Ring the changes

The UK aerospace industry enjoys a close working relationship with our universities, which provide graduates with the skills and knowledge demanded by the sector and serve much of its research needs.

The sector has gone through significant change, the 'primes' having consolidated into a smaller number of large transnational companies relying heavily on a global supply chain. With growing international competition, there is pressure for these big groups to consider universities as a part of that supply chain, raising the prospect of industry relying less on its traditional relationships with local universities and seeking the skills it is after more widely.

This applies in particular to research. When industry identifies a technical need, its priority will be to source the very best academic group in that field, whether from the UK or abroad, forcing universities to compete on the international stage.

The nature of government support is also changing, both for students and research. There is an expectation that university research should support UK industry in a more rational manner, with larger-scale centres of excellence in specific fields being formed at particular institutions. The EPSRC's new Doctoral Training Centre mechanism for postgraduate training is an example of this.