Blog: KE Matters

Dr. Adam Stoten, COO at Oxford University Innovation shares his motivation behind becoming RTTP accredited. In this short interview, Adam explains that RTTP status is a great way of giving confidence to those whom KEC professionals work with and gives a personal account of how those with RTTP status feel, when their achievements are recognised beyond their own organisation.  

The UK has a long history of university-industry research collaborations, with about two thirds of R&D funding coming from the private sector.  The recent 2018 State of the Relationship Report from the National Centre for Universities and Business noted that the UK now ranks 6th in the world for industry-university collaboration.  And with the UK Government has committed itself to growing R&D from 1.7% of GDP in 2015 to 2.4% by 2027, that’s great news.  But the report notes that 75% of private sector UK R&D is carried out by only 400 businesses.   Of the businesses that work with universities, the 2015 Dowling Review notes that a significant portion of these were headquartered outside of the UK.  If the UK is going to continue the trend of increased foreign investment in business collaborations with UK universities, what can universities do to increase their appeal to multinationals?

We’re asking a series of KE experts on the industry side, what makes their company choose to work with UK Universities, and how UK KE practitioners could up their game.  These R&D-centric multinationals have a wealth of collaboration choices, and naturally, a finite amount to invest.  How can the UK gain an edge?  Noelle Gracy, Head, Research Collaboration Office at Elsevier talked to Malcolm Skingle, Director, Academic Liaison to find out how GSK benefits from collaborating with UK universities.