West Virginia High Technology Foundation focuses on artificial intelligence growth in 2026, beyond
This WV News report is a grounded look at how a regional tech hub is trying to ride the AI wave with very “real economy” anchors. The West Virginia High Technology Foundation (which supports the I-79 High Tech Park in Fairmont) highlights AI as a strategic priority for 2026 and beyond, pointing to the presence of major federal tenants like NOAA’s Environmental Security Computing Center and NASA’s Katherine Johnson Independent Verification and Validation (IV&V) Facility.
One concrete catalyst is NOAA’s planned Rhea supercomputer (reported as a ~$100M system) slated for installation in 2026, with the Foundation’s leadership arguing that expanding local compute capacity can translate into more AI-focused work and, ideally, more local startup activity. On the NASA side, the IV&V team talks about using machine learning for practical, localized automation in software analysis and engineering work (explicitly not “just ChatGPT”). The article also calls out programs meant to connect students to these opportunities — like the Cloud Data Analytics Fellows Program with WVU — and frames “agentic AI” and LLM-driven apps as a new set of tools that lower the barrier for entrepreneurs.