The problem of academia versus private bureau will never go away. Previous
responses to these concerns have suggested that the theory is that the
better service and quality offered by the private RP company will result in
customers choosing the RP company than the cheaper, academic route - the
only problem is purchasing people buy on price not cost.
Summarising Prof. Phill Dickens "I tried to get them to co-ordinate all this
but I failed and so people in Universities went for what they could get and
now we have a bit of chaos" and "There is obviously some short term pain
(e.g. Formation) but the
Universities will be seen at have had an overall positive effect."
Whilst Universities and Polys (sorry Universities) can get funding from
Central Government and Europe to equip themselves with this level of kit
without any consideration of the private individuals who pour blood, sweat
and silicone to pay the banks back the chaos will be a very minor ripple. I
see High Wycombe have just got £1m to expand even further and now will
employ 2 more people. Its good that 2 people will get employment - but the
probability is that they will come from the private sector where its tougher
to keep a job in industry than within the umbrella of academia - so private
industry suffers again. I thought the idea of these academic sites was to
train people for industry not to take people. There is a fine line between
recruiting from industry to bolster the education facilities with practical
experience - and taking from industry to compete with that industry.
There needs to be regional facilities to help educate and move things
forward, to help smaller companies take advantage of the technologies. I
know that there is pressure for education to be self funding - but this has
to be policed properly.
What really gets my back up is when I see educational establishments
repeatedly taking large full colour ads in RP magazines. If these centres
are supposed to be looking after specific areas - why go nationally and even
internationally.
Phil - short term pain - jobs, family's, mortgages etc - the problem is
symptomatic of a larger issue in toady's culture - cut 10,000 jobs so that
the all so precious dividends can pay an extra 0.5p. We should be looking to
support our industry and the people that have worked long long hours to make
it viable. I tried to get hold of a newish academic centre that just got big
funding - they weren't home (at 3-00pm and through 3 weeks Easter break) -
but they can still get more funding if they want. What does the average RP
company have to do - I'll bet if you phone most after 6-00pm they'll still
be there grafting. These RP companies can give as much, if not more, to
small local companies as the academic centres - in fact if the other groups
such as the Business Link's and the TEC's were turned on and responsive
money's could be channelled through this route and therefore managed from a
co-ordinated body that is supposed to be there to help all. However that
opens another can of worms - ever tried to get any real support and help
from Business Link's and TEC's?
Tim Cole Wrote
" As the director of a small independent self financed RP bureau I cannot
see that the use of EU money in this way benefits anyone in the long term,
customers or bureaux. This issue has yet to be resolved in any meaningful
way and I am sure its consequences will be felt by everyone in RP in the
near future."
Tim - I'll bet you a pound to a pinch of .... that this argument will only
resolve itself when all the RP bureaux have suffered the "pain".
Bitter - but definitely not twisted
John Wright
Response Associates Ltd.
Tel 44 1747 822404
Fax 44 1747 822545
email: johnw@ra-ltd.co.uk
For more information about the rp-ml, see http://ltk.hut.fi/rp-ml/
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