A UC researcher joins with a scientist or engineer from a private company to formulate a research proposal. A panel of experts drawn from industry and academia selects the best projects for funding. At least half of the funding for each project comes from industry, with the remainder from the University. The benefits to companies and to California are evident. The most important of these benefits is that the UC program involves graduate students in every aspect of the research it sponsors.
Industry thus gets the benefit of some of the world's brightest young minds.
Graduate students learn firsthand about industry's needs. As a result, they have an incentive to stay in California and continue contributing their talents to our economy. There is growing interest in programs like these not only in California but in other American states as well. The impetus to greater linkages between universities and industry grows out of a longstanding American belief that universities should not be divorced, but on the contrary, deeply involved in helping solve society's problems. But there is another reason for this phenomenon as well.