education & business roundtable 27


pursue fundamental research so the transfer of that new knowledge into a business venture, is most likely to be achieved through their young post doctoral researchers who can be inspired to take the risk to move into a more applied physics direction.


Are we building bridges that will not meet?


Heathcock: ”I get the impression that universities are trying to exploit the information and IP they have, without interfacing enough with businesses to find out what they would like on the applied research side. This is where I see the bridges needing to be built over the next few years, getting businesses collaborating at an earlier stage and fully engaged.”


Birkett: ”There is frustration in a lot of companies as to how they access knowledge locked in universities. There doesn’t appear to be much motivation among the really good academics to transfer that knowledge out into industry. Although we talk about the need for academics to be more conscious of the commercial drivers coming from industry, in reality the pressures in academia mitigate against applied research, which is seen as being of a lesser status than pure research.”


Whitaker: ”I fear at present it is a little like building a bridge from two sides of a ravine, and there are plenty of opportunities for the arms of the bridge to miss each other.”


Ramsden: ”Businesses have to establish an awareness of relevant universities with whom they could collaborate.”


Norman Armstrong said one key ’gap’ to bridge for both academic institutions and businesses was the better use of KTPs at all levels of industry – from start-ups to corporates. Too often, corporates simply bought in expertise to solve a problem when it arose, rather than be forward-thinking and use research to steer them away from costly problems or gain market advantage. He highlighted the enlightened approach of McLaren, which has established an in-house facility to commercialise its research IP.


Birkett: ”That’s unusual because a lot of businesses are doing the reverse, outsourcing their research because they cannot create a critical mass within their company.”


Heathcock: ”That should be great news for universities then!”


Birkett: ”Universities haven’t quite worked out how to connect with that demand.”


Stark pointed out that government-funded university studies and knowledge transfer partnerships (KTPs) had proved successful for some businesses. ”Dorset Cereals used a KTP to boost their business prospects both regionally and nationally with the support of a highly-skilled graduate and an academic supervisor. This embedded quality into their marketing operations and two years later, they have become the UK’s leading muesli brand standing prominently on the shelves of Waitrose and every other major retailer in the country.”


Ramsden said the additional problem in setting up collaborative FE/HE-business projects was timescale because of the academic programme. ”The project has to have a time horizon of two years, whereas


THE BUSINESS MAGAZINE – SOLENT & SOUTH CENTRAL – JUNE 2011


the business world probably wants results within six months.”


Stark: ”We successfully involve our final year product design students with businesses. They come up with a brief and our students work it up within a termly timeframe. We ensure the IP is protected when it is given over to the clients.”


A clash of cultures


Stark: ”The real issue we have is the culture of academia. We have academics who are there as a career choice, to grow their personal intellect, publish learned papers, raise their expert status and gain professorships and so on.


”The problem we have is that as soon as they publish their paper we can’t protect that IP, which is totally out of tune with the commercialisation agenda of using that IP outside the institution.


”So there are not many opportunities to disseminate IP out into the real world.” He suggested the UK could learn from the US ’Silicon Valley’ culture with academics ’”flitting far more between business and academia”.


... and the culture of cash


Heathcock suggested that along with culture change, funding obstacles still had to be overcome.


Armstrong said financing had improved in the past few years with more funds and people with disposable investment assets willing to become involved with early stage businesses. Programmes such as Dragons Den had actually helped promote the environment and highlight the issues for both investors and business creators. ”As a nation we are going in the right direction with funding but we are a long way from being like west coast America.”


Michael Moores: ”Funding is always a challenge and mostly depends upon family and friends and high networth individuals. Funding from the conventional high street sources continues to be difficult.


”It would be very helpful to have a dedicated fund for early stage business to tap into. There also needs to some rigour in assessment of their fundability, but I have seen so many good potential opportunities that have not managed to achieve a level of funding to allow them to develop out their business plan and I think that is a real shame.”


Mike Donaldson pointed out that Santander introduced an ongoing global university/HE support programme in1996. There are currently 43 UK Universities signed up and 900 worldwide. In addition to helping entrepreneurs, scholarships, KTPs, and study and research grants are supported by Santander.


Banks do have difficulty funding some excellent business ideas because there is no equity involvement. ”Getting good ideas to market can be expensive and uncertain – the risk of loss is high and where profitability and cashflow have not been established it is more an equity play – and in the current financial environment banks can be reluctant to get involved.”


Armstrong: ”Over the years, there have always been funding ’angels’, but the money and the market is


Continued overleaf www.businessmag.co.uk Greg Collier David Murray Carol Pike


Mike Donaldson


Page 1  |  Page 2  |  Page 3  |  Page 4  |  Page 5  |  Page 6  |  Page 7  |  Page 8  |  Page 9  |  Page 10  |  Page 11  |  Page 12  |  Page 13  |  Page 14  |  Page 15  |  Page 16  |  Page 17  |  Page 18  |  Page 19  |  Page 20  |  Page 21  |  Page 22  |  Page 23  |  Page 24  |  Page 25  |  Page 26  |  Page 27  |  Page 28  |  Page 29  |  Page 30  |  Page 31  |  Page 32  |  Page 33  |  Page 34  |  Page 35  |  Page 36