Over the past five years, Prince Sultan University has significantly improved its position in both regional and world rankings. This reflects the university's growing status in all areas of education and innovation, aligned with Saudi Arabia's Vision 2030. In research alone, more than twenty research labs have been established, and over eighty full-time scholars have been appointed, empowering colleges to adopt a decentralized research governance strategy and providing generous incentives for research outcomes. None of these achievements would have been possible without the unwavering support of the University’s management and the efforts of the former Research and Initiatives Center (RIC) Director, Prof. Anis Koubaa.
To keep this momentum going, we must develop sustainable and stable funding resources to maintain the research excellence framework built by RIC. Most importantly, we must ensure that our research is sustainable and not solely reliant on PSU funding.
It is a great honor for me to step into the role of Director of RIC with a clear vision of harnessing the full potential of our research capabilities. To achieve this, I aim to promote transdisciplinary and applied research that not only advances knowledge but also solves real-world problems faced by local communities, industry, and global stakeholders, while addressing sustainable development goals. However, this ambitious yet realistic goal can only be achieved by creating knowledge that is not only innovative but also actionable, relevant, and accessible to all engaged stakeholders.
The RIC team will establish collaborations among different departments, building project teams that go beyond traditional research domain boundaries to solve complex social and industrial problems. This will provide opportunities for patent licenses, research commercialization, and consultancy, positioning PSU as a leader in helping the Kingdom build a meaningful and lasting impact on the knowledge economy and sustainable communities for future generations.