The University of Nottingham Malaysia Campus (UNMC) has appointed Professor Graham Kendall as CEO and Provost.
Professor Kendall is a Professor of Computer Science and currently Vice-Provost (Research and Knowledge Transfer) at UNMC.
Since his appointment in Malaysia in 2011 he has been responsible for developing and delivering the strategic aims of the University in the areas of Research and Knowledge Exchange. His period of office saw a step change in the volume and quality of research, resulting in a five-star rating in The Malaysian Research Assessment (MyRA).
He is also the Chief Executive Officer of Nottingham MyResearch Sdn Bhd. This company has MIDA R&D status, enabling companies to invest in Research and Development in a tax efficient way.
As the Vice Provost of Research and Knowledge Transfer, Professor Kendall facilitated the links with Nottingham campuses in the UK and China for research and commercialisation of research projects. He also chairs the UNMC’s Research Strategy and Knowledge Transfer Committees. He also sits on various boards based in the UK including the Research Excellence Framework Steering Committee and the Research and Knowledge Transfer Board.
He takes on the role effective August 1, succeeding Professor Christine Ennew who is taking up a new role as Provost at Warwick University,UK.
Professor Ennew was instrumental in setting up The University of Nottingham’s Malaysia Campus 16 years-ago and has been at the helm as CEO and Provost since 2013. During her time as Provost and CEO, Professor Ennew has led to the development and implementation of Strategic Road Map to guide all aspects of the campus’s development through to 2020.
“I am delighted that Professor Kendall will be taking on this key role at UNMC. He has vast experience of Malaysia as well as the UK campus and has supported me immensely during my tenure. I know that under his leadership UNMC will continue to flourish and develop to its full potential,” Professor Ennew.
Professor Kendall said: “This is an incredibly exciting opportunity and I am looking forward to building on Christine’s hard work and leading the next phase of expansion in both our teaching and research activities.”
Professor Sir David Greenaway, Vice Chancellor at The University of Nottingham, said: “We had a hugely impressive short list for this role, which testifies to the current standing of UNMC, and its future potential. Professor Kendall has the vision and experience to ensure that potential is realised, and I look forward to working with him in his new leadership role.”
Before he was appointed as Vice Provost of UNMC, Professor Graham Kendall was the Dunford Professor of Computer Science at The University of Nottingham. He has been awarded externally funded grants worth over £5.5 million (RM30.79 million) from a variety of sources including the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council and commercial organisations.
Before entering academia he spent almost 20 years in the IT industry, working for various companies, including the Co-operative Wholesale Society and Provincial Insurance, UK. In his career, he was also undertaking a variety of roles ranging from Computer Operator, Technical Support Manager and Operations Manager.
Professor Kendall’s research interests lie in Operational Research, Meta- and Hyper-Heuristics, Evolutionary Computation and Artificial Intelligence, with a specific interest in scheduling (particularly sports), timetabling, cutting and packing, rostering and routing and logistics.
He has a PhD from The University of Nottingham (School of Computer Science) in 2000 and a BSc (Hons) First Class in Computation from The University of Manchester Institute of Science and Technology (UMIST), UK in 1997.
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More information is available from Josephine Dionisappu, PR & Communications Manager at The University of Nottingham Malaysia Campus on +603 8924 8746, josephine.dionisappu@nottingham.edu.my.
Notes to editors: The University of Nottingham has 43,000 students and is ‘the nearest Britain has to a truly global university, with a “distinct” approach to internationalisation, which rests on those full-scale campuses in China and Malaysia, as well as a large presence in its home city.’ (Times Good University Guide 2016). It is also one of the most popular universities in the UK among graduate employers and the winner of ‘Outstanding Support for Early Career Researchers’ at the Times Higher Education Awards 2015. It is ranked in the world’s top 75 by the QS World University Rankings 2015/16, and 8th in the UK by research power according to the Research Excellence Framework 2014. It has been voted the world’s greenest campus for three years running, according to Greenmetrics Ranking of World Universities.
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Posted on 5th April 2016