INDUSTRY & RESEARCH campusreview. com. au
The missing link?
Calum Drummond
Gordon Wyeth
Two university leaders in science and innovation discuss the role of proposed growth centres in promoting better connections between science and industry.
By Andrew Bracey
The federal government recently unveiled promises of a greater focus on links between research and industry, plus a new science advisory council, as centrepieces of longawaited reforms to the research sector.
The new measures, announced by the industry minister, Ian Macfarlane, include $ 188.5 million in funding for industry growth centres that he said would be charged with pursuing“ global excellence in areas of competitive strength”.
“ These industry-led centres will bring together expertise from business and industry, the scientific and research communities and the university sector,” the government’ s announcement heralded.“ Fewer than 5 per cent of Australian businesses turn to the higher education sector – including scientists and researchers – directly for expertise and ideas.
“ Collaboration between business and research has proven to be the basis for enhanced international competitiveness in other countries. Growth centres will foster these links and relationships, which are critical to future economic success.”
The government is now seeking expressions of interest from business-led consortia to establish the centres, which will initially each receive $ 3.5 million a year in funding but will be required to be self-sustaining within four years.
Grants of up to $ 1 million each – from a pool of $ 60 million – will then be made available to assist the development of ideas into viable commercial endeavours; however, such grants must be matched by the company accepting the funding.
It was not clear what the launch of the new centres would mean for the future of the Co-operative Research Centre( CRC) program, which had its funding reduced by $ 80 million in the 2014 – 15 federal Budget and remains the subject of a review.
The new measures were welcomed by Universities Australia as
a means of enabling industry to“ leverage research its members already are undertaking within the key sectors the government identified”.
Campus Review spoke separately with RMIT deputy vicechancellor research and innovation professor Calum Drummond and Queensland University of Technology’ s science and engineering executive dean professor Gordon Wyeth to gauge their reaction to the new initiative.
CR: Can these growth centres really achieve better links between research and industry? CD: It’ s a very positive move. One of the big weaknesses in our national innovations system is the poor connectivity between university researchers and industry, so anything that encourages more connectivity I would suggest should be seen as a positive move.
GW: I don’ t think anyone is claiming this is going to paint the overall picture, or that this is the solution to all the problems but there is definitely a translational valley that is identified in terms of what is happening in research.
There is a lot of initial excitement around basic ideas and a lot of funding is usually available and there’ s a lot of excitement once something gets commercial and there is a clear business case for how these ideas will be developed – but it’ s long been recognised that there is a gap between those two areas.
You’ ve got [ to somehow maintain ] the excitement of the initial science through to the point where it is commercially available. Now the CRCs have certainly played a role here in providing some of that translation and places like the CSIRO have played a role and have done a good part of this, and they have been led in a certain way. If we are going to have industry leading this in a way that they say they are keen to drive innovation here and [ universities ] bring innovation into
18