Innovation can literally change the world and that has proudly been our mission at the University of Glasgow since our inception in 1451.
Introduction
Innovation takes an idea on a journey of discovery. It challenges convention, inspires our curiosity, fosters collaboration and provides solutions in a world full of complex challenges to the benefit of society.
Our vision of where we want to get to is clear. We want our innovation to change the world, for the better. By 2025, we want to be recognised as an entrepreneurial university. Through this strategy we will double our performance across all elements of our innovation portfolio by investing in and embedding the entrepreneurial spirit of innovation across the breadth of our organisation.
The time for Glasgow to make its impact is here, now. The ambition and leadership are firmly in place. We have strong foundations to build upon – our research is world leading, we have excellence in our learning and teaching, our global presence of over 200,000 alumni means we are a university connected to the world, and we already generate £4.4 billion of economic impact through activities. We have a unique opportunity through our Glasgow Riverside Innovation District (GRID) to deliver economic, social and environmental impact for the benefit of our community.
But to succeed, we must also invest in creating the right conditions that nurture, support, enable and empower our world changers to deliver on our ambitions.
This is a unique opportunity to make our vision a reality. We’re going to make sure we take it.
Discovery driven, solutions focused
Our values underpin everything we do.
We will ...
- Challenge everything
- Focus on solutions
- Build resilience for future challenges
- Embed fairness in all our decision-making.
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Our Vision
We want our innovation to change the world, for the better.
Our Mission
To empower innovation in every corner of our University.
Our Strategic Plan
Underpinned by our values, we will create the foundations for a world-class innovation university over the next three years through three enabling themes:
- Change mindsets
- Connect our innovation community
- Invest in our enabling infrastructure.
Alongside this, we have developed four key delivery pillars to demonstrate our priorities for action:
- Grow and accelerate our innovation portfolios
- Create partnerships that matter
- Expand access to our knowledge and expertise
- Create impact in our communities.
Enabling themes
An entrepreneurial mindset is the cornerstone to inspiring innovation
We are a world top 100 university and an internationally established leader in research and teaching. However, we are behind the curve when it comes to translating our world-class research outputs into tangible, positive outcomes that make the difference we want to see locally, nationally and globally. We must challenge the thinking that innovation comes at the expense of other traditional research and teaching activities.
We must ethically and sustainably excel in all three areas to ensure we are relevant and responsive in delivering solutions to meet the needs of tomorrow’s world.
Innovation is inherently risky, with no guarantees – managing expectations and learning from failure is part of the shared brief. Together, we will build our institutional confidence by providing the right expertise, incentives and enabling infrastructure to drive our ambitions forward.
Our Priorities
We will ...
Build understanding and confidence in a shared innovation ambition
Clarify our purpose and scope for innovation at the University of Glasgow. Generate wider impact and raise our profile whilst attracting and retaining the top talent and focusing on our sense of place.
Be open and transparent on the benefits of innovation (financial and non-financial) and develop clear and concise institutional reporting on our progress.
Build on our unique culture, driven by greater risk tolerance and learning from failure.
Influence choice
Take key actions to review our policies and processes that reward and create promotion pathways to influence how our staff and students choose to engage in innovation.
Embed equality, diversity and inclusion in everything we do
Promote and encourage engagement for under-represented groups by focusing on a model of inclusive innovation.
Define our innovation brand and share it with the world
Embed innovation in our brand, use it in our language, celebrate our people and success stories.
Create vibrant, informative and engaging campaigns internally and externally across all areas of activity.
People drive our world-changing innovation
Innovation is a creative process with people and their ideas at its heart. It demands collaboration, a deep understanding of research disciplines, an unconventional way of thinking and diverse skill sets beyond the traditional research track.
An innovation team’s role is to provide specialist expertise and to challenge everything. It is not just about drawing out what an academic can evidence – it’s about guiding them to gain a sharper understanding of the problem they are ultimately trying to solve and how their work can contribute to this goal.
Providing our staff with inspiring and equitable experiences and career avenues through innovation is essential.
Fuelling the potential of our people also requires development of powerful and dynamic networks with our alumni, our diverse range of partners and our investors to generate communities that share and embody at their core our University values and ambitions.
Our Priorities
We will ...
Invest in specialist innovation expertise to support our ambitions
Strengthen the professional teams within the new Innovation, Enterprise & Economic Development Directorate. We will develop and enhance capability, funding and empowerment to deliver, with the speed and agility to match the rapidly shifting needs of our innovation community.
Play to our strengths working in close partnership with colleagues across colleges, schools and professional services directorates to leverage skills, streamline process and achieve shared goals.
Promote skills and careers in innovation and entrepreneurship
Promote awareness and deliver training in innovation and entrepreneurship to the breadth of our University community to enhance learning, uncover career development opportunities and attract and retain the best staff.
Create strong, vibrant innovation communities
Build a vibrant network of research staff and professional services staff involved in innovation from all corners of the University and utilise this platform to springboard learning, mentoring and training, and inspire wider staff engagement, opening up the potential for career advancement through innovation activities.
Expand the community to engage alumni, entrepreneurs, investors, other universities and innovation partners. We will leverage these networks to play a key role in facilitating our own strategic ambitions around translation of our research, internationalisation and our civic mission alongside the ambitions of our partners.
Developing spaces that nurture our creativity, disrupt silos and attract the brightest minds
The creation of innovation spaces sets the physical foundations of an enabling innovation ecosystem. Carefully designed curation of buildings and surrounding areas creates the meeting places of brilliant minds, world-changing ideas and on a university campus, the first home for new ventures that have been nurtured and supported by professionals to launch into successful businesses.
Whether on our campus, or located within our innovation district, investment in infrastructure creates the ability to forge closer ties with business, public sector, social enterprise, investors and communities. It supports the development of industry clusters in partnership with our national agencies by attracting inward investment and encouraging businesses to co-locate with academics in our areas of research excellence.
We will capitalise on the opportunity created through the physical proximity to our Advanced Research Centre (ARC), School of Health & Wellbeing, the new Adam Smith Business School and our wider links to the city and enabling infrastructure. The convergence of staff and students will allow us to focus on the discovery of innovative solutions, promoting a collaborative and multidisciplinary approach which meets at the cutting edge of our research and teaching excellence.
Our Priorities
We will ...
Build our unique Innovation Zone on campus
We will continue to build on the success of our extensive campus redevelopment programme which has revolutionised our capacity and capabilities for groundbreaking research and provision of a world-class learning and teaching experience.
Through careful and innovative design, we will develop an innovation zone that fuels curiosity and creates
excitement around our innovation activity. We will ensure the Church Street development becomes a vibrant, creative and collaborative people-centred place that showcases the best of our University’s innovation to the world. Our spaces will be accessible and inclusive – to our research community, staff, students, spin-outs, spin-ins, business partners, investors and the wider community.
Expand our clinical innovation spaces in Govan
The Clinical Innovation Zone provides a unique opportunity to create a life sciences cluster within GRID. Through our investment, we will enable Glasgow and Scotland to position itself as world leader in innovation. We will bring together world-leading clinical academics, clinical research facilities and industry partners to co-locate on the Queen Elizabeth University Hospital campus.
We will deliver the Health Innovation Hub, as part of our Living Laboratory programme, attracting inward investment, creating jobs and bringing community benefits to Govan. We will continue to work with partners to develop brownfield sites as a platform for ambitious research and innovation in Glasgow.
Delivery pillars
Creation of intellectual assets drives our real-world impact
Creativity and ideas are the lifeblood of research. Research outcomes can produce intellectual assets with the potential to create new products and services, public policy initiatives, educational tools and resources and job creation. However, these intellectual assets are early stage and speculative opportunities. They require significant development, investment and entrepreneurial skill to de-risk and make them into proposals that are attractive for external partners to engage in realising their potential.
There have been successes, but we know that we have far greater potential given our excellent research base. We must create an enabling environment and notably increase the resources available to identify, support and accelerate the opportunities
with the greatest impact potential for external partnering and
deal-making.
We will build expertise and funding to develop a leading, progressive approach to reward innovation achievement by our staff and schools in all areas of the University.
We will grow our supply of world-changing innovations and facilitate greater uptake externally through licensing and new venture creation.
Our priorities
We will ...
Identify opportunities and accelerate the creation of intellectual assets that can be scaled, with impact
Improve our processes and systems to increase the identification of promising intellectual assets. In doing so, we will optimise internal resource allocation and support to accelerate the preparation for licensing and new venture formation.
Develop clear signposting for our staff and engage our network of external partners in the identification, impact evaluation and development of innovation opportunities to help secure deals with external partners.
Adopt a leading position on incentives
Continue to review our policy position on rewarding innovators, placing our research staff and schools at the core, and develop enabling pathways for our academic staff to participate in innovation activity.
Improve access to investment funds and capital to support innovation opportunities
Establish a new investment fund managed by Glasgow University Holdings Ltd to support spin-outs through their early growth stages and as they scale.
Working with diverse and virtuous partners is our pathway to being world changing
Partnership is fundamental to inspiring, enabling and realising everything we aim to achieve. We cannot work alone.
Our partners and alumni bring a rich wealth of knowledge, perspective and skills alongside deep sector experience. They include industry, public and governmental bodies, NGOs, charities, universities, funders and alumni across local and global domains. A deep understanding of their needs and timescales is essential to unlocking innovative solutions.
Building partnerships takes time and effort. We will invest in professional expertise to support research staff in these conversations to nurture and secure new partnerships. Being easy to work with and agile in responding to partner needs must be our norm.
Grounding long-term strategic relationships requires commitment and multiple points of engagement into our organisation.
We will establish ourselves as a university partner of choice and make it easier to engage with us.
Our priorities
We will ...
Build capability to drive and support greater partnering
Establish a professional innovation partnerships team to lead growth in activity. Align our team’s skills and activity to support each college’s development plans and targets for partnership funding.
Develop a Service Charter with our clients that champions a consistent, timely and professional experience. Work with our college teams to secure business-led funding for research and innovation projects.
Implement streamlined, agile processes for developing strategic partnerships, including access to the full spectrum of our world-leading, interdisciplinary research expertise, innovation, graduate talent and specialist facilities.
Promote our strategic partnership capabilities
Raise the profile of our innovation partnership activity through campaigns which promote our University as a place to do business with.
Participate in targeted national and international events.
Work with our alumni office to strengthen our global networks.
Growing our global reach through academic consultancy
Consultancy is a powerful and effective mechanism for transferring the knowledge and expertise from our research base to external partners, creating solutions in answer to pressing challenges.
By catalysing the first connections with external partners, consultancy expands personal networks, establishes new collaborations and uncovers new research avenues and funding. Importantly though, it requires a different approach and skills that offer new and enriching career dimensions for our research staff.
While concentrated pockets of excellence in consultancy exist in our University there is much more to be done to open up the breadth and depth of our expertise to the wider world.
A shared understanding of the benefits of consultancy is vital in unlocking this potential. We will promote engagement across all our disciplines, remove barriers and develop clear support pathways to ensure that it is an easy, rewarding and productive endeavour for all of our research staff community as well as our partners.
Our priorities
We will ...
Create effective, responsive and transparent consultancy support
Establish a dedicated academic consultancy team to lead delivery of growth and diversity in consultancy across our organisation.
Develop clear signposting and streamlined processes in collaboration with partner services and college teams to efficiently manage consultancy activities.
Grow engagement in consultancy and reward success
Revise our academic consultancy policy to enhance incentives, clarify our institutional purpose and articulate the roles and responsibilities of all parties involved in the consultancy process.
Lead a change in the perception of consultancy
Raise awareness of consultancy and bring the wealth of benefits of consultancy to life through vibrant examples of our successes.
Build skills to open up consultancy to academic staff in all corners of our organisation.
Our research outputs have the ability to impact our society both locally and globally
The Glasgow Riverside Innovation District (GRID) is an ambitious partnership between the University, Scottish Enterprise, Glasgow City Council and the community to support a net zero innovation district that brings together public, private and social enterprises to deliver transformational change. Our focus will be on creating opportunity and lasting benefit for all through stimulating productive economic growth, attracting inward investment and improving the quality of life and wellbeing of citizens.
Through the GRID, we will help position Glasgow as one of the world’s most sustainable and resilient places to do business, live, learn and visit.
Glasgow is a participant in the pilot phase of the Levelling Up Innovation Accelerator, a £100m programme of investment across three city regions in the UK. With our University and business partners we have generated a broad portfolio of projects for the Glasgow City Region and GRID from which the Levelling Up Innovation Accelerator programme will fund £33m.
Our aim is to support projects that deliver benefits directly to the region and encompass a wide range of sectors, from STEM to creative arts and skills development. This portfolio approach applied to the Innovation Accelerator will ensure that the maximum impact in jobs and enterprise value will be applied to the Glasgow City Region.
Our priorities
We will ...
Mobilise the University’s institutional and knowledge capabilities on GRID
Connect to and seek opportunities with our research community across the University to deliver innovation projects on the ground, taking a whole-systems approach to finding solutions to the socio-economic and climate challenge around us.
Establish a University Economic Development Board providing appropriate governance and oversight of our activity, bringing in key external stakeholders and representation from the community.
Develop commercial and academic applied research facilities and commercial accommodation which build on our research strengths.Provide incubation, grow on and high-quality premises for inward investors, spin-outs, new starts and high-growth companies.
Strengthen links with the local communities who live, learn and work in the area
Support the development of Smart infrastructure investment such as improved digital connectivity and digital inclusion to deliver technically wired, inclusive, mixed-use neighbourhoods.
Enable the transition to a net-zero economy and a zero-carbon GRID community. Use vacant and derelict land for the benefit of the economy, the environment, and communities.
Deliver on the legacy of levelling up
Build on the success of the Innovation Accelerators by creating a wider Glasgow City Region forum for innovation and partnerships in the university and college.
Innovation and the SDGs
The University of Glasgow is committed to contributing to the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) through impactful, responsible and sustainable innovation activity. By contributing to the SDGs, we can help tackle the most pressing global challenges facing humanity and the natural world.
We recognise the opportunity our world-changing research and innovation has to make a material impact on this global movement.
This, our Innovation Strategy, reflects our commitment through its key enabling themes and delivery pillars in growing our partnerships, innovation outcomes and our economic contribution to growth and prosperity in Glasgow and beyond. We will further progress towards the SDGs through our support of projects that benefit our communities and create social, economic and environmental impact. Our creation of innovation opportunities, alongside the ecosystem and culture which encourages cross-sectoral collaboration are key to delivering on the SDGs.
We are proud of our contribution to the SDGs, and our Innovation Strategy reflects our whole-of-institution approach to delivering impact, year on year.
Find out about our progress towards the 17 SDGs:
