University of Ulster: Fusing academic excellence with industry needs

Fusion is InterTradeIreland’s all-island technology transfer programme, aimed at helping businesses improve profitability by partnering them with a third-level institution with specialist expertise as well as a high-calibre science, engineering or technology graduate.

The programme works through companies discussing a specific business need with InterTradeIreland, which then identifies potential university or college partners with the expertise required to address that need. Alternatively, companies may already have an academic partner in mind for the project.

The academic institution works with the company to develop solutions to the issues raised while the company employs a graduate from the institution for a period of 12 to 18 months. InterTradeIreland provides funding of up to €52,800 for 18 months and €37,000 for 12 months.

"The University of Ulster is a very strong supporter of the programme," says Alan Morrow, InterTradeIreland's Fusion programme operations manager. "The university has worked with more companies than any other under the programme. This is because it is so strong across such a wide range of areas.

“We are looking for companies with a need to do something new or different and don’t know quite how to do it. In 80 per cent of cases, it is new product or service development, and in the remainder it tends to be process improvements.”

Dr Pat Ibbotson, senior e-commerce lecturer with the University of Ulster, explains some of the reasons behind the university's strong showing on the Fusion programme.

"If you look at all of the Fusion projects across the whole island, the University of Ulster has participated in about 50 per cent of them," he says. "There is definitely a greater number of companies from south of the Border looking for academic partners in Northern Ireland than the other way round, and this partly explains it.

“Also, academics north of the Border are quite proactive when it comes to trying to recruit companies onto programmes such as Fusion. Academics north of the Border have a slightly keener eye for companies that could benefit from partnering with academic institutions.”

There are also funding and performance measurement imperatives, Ibbotson says.

“While Fusion funding is seen as consultancy rather than research funding, I put the funds received directly into research and use it to support doctoral students on overseas study visits and so on. There’s a very useful pot of cash there that the university can use. Also, the new Research Excellence Framework, which we will be working under, awards 25 per cent of the score for company outreach activity. So programmes like Fusion are very important to us.”

While the university wins in terms of funding and performance measurement, there are other gains as well. “There is a definite win for the companies in terms of knowledge transfer and there is a win for our graduates, who in many cases are hired by the companies where they carry out the research. In fact, we now have a situation where we hired a graduate some years ago who was so good he went and formed his own company, which in turn took on a graduate through a Fusion project with us. That graduate has also turned out to be so good that he has hired another graduate through another Fusion project.

“I think the University of Ulster is unique in having a third-generation Fusion project like that. The programme has only been in existence for 10 years.”

According to Morrow the initial matching process is very important. “Some guys can be a bit wary of dealing with universities as they haven’t done it before. We meet the companies first and see what they need. It could be in the area of electronics, food, or engineering. For example, it could be a metal fabrication company that wants to add electronics to one of its products to allow a gate to detect animals. We will look to hook them up with an appropriate academic partner who can help them with that particular need.

“We set up a meeting between the academic and the company and they can often help bring the project on further straight away. Once they agree on what they are going to do together they apply for assistance under Fusion. The graduate is then employed by the company and the institution is tied in to supporting the project from that point. Typically they would help the companies for about two days a month.”

In many cases, the partner of choice will by the university. “The University of Ulster has been very helpful over the years and is very easy to work with,” Morrow says. “Also, because of its breadth of knowledge across a very wide range of areas, the university very often has the expertise required by the companies which approach us.”

The projects tend to be very practical. Ibbotson's department has, for example, worked with the Irish Farmers Journal on a digitisation project and with the Irish Farmers Association on a new decision support system.

“The IFA had a vast number of databases scattered throughout various centres around Ireland,” he says. “The project has helped make sure the data is held centrally and is accessible in a way that makes sure that useful information comes out of it.”

Another current project sees the university working with Extreme Ireland on the development of a new app that will help visitors to this country plan their stay. “It will be able to detect gaps in their day and using geo-sensing technology make suggestions for things to do where they are. It will also be able to send them discount codes and vouchers for shops, restaurants and other visitor attractions.”

Of slightly older vintage is a project carried out with a Dublin-based hospitality recruitment firm nearly a decade ago.

"They had offices in Exchequer Street in the centre of Dublin at the time, and rents were going through the roof back then." Ibbotson says. "That was unsustainable and we put the business on the cloud for them. They are still trading very successfully today without the need for a physical headquarters. That led through word of mouth to us working for another company in Dublin on a similar project.

“We often get involved in Fusion projects this way. We come in contact with a company with a need and we are able to recommend the Fusion programme and we will approach InterTradeIreland together.

“We are always interested in hearing from companies with needs which the University of Ulster might be able to help meet.” ulster.ac.uk