Waterford Institute of Technology has announced the appointment of Dr Mark White as the Institute's Vice President for Research, Innovation and Graduate Studies.
In welcoming Dr White to WIT, Prof Willie Donnelly, President of WIT said that the new Vice President for Research, Innovation and Graduate Studies who has 30 years experience at regional and national level in the health service will be a valuable addition to the WIT executive team.
"Dr White has a proven track record in successfully managing complex large scale research and change management projects, as well as leadership in academic research in his own right. He has the experience, vision and commitment to build on the Institute’s extraordinary achievements to date in research and innovation, and to bring it to the next level in line with our commitment to become one of the top 100 young universities by 2030," Prof Donnelly said.
The 2018-2021 strategic plan puts WIT at the very centre of regional social, cultural and economic development. The institute plans to continue to expand its innovation and research activity which to date has created hundreds of high quality jobs in the region in industries like pharmaceuticals and information technology.
Commenting on his appointment Dr White said he is looking forward to engaging with the research community and the wider institute in his new role.
"I am very much looking forward to the challenge of building the research capacity of the institute and building on the previous success and reputation. A key focus for me over the coming months is the development of a new research strategy for WIT which will align and deliver the aspirations of the recently published WIT Strategy (2018-2021) and naturally prepare us for our Technological University journey in the coming months and years," said Dr White.
He added that he is looking forward to the completion of the extension of ArcLabs, WIT’s research and innovation hub on the institute’s West Campus. A €2.5m investment was awarded to WIT by Enterprise Ireland to double the capacity to support technology start-ups at ArcLabs. "The extension of ArcLabs is expected to be completed in Q4 and will attract new businesses and startups into the south east region who will be co-located alongside researchers," Dr White explained.
WIT brought in more than €140m in research funding over the past 10 years.
