Collaboration

PAI brings AI expertise and innovation to local companies and provides support for entrepreneurial researchers to establish successful companies through AI. The University of Surrey has a history of helping local businesses grow through partnerships and networks.   

Ways to engage with the University 

Contact Dr Andrew Rogoyski, Director of Partnerships & Innovation

• Advisory to University 
  The external organisation contributes ideas and insights to research projects, shaping the research to address real-world problems. In return, the organisation gets exposed to ongoing research outputs, academic staff, students, etc. The only commitment is a little time.
• Student Projects  
  The University generally welcomes ideas for undergraduate and MSc projects – a short brief that describes the problem that might be addressed in a project that lasts a few weeks or months, plus a little time to introduce the idea to the students (they get to choose their projects) plus some time to hear the output from the project. A lot of organisations look at this type of engagement as a good way to recruit. Again, the only commitment is a bit of time.
• In-Kind Support for Grants  
  The University obtains the majority of its research funding from the research councils. External organisations often provide a ‘letter of support’ as part of a grant application. These letters outline the reasons for support and offer time, access to facilities, etc that will help the University deliver relevant research. It’s a good way for the external organisation to explore a topic and to recruit.
• Knowledge Transfer Partnership 
  These are formally funded projects that aim to transfer expertise from the University to the external organisation. Typically, a post-doctoral researcher will be embedded with the external organisation, with support from academics, for 1-2 years, transferring expertise. These are co-funded by the external organisation and the research councils (via the University) and can represent an affordable way to acquire knowledge.
• PhD Studentships  
  This is an agreement to co-fund a PhD student for a period of 3-4 years. This provides an opportunity for the external organisation to work with the academic to shape a project and then to collaborate with the student throughout their training and research. Projects don’t always follow the original trajectory, so some flexibility is advised.
• Research Consultancy  
  Academic researchers and postgraduate students can often get involved in providing consultancy services, typically short projects (a few weeks) with defined outputs, similar to commercial consultancy but usually more oriented to long-term research questions.
• Training & Education  
  The external organisation may want to utilise the teaching capabilities of the university. Some departments provide dedicated commercial training, others support part-time attendance of traditional degree courses. Increasingly, these include online options.
• Business Incubation  
  Many universities support start-up businesses with services that range from training for students, through to fully-fledged spin-outs and investment support. Surrey is a member of SETsquared, one of the world’s largest and most successful incubation groups, operating with 6 universities across the South-East of the UK
• Equipment and facilities  
  External organisations may seek to use facilities that the university possesses. For example, Surrey has the 5GIC, the UK’s largest 5G testbed, on campus, allowing new services to be trialled on a fully functional large-scale 5G infrastructure. Another example is the compute facilities that the university has at its disposal. New facilities are being put together all the time including smart buildings, digital twins, living labs and other novel ways of utilising the Surrey campus.
• Licensing  
  There may be intellectual property that the university possesses, ranging from software tools to novel inventions, that external organisations may license from the university.   
• Surrey Research Park  
  The University of Surrey has one of the oldest Research Parks in the UK, hosting nearly 200 companies, ranging from start-ups to major international companies (for example, Surrey Research Park has Airbus and BAE Systems on its park) allowing the companies to benefit from facilities, staff and students at the university (including a strong recruitment dimension). The Surrey Research Park is a few minutes’ walk from the university’s campus, and is situated just off the A3 with easy access to the M25, while also being close to Guildford mainline station with direct lines to London Waterloo.
• Surrey Enterprise  
  The University of Surrey has one of the largest and most well-established enterprise teams in the UK, working with students, academics, businesses and investors to create economic growth. The University is a founding member of SETsquared, one of the world’s leading incubators for new businesses, in which the University of Surrey has partnered with Universities at Bath, Bristol, Cardiff, Southampton and Exeter work together to deliver a number of enterprise services, from help for start-ups to programmes for scaling up ambitious businesses.