportunities surrounding the growth of the artificial intelligence industry, saying at the state legislative breakfast in May the growing deployment of artificial intelligence in industries and manufacturing, and the need for energy production for data centers, provides an opportunity for Butler County and Western Pennsylvania to grow its economy.

Gordon lauded the work the company is doing in defense, developing equipment like autonomous reconnaissance vehicles that do dangerous work in place of human soldiers.

“Historically, in times of conflict, they would send military personnel in a van with troops, but as a result, it’s pretty dangerous work, they walk into land mines, IED’s,” Gordon said. “This technology employs robotics and such, where they can go into an area and survey the area for a tactical piece of equipment, essentially determine whether its safe or if there’s issues in some of these places.”

With the number of manufacturers in Butler County in some way affiliated with industries like tech, defense and aerospace, Gordon believes this kind of partnership would be very beneficial to BC3 in the coming years.

“The campus has around 130 acres. It’s a wonderful opportunity for use of land in conjunction with that college, and that type of technology at the college with the workforce development program could be great,” Gordon said.