Industrial Fellowships
Encouraging profitable innovation and creativity in British Industry – to the mutual benefit of the Fellow and their sponsoring company.
Applications are open
Timeframe
Deadline: 10 February 2026 Midday
Interviews: 24 March 2026
Fellowship Commences: October 2026
We encourage those interested in applying to get in touch with our team, who can answer questions and offer advise about the process.
Industrial Fellowships are awarded to graduates with the potential to make an outstanding contribution to industry, for research supported by a company, leading to a patent, product or process improvement and a postgraduate award.
With our Industrial Fellowships, companies get the chance to craft a bespoke PhD from the ground up that supports company ambitions as well as employee interests, and forge strong links with leading academics, to share access to expertise, facilities and knowledge.
Pursue a PhD whilst working Fellows receive significant funding towards their fees and salary, enabling employers to offer exciting personal development opportunities for their brightest employees.
Gain new IP whilst minimising R&D costs Fellows pursue a PhD whilst working, allowing companies to conduct innovative research that furthers their business objectives, and accelerates the creation of IP.
Collaborative relationships Fellows and their sponsoring companies will work closely with the PhD institution, forging strong and lasting links with leading academics
Fellowship Details
The aim of the scheme is to encourage profitable innovation and creativity in British Industry – to the mutual benefit of the Fellow and his or her sponsoring company. Projects in any science or engineering discipline will be considered.
2025 Fellows
Previous Industrial Fellows-
Wan Yeung
Hydro for Hydrogen: Charting a Course for Green Hydrogen with Offshore Seawater Production
Aqualution
University of Edinburgh -
Maggie So
Expediting Covalent Medicine Discovery through Electrophile Diversification
GSK
University of Strathclyde -
Anna Passmore
Value from Abundance: A New Catalytic Strategy for Unlocking Crucial Tertiary Amine Products
Cortex Organics Ltd
University of Oxford -
Alex Bentley
High-throughput generation of ligase molecular glue libraries
GSK
University of Strathclyde -
Carl Parsons
High Resolution Thermal Imaging of Temperature Memory Coatings
Sensor Coating Systems
University of Cambridge -
Samuel Winter
Variational quantum algorithms for the optimisation of telecommunications systems
BT
University of Edinburgh -
Charlie Chandler
Femtosecond laser ablation X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy depth profiling
Thermo Fisher Scientific
University of Surrey -
Graham Lightfoot
A Novel Sustainable Catalyst for the Synthesis of Methanol, a Foundational Chemical
Johnson Matthey
Durham University -
Zaeem Najeeb
Quantitative High-Throughput Characterisation of Catalyst Nanoparticles Using Advanced 4D-STEM and Spectroscopy
Johnson Matthey
University of Oxford -
Natasha Bury
Discovery of novel BacTACs: Advancing antibacterial drug discovery
LifeArc
University of Glasgow -
Cordelia Cavill
AI-driven design of perovskite materials for next-generation energy devices
QinetiQ
Imperial College London -
Viktoria Brachmaier
The astrocyte nexus: Developing a platform using translatable human cell models for motor neuron disease
LifeArc
University of Sheffield