I want to thank the Ministry of University Affairs for inviting me to address this assembly today, and I especially want to acknowledge the important work of our friend and alumnus, Dr. Adisai Bodharamik, Minister of Commerce, for his dedication to the University of Maryland and also for all his energetic help in increasing the University's presence in Thailand. We are enormously proud to have a large number of faithful alumni in this important country as well as many strong connections to leaders in your universities, government agencies, and industries. Our Thai Alumni Club is among our strongest and most enthusiastic clubs found anywhere. We wish to take every opportunity to thank our friends in Thailand for their spirit and support and to build even closer ties as we move into the future together.

The University of Maryland is one of the oldest, largest and finest public research universities in the United States. It is an ideal destination for visitors and students alike, located in College Park, Maryland, just 15 kilometers from the White House and the center of our national government in Washington, DC. We have a broad range of degree programs, special training programs and exchange programs, and we welcome faculty, students, and leaders from every segment of the Thai society to visit us so that we may learn from you and continue to build our tradition of friendship. We currently host 82 Thai students who are the 7th largest international student population on the campus.

Partnerships

Our future calls for us to strengthen our ties, at home and worldwide, by expanding our circle of friends and building new partnerships. The theme of my talk today is the growing role of partnerships in our future -- partnerships that are flourishing within the United States between corporations, government agencies and universities; partnerships that we are building abroad. This period in our global society can be characterized as the time of partnerships, and I want to talk briefly today about why partnerships are crucial to an expansion of prosperity and why research universities, like the University of Maryland, play a special part in this new economy.

Over the past three decades, we have moved with almost lightning speed into an information age where knowledge and expertise are highly valued. This transformation has fueled the growth of partnerships. If you think about IBM at the height of its influence in the 1960's, you will recall the model of the self-contained corporate giant. IBM did everything itself: generated its ideas, manufactured all computer system components, and cultivated in-house specialists in every area. IBM even avoided talking to people outside the corporation for fear that others might claim its ideas. But in today's knowledge economy, corporations function very differently. An economy built on knowledge depends on, and fosters, partnerships. In fact, most of the recent advances in the key areas -- information, wireless communications, biotechnology, and nano-technology -- that are transforming how we live, and even how long we live, have all been accelerated by partnerships. Complex problems like the environment, energy, peace and conflict management are also served through partnerships.

Why is this so? Primarily, because partnerships facilitate the key factors that drive success in a knowledge economy -- innovation, speed, expertise and cross-fertilization of ideas. First, rapid creation and application of innovative ideas are primary drivers. Innovation gives temporary advantage to the innovator and long-term advantage to everyone. The innovations in the 1990's by United States businesses were made possible because progressive companies took advantage of their access to the information and their speed of innovation. It's not the large companies that win the technology competition, but the quick ones. Speed, not size, counts.

The rapid exchange of information and ideas, the speed, is enhanced through partnerships. Partnerships enable the rapid assemblage of teams of people whose expertise can efficiently move innovation forward. One of the most successful recent achievements was the decoding of the human genome: an accomplishment that grew out of a partnership between a federal agency, the NIH, and a private biotech firm, Celera, both of which are located not far from our University. The genomic code was identified much more rapidly than anyone had expected because of this collaboration.

The Human Genome Project is enormous and spectacular, but small projects can also benefit from partnerships. They are bringing innovation to the advancement of knowledge in every area of human endeavor: information, communications, energy, the environment, health care, drug design, agriculture, neuroscience, computational biology, biotechnology, public policy and regulation, economics and marketing, health care and working conditions.

Another factor driving the need for partnerships is the shortage of expertise, shortage of skilled workers, to meet the needs of this new economy. According to a report released on April 2 by the Information Technology Association of America, about 425,000 IT positions may go unfilled this year in the U.S. due to an insufficient number of workers trained in advanced computing skills. This shortage exists despite the downturn in the economy. The emerging biotechnology industry has even greater need for workers with special expertise. People with expertise have become as valuable as material resources were in the manufacturing economy. Corporate mergers or acquisitions are driven in part by the value of the expertise acquired. In one recent merger, a communications company was valued for acquisition purposes at $18 million per employee. Biotech companies are also often valued by the number of Ph.D.'s employed. Building across-the-board, in-house expertise as IBM did years ago, requires too much time, even for the large and rich companies. The same might be said about countries as well companies. The competition for expertise is intense in America because, in addition to industry and universities, government laboratories are also in the hunt for skilled people. Accordingly, the fastest way to build expertise is to assemble people with skills, not train them, and partnerships are among the most effective ways to bring these experts together.

This demand for people with knowledge is changing the culture of workers in universities and industry. The skilled workforce is more independent today than at any other time in history. People with expertise move from opportunity to opportunity. Not surprisingly, loyalty to a particular institution is no longer expected or even valued highly.

Some predict that this growing independence of workers with expertise will spread to universities, too. In this model, faculty will be "faculty-at-large," moving from opportunity to opportunity with modest commitment to a particular university. There have been a small number of highly sought-after scholars who have functioned this way for many years. Countries advertise worldwide for faculty, for expertise in key areas, to work on short-term contracts, such as, in Australia and the Middle East. Universities in the United States recruit worldwide too. We can expect that the mobility of scholars will increase in the years ahead, with both positive and negative outcomes for universities.

Another interesting transformation derived from partnerships is that jobs are beginning to move to people, not the people to jobs. People can now work over the Internet. Many companies in the United States depend on software support from a myriad of small firms in India - while employees on the American continent sleep, computer experts and support people in India take over. Companies are establishing operations where the people are, instead of trying to move people to the companies. In the past, employees had to physically locate where their companies wanted them to be; they had no choice - move or lose your job. Now employees often resign rather than move. And these days they, or their expertise, cannot be easily replaced.

Successful partnerships depend on mutual benefit, not on national boundaries. Communications and the global economy know no borders. Everyone is connected to everyone. Partnerships extend internationally too. The burgeoning Indian software enterprises that work while the U.S. sleeps are a current example.

Research University Partnerships

What does all this mean for universities? Research universities are sources of new ideas and information, as well as expertrise, so partnerships with universities are becoming increasingly important to industry and government agencies. As an example, I would like to talk briefly about the role of my University, the University of Maryland, as a builder of partnerships in the new economy. As some of you know, the University of Maryland is large, one of the largest in the United States. We have 33,500 students, 24, 500 of whom are undergraduates, and 9,000 are graduate students. When we add to that number the faculty, support staff and visitors, our community totals about 50,000 people. The University is the largest organization in the State of Maryland.

We are also the state's greatest asset in the development of its future. With the University as a partner, the State of Maryland is transforming itself into a technology hub, an innovative economy based on knowledge industries with the focus on infotech, biotech, nano-tech, and its long tradition of defense and space technology companies.

The University of Maryland is a major drawing card for recruiting high-tech companies to the state. New companies are eager to locate close to the University. The University can address many of their workforce needs, helping them, for example, with hiring, retaining, and retraining needs. Through its faculty and student expertise and research activities, the University feeds the innovation needs of companies with new ideas. The University enterprise also provides for stimulation and visibility, consultation and guidance, workforce satisfaction and growth.

Given the importance of partnerships and the many benefits to all involved, the University of Maryland is pursuing agreements that pull corporate, university and governmental assets together. The range of opportunities for collaboration and partnering are very great. The A. James Clark School of Engineering's successful Engineering Research Center, for example, houses a Technology Advancement Program that serves as an incubator for start-up companies developing technology-based products or services; a Technology Extension Service that provides consultation for large and small companies; and a Maryland Industrial Partnerships program that offers matching grants for industry-university research projects leading to product and process development.

Let me give you just one example of our many successes: MedImmune, the world's fifth largest biotech firm located not far from the University, has developed a major new antiviral drug, MEDI-492, to combat infectious disease. It is believed to be one of the most important products for pediatric medicine in a decade. It was a Maryland Industrial Partnerships project that aided MedImmune in improving the quality control for production of MEDI-493.

In addition, the University is also pursuing collaborative agreements with major corporations. Many of these companies wish to build their research labs close to the University to take advantage of our people and our ideas. Not five minutes from the University, we now have a Lucent optical communications laboratory that was established by a University of Maryland alumnus. At the beginning of this year, we announced that Fujitsu, Ltd., the world's third largest electronics company, would establish its U.S. research laboratory for advanced computer technology next to the university. Fujitsu researchers will engage in cooperative study with University faculty and students on technologies aimed at advancing the evolution of the Internet and developing computers more closely linked to people's everyday lives. And just one final corporate example: Fraunhofer, Europe's largest applied research and development organization, has partnered with the University on an institute located in College Park that draws on the University's expertise in software and reliability engineering.

Not only corporations but also U.S. government agencies are eager to form partnerships with the University. Government labs are increasingly moving to locations next to universities, which allow a ready exchange of ideas between researchers through visiting scholars, internships, lectures, seminars, and workshops. Their proximity to the University also allows them to recruit effectively among University graduates, and this proximity is also an attraction when they recruit researchers from elsewhere. The NASA-Goddard Space Flight Center collaborates with the University on a hundred projects that cover topics from space to nano-biotechnology. NASA is an active participant and supporter of our Earth Systems Science Interdisciplinary Center that brings together expertise in meteorology, geology, and geography to study atmospheric, oceanographic, and land processes and the interactions among them.

The University also just concluded arrangements for a joint Global Change Research Institute with the U.S. Department of Energy's Pacific Northwest National Laboratory to investigate the scientific, social and economic implications of climate change both nationally and globally. The University's neuroscience and cognitive science program has developed a joint doctoral and post-doctoral program within the NIH. Finally, our recent recruitment of William Phillips, who won the 1997 Nobel Prize in Physics, put in place a partnership with the National Institute of Standards and Technology to create the world's top research group in atomic, molecular, and optical physics.

It is not my intention to recite to this captive audience a complete list of the collaborative efforts at the University of Maryland, though my colleagues and I are immensely proud of them. Rather, these, and many other arrangements I have not mentioned, are a reflection of a remarkable shift from the old, and probably never really accurate, image of a scholar working in isolation, whose ideas crept into public circulation many years later. Research in the beginning of the 21st century is transferred to the public domain at high speed and the process depends on partnerships of all kinds between universities, industry, and governmental agencies.

Thai Partnerships

I wish to conclude my remarks today by encouraging your participation in partnerships with the University of Maryland. We are eager to build strong research ties with universities, government, and businesses in Thailand, through executive training programs, exchanges of scholars and formal collaborations. I particularly urge the government of Thailand to consider sponsoring programs under which distinguished students and other future leaders can come to Maryland and prepare for positions in academia, industry and government in Thailand.

We seek engagement with your industry through projects that we can sponsor together to increase the speed and effectiveness of our many entrepreneurial leaders. We are eager to learn from you, to understand your culture and to explain ours. Effective partnerships are built on knowledge, mutual understanding and of course mutual benefit. Finally, we join with the people and leaders of Thailand in promoting a global society that advances the health and welfare of all peoples on the earth.

Partnerships are increasing rapidly everywhere; and this vigorous expansion is just in the beginning stages. Front line research in universities and industry will be needed to address a wide range of issues that confront our society and the University of Maryland is proud to be a part of this leadership, working in partnerships of a national and international scope. We hope that many outstanding scholars, students and leaders in Thailand will join with us in this exciting effort.

Thank you for your kind attention.