Professor James Gleeson:

Professor Nolan is completely right. The focus of the PhD training supervisors is largely on what is coming over the horizon in the future. Our industry partners and, in particular, Skillnet Ireland are very happy with that focus. While we have industry support and our students do go out on placements in industry, industry does not tell the students what to do for their PhDs. These are PhDs that are driven from the bottom up which gives the researchers freedom to pivot and to be aware of what is coming over the horizon. Our partners are very bought into that. They understand it is an important skill for their future employees to have. They are really bought into this programme because it is a talent pipeline and they know there is a need for PhD-level talent for employability and to keep Ireland competitive in the future.