Fundamental and practical challenges facing our society can be addressed with new methods and thus approached from a new perspective. Examples of present day challenges are energy conversion, information technology, new materials and biology and medicine.The centre (LACUS) was started because most of these challenges can only be addressed by a truly interdisciplinary approach in research and technology, e.g. through the collaboration of specialists in ultrafast science and technology with experts in physics, chemistry, engineering and life sciences.To tackle the ever-increasing demands and complexity posed by ultrafast science experiments addressing important societal challenges and to encourage the collaboration with EPFL research groups in Engineering and Life Sciences and meet their demands, pooling of resources and research infrastructure is needed that allows researchers to go beyond what a single group can afford or manage in terms of equipment, know-how or complexity. In particular, LACUS will remove the technological burden of developing technology from groups that are primarily interested in the use of these tools to address scientific questions or practical applications. An internationally competitive, sustainable and cost-efficient development of ultrafast science and technology in Lausanne can only be achieved by creating a new, carefully designed and fully dedicated research environment that satisfies the complex requirements of cutting-edge laser technology and helps proliferate ultrafast methods into new areas of science and technology.At the same time, LACUS will facilitate the access of young researchers to an academic career by providing access to expensive equipment and instrumentation that would otherwise be out of reach. Finally, it will foster contacts with industry to ease the transfer of newly emerging ultrafast technology towards applications.