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Responding to Industry Needs
The Institute of Photonics has recently employed a new Research Technologist, Dr Gareth Valentine, in an effort to respond more quickly to the needs of industry. Whilst University staff are often committed to long term research projects, the Institute recognised the need to be able to work more flexibly with industry and in particular with SMEs.
It is SMEs frequent desire to be able to start more quickly and work with short term contracts that led to this new initiative. It is one of several initiatives instigated by the Institute to address the misperception that universities are slow to react. Business Development Manager Simon Andrews commented ‘With the blossoming biotech sector in Scotland, we are receiving more and more requests for help from a variety of life science companies. As many of these companies are young SMEs they do not usually have in-house expertise in optical systems, even though they are heavily reliant on optical sensing, measuring and imaging.’
This new post enables a researcher with expertise in optics, electronics and software to bring his research experience from academia and industry to bear on challenges from industry. The Research Technologist will be supported by the Institute’s in-house electronics and mechanical workshops and will draw on the knowledge of the 60 strong staff and students in the Institute. Chief Executive Tim Holt added ‘We are grateful to the University for its support in this endeavour. We are hopeful that other departments will adopt this model once it has proven its worth to industry and the University.’