WMG News - Latest news from WMG

Professor Lord Bhattacharyya was pleased to welcome the delegation to WMG.

Meeting with Professor Lord Bhattacharyya they discussed the success of WMG and the wider landscape of business and industry.

The delegation which was led by the Dr Ismail, Deputy Secretary General, were particularly interested to hear about WMG's world renowned innovative postgraduate education programmes which have been developed in collaboration with industry, as well as understanding the collaborative cutting-edge research that the Group is leading.

Pupils from North Leamington School in Warwickshire have made it through to the national finals of the F1 in Schools competition for the second year running.

The team of six students spent six months designing and building a model Formula One car, which they raced at the regional competition at Aston University, finishing in second place (missing out on fastest car by 0.005 seconds!) The team also won the trophy for Best Engineered Car, sponsored by Jaguar Land Rover.

Dr Greg Gibbons, Senior Research Fellow at WMG, helped the team to manufacture the suspension and some aerofoil components using WMG's state-of-the-art 3D printing facilities.

The search has begun for an inspirational Principal and Managing Director to lead the new WMG Academy for Young Engineers.

The WMG Academy, a business-led and business-like University Technical College for 14-19-year olds, is due to open in September 2014.

The Academy is led by a partnership of local, regional and national employer organisations, innovative advanced manufacturing, engineering and digital technology businesses. Partners include WMG, University of Warwick, Jaguar Land Rover, National Grid and SCC.

The SME team from WMG, at the University of Warwick, have been working with Birmingham-based Barkley Plastics for the past year in a collaboration which has led to increased turnover for Barkley Plastics of over half a million pounds and the creation of three new jobs.

The WMG team are based in The International Institute for Product and Service Innovation (IIPSI), a building funded by the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF) and University of Warwick that is dedicated for the use of small and medium sized businesses (SMEs) in the West Midlands region. Their in house Innovation Programme aims to encourage SMEs in understanding how new technology, processes and ideas can be implemented to develop new products and services to benefit their business. Companies can access three areas of support: Experience Led Innovation, Polymer Innovation and Digital Innovation.

WMG, at the University of Warwick, are pleased to announce that Dr Richard Hutchins has been appointed to the Board of the Coventry and Warwickshire Local Enterprise Partnership (CW LEP).

As a Director of the CW LEP, a partnership designed to grow the economy of the area, he will be involved in a number of activities that will help to create long term growth for the region.

Dr Richard Hutchins is Director of Jaguar Land Rover (JLR) Programmes at WMG, supporting JLR's partnership with WMG and other public bodies. He is also leading the development of the WMG Academy for Young Engineers and is a Board Member of the West Midlands Manufacturing Consortium which runs the Manufacturing Advisory Service.

Previously, he was Deputy Chief Executive at Advantage West Midlands and was also a business director at food industry think-tank IGD and a lecturer at Newcastle University and Imperial College.

WMG (Warwick Manufacturing Group) at the University of Warwick has announced that it has entered an agreement with Jaguar Land Rover to teach up to 600 Jaguar Land Rover employees to degree level in product engineering and manufacturing engineering.

Up to 100 Jaguar Land Rover staff will take up their places as sponsored degree students in October to January this year (2013) and next, studying either product development engineering or manufacturing engineering degrees. From 2014, WMG will also support the degree provision for the higher apprenticeship programme. This means that there will be up to 600 students studying at various stages over the next 3 to 4 years.

Researchers from WMG are working with staff and students from a local school on a project designed to help get the students interested in engineering and the technology involved in developing an electric-powered racing car.

Darren Stewardson, Materials Technologist at WMG, and Dr Steve Maggs, Principal Teaching Fellow at WMG, have been working with North Leamington School to develop an electric car which will eventually be built to compete in IET Formula 24, a national competition held at Goodwood, for students aged 11-16.

WMG will be opening its doors on 4th December 2012, to showcase the research, education and knowledge transfer capabilities of its Service Systems Group.

Professor Irene Ng, Head of the Service Systems Group and Director of the new International Institute for Product and Service Innovation, will speak on Service Systems, Markets and New Business Models in the Digital Economy.

Mark Reddish from Rolls-Royce will provide his perspective on why service - and the new MSc programme - is important to his business. Traditionally, a manufacturing-focused concern, Rolls-Royce now derives more than half of all its revenue from services.

The event will take place on Tuesday 4th December (6pm - 8pm). A light buffet will be provided beforehand with presentations starting from 6:30pm.

If you would like to attend the event, please RSVP to Julia Fan (J.M.Fan@warwick.ac.uk)

Researchers have pushed the boundaries of High Dynamic Range (HDR) video to match our own eyes’ ability to cope with the real world's ever rapidly changing light intensity - such as sun simply going behind clouds. Now researchers at WMG at the University of Warwick, have found a way to compress and stream HDR video directly to monitors and mobile devices, such as an iPad, bringing enormous benefits to industries including gaming and security.

A consortium of researchers led by WMG at the University of Warwick are to embark on a £3 million research programme called “Cleaning Land for Wealth” (CL4W), that will use a common class of flower to restore poisoned soils while at the same time producing perfectly sized and shaped nano sized platinum and arsenic nanoparticles for use in catalytic convertors, cancer treatments and a range of other applications.

A “Sandpit” exercise organised by the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC) allowed researchers from WMG at the University of Warwick, Newcastle University, The University of Birmingham, Cranfield University and the University of Edinburgh to come together and share technologies and skills to come up with an innovative multidisciplinary research project that could help solve major technological and environmental challenges.