Strathclyde Business School

Enquiries: Dr Beverly Wagner, Department of Marketing, beverly.wagner@strath.ac.uk; Applications to: Mrs Mary Hughes, mary.hughes@strath.ac.uk)

Deadline: 1 September 2013

Funding: UK/EU fees are covered,plus an annual stipend of £13,762.

Research: Applications are sought for a PhD candidate to join a growing group of innovation researchers at Strathclyde Business School. The project will complement three already established research projects – one utilising Technology Road Mapping (TRM) to support technology management and planning in Scotland, one looking at open innovation in sectors key to Scotland’s economy and a third investigating innovation in services. The multi-disciplinary team are now seeking a PhD candidate to add to these activities and knowledge areas. 

The food and drink sector has been identified by the Scottish Government as an important strategic sector for the Scottish economy. In order to adapt to and anticipate changing demands, food and drink businesses need to be more open to the idea of innovation. This studentship will address some of the challenges facing the Scottish food and drink sector and explore how innovation can be used exploit this priority area. Building on existing work this PhD candidate will use techniques from the disciplines of marketing, operations management, management science and entrepreneurship to identify how and where innovation can be used to explain supply chain, challenges, competencies and opportunities within the sector. There are many tools available to identify sources of waste in the supply chain, such as life cycle assessment that capture environmental related inputs and outputs of the entire value chain, from raw materials, through product use to returns. Research has shown such activities lower costs, improve efficiency and in some instances create new businesses. In a time of austerity and rapid technological change one of the academic contributions may be to the critique and develop of business models for innovation.

This project will give the student a great opportunity to work with an interdisciplinary team and to make linkages across Strathclyde and numerous industry sectors.

Requirements: We invite applications to join this vibrant academic network and our ideal candidate would have a first class Honours degree. We are particularly keen to receive applications from candidates from a marketing, operations management, technology management or entrepreneurship background.

To apply click on the ‘Apply’ button below.