The University of the Commonwealth Caribbean (UCC) aims to raise US$15 million to complete land acquisition for EcoVista, a 283-acre development in Trelawny.
The plan involves building a university-anchored smart city. UCC plans to invite up to six international universities to join as academic partners.
“EcoVista is not simply a real estate concept. It is an integrated future city proposition anchored by education, sustainability, smart infrastructure, and long-term national development logic. It attempts to solve more than one problem simultaneously,” said Dr Winston Adams, founder and group executive chairman of UCC, in an international release seen by the Financial Gleaner.
Construction on EcoVista is phased through to 2038. Adams stated that the market, the technology, and the regional need have now overlapped. “That convergence is not accidental, and it will not wait,” Adams added.
The project combines a campus designed for more than 5,000 students with four planned innovation districts — financial technology, health technology, a business incubator for artificial intelligence (AI), and business process outsourcing firms. It also envisages a resort district with 710 hotel rooms and 150 overwater villas. The site, on 1,200 metres of beachfront property 40 minutes from Montego Bay’s international airport, is being acquired at 40 per cent below its 2024 appraised value of US$52.8 million, creating US$21 million in built-in equity before construction begins, according to the release.
Total development cost is projected at US$513 million against forecast revenue of US$2.04 billion across all phases. UCC says it carries zero institutional debt and holds more than US$20 million in net assets, acting as project guarantor.
The development has circulated under various names since at least 2024, when it was marketed to investors online as an eco-city offering equity shares, preference shares and debt financing. The project won the Smart Infrastructure category at the AIM Future Cities Award in Abu Dhabi in April 2025.
Dr Adams has been building Caribbean higher-education infrastructure since 1992, when he founded the Institute of Management Sciences in Kingston, at a time when “fewer than four per cent” of Jamaicans of eligible age had access to tertiary education. IMS merged with the Institute of Management and Production to create UCC in 2002.
