0.5 Results  (Page 7/20)

[link] present the importance of facilities/support by Revenue. This presentation highlights the different needs of small and large enterprises. The following are key observations from these data:

• Small Companies Need Different Help : Small companies demonstrate significantly more interest in funding and more basic facilities than larger counter parts. For example within the scope of R&D facilities and equipment, it is more generic offerings such as clean room facilities, which are of most importance.
• Big Toys for Big Boys : Larger enterprises demonstrate significantly greater interest in specialist facilities, especially those relating to complex processes and manufacturing. While this presentation of this data does not give a sectoral breakdown, there is clearly more importance for Bio-specific facilities amongst larger companies.
• Everyone wants Money : One of the most sought after supports is access to regional funding, and to a lesser extent venture capital. In both cases it is significantly more important to smaller enterprises.
• Large Companies need less Networking : The most important support mechanisms for companies large and small are access to international networks and collaboration opportunities. However, the importance is less amongst large enterprises, though remains significantly greater than for any of their other support needs.

Texas – united kingdom collaborative questionnaire

The academic respondents

[link] above presents weighted proportions of “Junior” (Lectures&Researchers) and “Senior” (Readers&Professors) Academic respondents from the Control and TX/UK cohorts. These cohorts involved (24 and 21) academics respectively. It can be seen that there was just over twice as many “Senior” Academics amongst the TX/UK respondents. This point is of note for subsequent sections to give consideration regarding the nature of the respondents including their propensity to engage and effects from their age, experience, etc.

[link] presents, for the same cohorts, the academic disciplines of the respondents. It can be seen that the majority from both cohorts are based within the Schools of Engineering and Medicine. It can also be seen that the proportions representing each discipline are broadly similar for the two cohorts and wholly represent growth sectors.

[link] and [link] highlights both the primary and secondary areas of research for both the Control and the TX/UK cohorts. The profiles of primary research areas for both cohorts are broadly similar, with slightly more variety amongst Texas/UK participants. It can be seen that both cohorts show greater diversity in Secondary areas, though the diversity, by both number and split of fields for Texas/UK participants indicates a more multidisciplinary group of academics.

Training is an important factor when trying to enshrine the benefit of collaboration in younger researchers. The respondents within the TX/UK Collaborative recognise difficulty in conducting multi-disciplinary training; however they do recognise its importance to enhancing activities, whereas the Control cohort see multi-disciplinary training activities as diluting focus. Overall, the participants within the TX/UK Collaborative see a high level of benefit in teaching the value of multi-disciplinarily amongst earlier-stage researchers ( [link] ).