Marist University brings IBM z17 on campus for new AI research incubator

The Innovation Incubator expands a 50-year partnership between Marist and IBM, giving students across disciplines access to enterprise computing for AI research, application development and career-focused projects Marist University will use an IBM z17 as part of its new Innovation Incubator for AI research, application development and student learning Marist University and IBM are expanding their more than 50-year partnership with a new Innovation Incubator built around an IBM z17 mainframe, opening enterprise computing and AI research opportunities to students beyond traditional computer science programs. The incubator will bring together students, faculty researchers and IBM specialists on interdisciplinary projects spanning areas including marketing, business, financial management and polling. Marist is using the IBM z17 on its Poughkeepsie, New York campus so students can develop and test applications while gaining experience with technology designed for large-scale enterprise workloads. For IBM’s Doris Conti, VP of IBM Power Systems Product Management, the announcement also has a personal connection. Writing on LinkedIn , the Marist alum and former IBM intern described the partnership as an opportunity to “help students across majors prepare for the evolving digital economy.” The university and IBM are positioning the incubator as a shift away from treating AI and digital skills as the preserve of computing students, with projects intended to involve different academic schools and disciplines. AI projects move beyond computer science Three initial areas of work show how broad that remit could become, although each remains at a different stage of development. Marist’s Schools of Computer Science and Mathematics and Management are planning research that would run controlled synthetic marketing campaigns using teams of autonomous AI agents. The project is intended to test whether built-in guardrails continue to work when agents are instructed to pursue aggressive, deceptive or unethical tactics, and whether those protections can contain failures. A second project, currently being scoped by the Schools of Management and Computer Science and Mathematics, would apply quantum optimization algorithms to real-time financial data to generate portfolio allocations. The Marist Poll and School of Computer Science and Mathematics are also considering research into how AI could be used in polling methodology, survey design and modeling voter participation trends. That university-wide approach is central to the expansion. Marist says the collaboration is intended to involve areas including political science, communications, marketing, business, environmental science and library sciences rather than concentrating access to the technology in one department. “At Marist, we believe the future of higher education lies at the intersection of academic excellence and meaningful industry engagement,” says Marist President Kevin Weinman. He adds that the IBM relationship is now being used to create “new opportunities in artificial intelligence, research, and innovation that span the entire university.” IBM z17 becomes part of student learning and research The IBM z17 gives Marist students and faculty access to enterprise technology that IBM says is designed around the performance, security and reliability requirements of large organizations. Rather than limiting the system to faculty research, the university plans to use it for student application development and testing, connecting academic work with experience students could later apply in employment. Tina Tarquinio, Chief Product Officer for IBM Z and LinuxONE and IBM’s Senior Location Executive for the Mid-Hudson Valley, frames the project around that combination of research and workforce preparation. “By combining IBM’s technology expertise with Marist’s commitment to innovation and student success, we’re creating new pathways for research, learning, and workforce development that prepare students for the future,” she says. The incubator also builds on Marist’s wider AI strategy announced earlier in 2026, which places technical AI skills alongside ethical reflection and aims to prepare students across majors to work with the technology. IBM and Marist’s relationship originally centered more heavily on enterprise computing and computer science education. The new incubator broadens that work into interdisciplinary AI research and experiential learning across the university. Marist has more than 6,000 undergraduate and graduate students across six schools and nearly 50 majors. The university operates campuses in Poughkeepsie, New York, and Florence, Italy, alongside international study programs. Permalink