Equipping UK universities : an evaluation of the Wellcome Trust's equipment scheme / M. O'Driscoll and J. Yates.

  • O'Driscoll, M. (Mairéad)
Date:
1995
Catalogue details

Licence: Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0)

Credit: Equipping UK universities : an evaluation of the Wellcome Trust's equipment scheme / M. O'Driscoll and J. Yates. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    4. EQUIPMENT NEEDS AND CASE STUDIES This section briefly reviews past equipment needs as revealed by previous studies and describes the types of grants awarded by the Trust scheme with specific examples. 4.1 Background The studies by Georghiou et al. in 1989 and 1991 identified equipment shortages in UK HEIs, particularly in terms of 'basic' equipment such as centrifuges and scintillation counters. These items were usually too expen- sive for individual departments to acquire from their departmental budgets, but were likewise difficult to obtain on individual research council grants as the funding bodies often considered it the responsibility of the host HEI to provide a 'well found laboratory'. The decline of the dual support system is unlikely to improve this situation. The objectives of the Trust scheme (see 'logic diagram', Scheme 1 in section 2.3) were to fund equipment in three main areas: • purchase of new technology, • updating/upgrading existing equipment, and • customizing and developing equipment. A fourth category emerged from this study, facilities and infrastructure, to cover instances where the scheme has effectively created a new facility as a result of providing equipment funding. The following sections give examples of each of these categories, though some overlap exists. Updating equipment, for example, often involves the purchase of the latest technology. One item of equipment was awarded on a sharing basis, and the progress of this award is also described. 4.2 Purchase of latest Of the 22 grants in the sample considered, 18 stated that their require- technology ment was for the purchase of the latest technology. This applied at all levels of grant. Two examples from either end of the spectrum will serve to illustrate typical requirements in this category. The first example is one of the largest grants in the sample considered. The application was from a shared NMR facility in a School of Biochemistry. The original bid, for approximately £1 million, was submitted by five co-appli- cants for a 500 MHz NMR machine. The EWP awarded the applicants just over £600 000 and this proved sufficient to enable them to negotiate suf- ficient discount with the manufacturers, to purchase a 600 MHz machine. Some additional funding was also provided by the university. This is typical of large grants through the scheme and illustrates two common indirect ben- efits. The first is that the award of a grant greatly strengthens the bargaining power of the applicant with the manufacturer. Substantial discounts or extra equipment may be negotiated and similarity the host university/ institute can often be persuaded to supply top up funding or extra facilities once funding from the Trust is guaranteed (see section 5.8).
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