RESEARCH, DEVELOPMENT AND COMMERCIALISATION IN UTAR

In the year 2019, Universiti Tunku Abdul Rahman (UTAR) continues to make progress and gain recognition as one of the leading research universities in Malaysia. This is the ninth annual report on Research & Development of the university. The Faculties, Research Centres and supporting units made significant progress in the year 2019 as can be seen in their respective reports.

In today‘s highly competitive and globalised environment, it is imperative that organisations such as universities continuously enhance their roles in knowledge and value creation to ensure their relevance to the economy and society. Research, development and commercialisation (RDC) thus become the key activities of universities. UTAR, being one of the many institutions of higher learning in the country, continues to focus and excel in RDC to ensure its long-term survival, relevance and recognition. UTAR has defined and continues to refine its direction and approach in transforming itself into a world recognised research-focused university.

Research Roadmap of UTAR

To achieve worldwide recognition, it is imperative that UTAR focus and excel in research, development and commercialisation (RDC) activities. A 5-year research roadmap (2010 – 2014) for UTAR was defined and announced to the university community in August 2009.

The research roadmap is an outline of the important outcomes and the corresponding key performance indicators (KPIs), the recommended approaches and steps for UTAR to pursue in order to achieve Research University status as defined by the Ministry of Higher Education (MOHE) of Malaysia. Clear and measurable key performance indicators (KPIs) were defined and relevant benchmarks were set in the roadmap.

To perpetuate UTAR further into realising its goals, the "UTAR Research, Development and Commercialisation: Enhancement Strategy and Plan for 2013" encompassing detailed improvement plans for Human Resource Development, Research Funding, Postgraduate Programme Promotion and Intake, Data Management & Reporting and UTAR Internal Research Funding Allocation were drawn up and implemented accordingly. The initiatives introduced include UTAR Strategic Research Fund, UTAR Postdoctoral Research Scholarship Scheme, UTAR Research Publication Scheme and UTAR Undergraduate Research Scheme.

Since 2013, UTAR has continued to strengthen its pursuance of certain key milestones as set in the UTAR 10-year Strategic Plan (2013 – 2022). Strategies for each of the following 5 focused areas were formulated under the Research & Development Focused Area of the Strategic Plan.

  • Cross-disciplinary research to solve real world problems
  • Diversification of research funding sources
  • Publication and Patent filing
  • Commercialisation and Consultancy
  • International collaborations

UTAR R&D Colloquium 2019 (1.0) and (2.0) continued to be held to promote regular interactions among the research centres, to establish cross-disciplinary research co-operations and to bid for local and international research funding. This initiative is in line with one of the initiatives/action plans devised under Focus Area 3: Research and Development of the UTAR 10-year Strategic Plan 2013-2022 i.e. strengthening of Cross Disciplinary Research Centres which has resulted in two (2) collaborations submitted for UTAR Strategic Research Fund (UTARSRF) 2019 application.

Year 2019 saw further enhancements to the following policy and guidelines:

  • Udates to the Guideline Research Scholarship Scheme (RSS) (GD-IPSR-R&D-002) to tighten the terms and conditions for the RSS engagement and extension as well as to incorporate extension and payment criteria for PhD student.
  • Revisions to the UTAR Guideline GD-IPSR-R&D-007 on the Involvement of UTAR in the Organising of Conferences, Seminars, Workshops and Symposiums Related To R&D and its procedures QP-IPSR-R&D-036 & QP-IPSR-R&D-039;
  • Updates to the UTAR Guideline GD-IPSR-R&D-008 on the Organisation of Student Conference, Seminar, Forum, Participation of Student in Contest, Design Competition and Other Events Related To R&D and its procedures QP-IPSR-R&D-037 & QP-IPSR-R&D-038;
  • Developed the UTAR Knowledge Transfer Programme (UTAR KTP) guideline GD-IPSR-R&D-019 to encourage UTAR academic staff to promote the transfer of knowledge via the exchange of creative and innovative ideas, research findings, experiences and skills between UTAR, industries and the wider community (Non-Government Organisations (NGOs)/public).

Research, Development and Commercialisation Process in UTAR

In UTAR, the relevant organisation structure, support and services are shaped and streamlined based on the research, development and commercialisation process chain as depicted in Figure 1.

Keysight Technologies Inc sponsored two students from the UTAR team, Lim Wen Qing and Au Jin Cheng for an all-expenses paid trip to New York covering the airfare, accommodation, meals and transportation, to present their invention at the finals before a team of judges.

In UTAR, the entire RDC process chain is handled by the following institute and department:

1. Institute of Postgraduate Studies and Research (IPSR);
2. Department of Consultancy and Commercialisation (DCC).

IPSR consists of two main units:

  • Research and Development Unit (RDU);
  • Postgraduate Studies Unit (PSU).

R&D management and the facilitation of postgraduate studies are two important aspects in every established research university. With both units managed under IPSR, UTAR hopes to achieve coherence and synergy between the two aspects such that greater and more significant output and impact can be generated. In recent years, IPSR has focused and worked on various facets of the RDC process chain to further enhance the processes and outputs in UTAR.

Figure 1: Process Chain, Input and Output for Research, Development and Commercialisation in UTAR

Research Initiation

  • Good quality research ideas can only come from an academic and research community that is highly motivated and has strong healthy research culture and diversity of disciplines and specialisations. Thus far, much effort has been spent for such purposes.
  • For the year 2019, thirty two (32) research centres in UTAR continued to implement and carry out their respective activities as well co-operate in comprehensive research projects to improve better utilisation of facilities and resources.
  • Frequent discussions, dialogues and workshops among researchers of different research centres, backgrounds and disciplines are held to stimulate more research ideas across discipline/s and relevant to the socio-economic problems faced in the country.

Research Plan

  • Guidance and support are constantly provided by IPSR to assist academic staff and researchers of UTAR to transform ideas into feasible research project plans.
    • The MOHE Grant applications Evaluation Workshop held in March 2019 facilitated the submission of 146 FRGS, 10 TRGS and 1 LRGS applications amounting RM15,445,059.00, RM6,889,120.00 and RM1,950,000.00 respectively in the MOHE Grants Application Phase 2019.

R&D Budget and Funding

  • IPSR continues to look out for additional potential external sources of funding for research activities in UTAR. Such information are constantly disseminated to the university community; support and advice are provided so that a good match between the interests of the researchers and the funding agencies can be attained and thus enhancing the success rates of fund biddings.
  • The UTAR Research Funding scheme (UTARRF) was established in 2005 with an initial amount of RM1 million allocated per annum. The allocation is intended to serve as seed fund to kick-start implementation of projects with good potential. This amount was subsequently increased to RM3 million in year 2010. The University management further increased the annual allocation for UTARRF to RM5 million for each year of 2011 till 2014, RM6.25 million for 2015 and subsequently to RM5.52 million for 2019. It enables additional and larger scale projects to be initiated as well as boost research & development activities geared towards realising the goal to transform UTAR into a research intensive university.

Project Implementation and Monitoring

  • IPSR provides the support and services required throughout the research project implementation such as project financial account setup and maintenance, procurement, manpower sourcing, progress monitoring and report, output measurement, etc.
  • Close monitoring of project progress and outcome measurement have been one of the main focuses of IPSR. For this, IPSR facilitates to ensure that projects have been carefully planned such that deliverables and outcome are measurable and clearly mapped to major research key performance indicators (KPIs) of individuals, departments, faculties and university.

Research Commercialisation

UTAR strongly believes that further steps should be taken to explore on how the findings and output of the project can be applied in real life. Hence, DCC takes on the task to look into the post-completion phase of research projects in UTAR. DCC continues to work closely with IPSR in year 2019 to further enhance the transition of research projects into commercialisation phase. Among the steps taken are as follows:

  • Support, guidance and advice on commercialisation process have been further strengthened to minimise problems and hindrances faced by researchers to commercialise their research output/s;
  • Seminars and workshops on various aspects of commercialisation have been conducted for awareness enhancement and information dissemination;
  • Constant dialogues, discussions and match-making with external parties such as venture capitalists, commercialisation seed funding agencies, private corporate industries, etc. have been held.

RESEARCH, DEVELOPMENT AND COMMERCIALISATION ORGANISATION CHART