Mr. Jerald "Jerry" Coughter, Industry Director, Biotechnology and Medical Apps, of Virginia's Center for Innovative Technology (CIT), asked Michael A. Ricciardi, the President of RTI, to lead the steering committee for the 1st Virginia Conference on Combating Terrorism... RTI has also been selected to be one of the featured companies and presenters at this conference.

This event is about connecting existing and potential Virginia bio-defense contractors with each other, with University researchers, and with decision makers in the federal agencies. The hope is that some of these people have solutions to bio-defense related problems that are either already on the shelf or close to commercialization.

The conference will be a one-day event, held on Dec 13, 2001. The audience is Virginia companies working on bio-defense issues; university-based researchers and tech transfer officers, and representatives from as many of the DOD agencies as possible. Tabletop type exhibits by the companies and agencies will be encouraged. The goal is to promote Virginia companies and universities to the DOD agencies, and to educate the companies about bio-defense opportunities.

The ultimate end goal is to create "the" Virginia Bio-defense Industry Council that will lead the way in promoting and innovating bio-defense solutions for the Commonwealth of Virginia.

RTI (Ricciardi Technologies, Inc.) is a software development and consulting company providing professional software & hardware development support and distributed/embedded systems solutions to Fortune 500 Clients and Federal Agencies.