Rolls-Royce and Queen’s University Belfast have formalised more than 25 years of collaboration into a new University Technology Partnership (UTP), the latest step in strengthening Northern Ireland’s growing role in aerospace research and development.
Announced on 28 August, the partnership will concentrate on three areas central to the future of aero-engine design and manufacture: modelling and simulation, to accelerate engine design timelines; cyber security, building on two decades of work at Queen’s Centre for Secure Information Technologies (CSIT); and advanced manufacturing, drawing on the newly established Advanced Manufacturing Innovation Centre (AMIC), part of the Belfast Region City Deal.
Professor Sir Ian Greer, President and Vice-Chancellor of Queen’s, said the partnership “brings commercial, economic and societal benefits to Northern Ireland.” Professor Trevor Robinson, who will direct the UTP at Queen’s, said the university would “continue to focus on creating faster design capabilities, advancing modelling and simulation, and cyber security.” For Rolls-Royce, Professor Mark Jefferies, Head of Research Partnerships, described the agreement as “our new anchor in the region.”
The announcement follows a run of investment news for Northern Ireland’s aerospace sector, including Airbus’s ongoing expansion of its Belfast wing facility to support increased A220 production. It comes as the region’s aerospace industry, worth an estimated £2.2 billion a year and supporting more than 8,000 jobs across around 100 companies, continues to attract fresh investment from major manufacturers.
For Queen’s, the formal UTP status places it alongside a small number of universities worldwide recognised by Rolls-Royce as strategic technology partners, reinforcing Belfast’s position as a centre for aerospace engineering research on the island of Ireland.
