Is it better than it seems?

From the LA Business Journal:

The headline is encouraging with its inter-university cooperation.  But the text says:

USC, UCLA and CalTech Receive $3.75 Million Federal Grant

By Melissah Yang Tuesday, August 26, 2014 
 
Southern California’s tech scene is getting federally funded. The National Science Foundation, an independent federal agency that supports science and engineering research, has awarded a three-year $3.75 million grant to establish an innovation hub, or “node,” in Southern California. The Innovation Corps program, which helps university researchers adapt their discoveries for commercial use, will begin Sept. 1 through a joint partnership between UCLA, CalTech and USC, which is administering the grant.

Yannis C. Yortsos, dean of USC Viterbi School of Engineering and the grant’s principal investigator, said the money will go toward faculty and mentorship training, research development and community events to draw interest from local investors...

Andrea Belz, an academic director at USC Marshall School of Business and the node’s new director, said programming will specifically focus on developing research for the healthcare and aerospace industries though not exclusively. She also said she expected the program’s “hub-and-spoke” model to spark innovation at other Southern California universities and throughout the region, no matter how risky the technology...

Full story at http://www.labusinessjournal.com/news/2014/aug/26/usc-ucla-and-caltech-receive-375-million-federal-g/

At least from the description in the article, there are two junior partners in this venture and neither of them is USC.