{"id":1428,"date":"2014-10-16T16:25:00","date_gmt":"2014-10-16T16:25:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/?p=1428"},"modified":"2016-08-20T22:00:02","modified_gmt":"2016-08-20T22:00:02","slug":"microsoft-partners-with-university-but-industry-collaboration-still-weak","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/microsoft-partners-with-university-but-industry-collaboration-still-weak\/","title":{"rendered":"Microsoft partners with university but industry collaboration still weak"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Kylar Loussikian, The Conversation<\/em><\/p>\n

Microsoft\u2019s research arm will partner with the University of Melbourne to explore how people interact socially with technology. But indicators continue to show Australia trailing other countries in terms of business collaboration.<\/p>\n

The A$8 million Microsoft Centre for Social Natural User Interface Research will be funded in part by the technology company, and will employ 28 people through Melbourne University. The remaining funds will come from Melbourne University and the Victorian Government.<\/p>\n

Researchers, led by Frank Vetere at Melbourne University\u2019s department of computing and information systems, will focus on gestures and other ways humans can manipulate technology for use in a number of areas like education, health and other public settings.<\/p>\n

Australia has traditionally lagged behind other developed countries in collaborations between private firms and higher education. A recent OECD innovations report<\/a> found Australia was last out of 33 countries in large firm collaboration.<\/p>\n

\"\"
Firms collaborating on innovation with higher education or public research institutions as a percent of product or process innovating firms.<\/span>
\nOECD Science, Technology and Industry Scoreboard<\/span><\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

And the \u201ctown and gown\u201d divide between academia and business is \u201cgetting worse, not better\u201d, according to Tim Mazzarol, the Winthrop Professor in entrepreneurship and innovation at the University of Western Australia.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe reward systems inside universities are not set up for commercial activity and they focus on being published in journals of a certain ranking,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cCommercialisation is often a very long pathway and we don\u2019t have a strong track record with the cooperative research centres that were designed for commercial outcomes.\u201d<\/p>\n

Professor Vetere said the gap was \u201can artefact of the sort of country we are\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cMany of the large developers are international. We don\u2019t have a Nokia like Finland or an Ericsson in Sweden, so we don\u2019t have these major, major companies,\u201d he said. \u201cSo we are underrepresented in these kinds of centres, and they are much more common in North America or in Europe.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Social Natural User Interface Research Centre, which was launched this morning by Gordon Rich-Phillips, Victoria\u2019s Minister for Technology, is the 14th in a network of Microsoft research facilities. Professor Vetere said there were opportunities for researchers to work with Microsoft\u2019s Redmond headquarters, as well as at the research centre at the University of Oxford.<\/p>\n

He said the direction of the Centre\u2019s research would be determined by an advisory board, as well as by expertise the faculty already had. But he dismissed any concern the focus would shift to research that was more easily commercialised.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf you look at the way Microsoft has engaged with research in the past, their focus has always been the contribution of knowledge, so they\u2019re very high contributors to publications, scholarly journals, conference proceedings,\u201d Professor Vetere said. \u201cThey are very much interested in the outcomes of research because it extends our knowledge base.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cHaving said that, they are a commercial company, and that gives us access to commercialisation possibilities. Where commercialisation is possible we\u2019ll explore that.\u201d<\/p>\n

Professor Mazzarol said collaboration with smaller companies was more difficult to organise. \u201cSmall companies haven\u2019t got the patience for things like the ARC Linkage Grants because they come with requirements for a lot of cash and in-kind support to make the project work,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

The University of Technology, Sydney is also moving toward a number of partnerships with large and small businesses, under the guise of a creative industries innovation precinct.<\/p>\n

Roy Green, Dean of the UTS Business School said he envisaged the project would extend past the current partners if successful. \u201cIt\u2019ll involve connections with startup capital in the way that you see happening in a number of other precincts around the world,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cPlaces like Cornell Tech\u2019s \u2018Silicon Alley\u2019 initiative<\/a> in New York and \u2018Silicon Roundabout<\/a>\u2019 in the east of London around Shoreditch, that\u2019s where you see foreign investors, local startups and universities developing together.\u201d<\/p>\n

Professor Green wasn\u2019t concerned commercial requirements would change research conducted by academics. \u201cMuch of the research that has a commercial application is excellent and much of the commercial work that\u2019s done is a breakthrough in thinking in a particular area.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThe real long-term benefit is this takes places at the interface of disciplines, so it\u2019ll encourage more interdisciplinary research,\u201d Professor Green said.<\/p>\n

\"The<\/p>\n

This article was originally published on The Conversation<\/a>.
\nRead the original article<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Kylar Loussikian, The Conversation Microsoft\u2019s research arm will partner with the University of Melbourne to explore how people interact socially with technology. But indicators continue to show Australia trailing other countries in terms of business collaboration. The A$8 million Microsoft Centre for Social Natural User Interface Research will be funded in part by the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":39,"featured_media":6915,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[5],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1428"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/39"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1428"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1428\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6916,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1428\/revisions\/6916"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6915"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1428"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1428"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1428"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}