Sir James Dyson calls for guaranteed visas for overseas tech students

Sir James Dyson (69), a British  inventor, industrial designer and founder of the Dyson company has called for foreign engineering and science students to be guaranteed visas after completing university courses to address the UK’s acute skills shortage. He is best known as the inventor of the dual cyclone bagless vacuum cleaner which works on the principle of cyclonic separation. He is to open his own institute t0 train engineers, who he says are badly needed if UK companies are to remain competitive in the world markets.  He is setting up a £15m Dyson Institute of Technology in autumn 2017 at Malmesbury, Wiltshire  and will offer a four-year engineering degree in partnership with the University of Warwick   and thereby expecting  to create homegrown talent. Students will be paid a salary while studying and will not have to pay tuition fees and the key benefits are students working on live projects alongside mentors and research staff.   One of the major developments will be in Robotics:- creating  an autonomous system, that can adapt intelligently to their environment. According to Sir James, students will be able to see these projects being put into production and going into the shops with the label made in the UK.

At present,  his own engineers for his company are drawn from 34 countries:-  UK manufacturing faces tough international challenges from South Korea, China, and India.

A third of all students studying for engineering and technology subjects were international in 2014-15, according to HESA, a higher education data provider.

According to Sir James, the UK needs another one million engineers with skills in software, hardware and electronics by 2020.

Sir James said: ” I would like the foreign students to feel they would be guaranteed a visa at the end of their training, we can also do some very simple things to considerably increase the number of British engineers and keep that talent in Britain.”

Universities minister Jo Johnson said: ” few organisations embody the spirit of great British invention quite like Dyson. The Dyson Institute of Technolgy will not only offer students the chance to study on cutting edge degree level programmes but  will also  play a vital role in educating the next generation of much-needed engineers ”