12th December 2003

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L-R: Linda Cadier of the UK's NationalCentre for Languages;
Arthur Bell of Language Network Northern Ireland and Fred Scharf, University of Ulster


A University of Ulster business project has scooped a National Languages for Export Award at a special award ceremony in Belfast.

The awards aim to showcase the role of language and culture skills in order to improve business performance overseas.

The winning UU project is part of the International Marketing module in the final year BA Hons International Business Studies at Coleraine.

Fred Scharf, Project Leader, School of Business, Retail and Financial Services said: “Many of the students spend the third year of their course overseas and, in their final year, they complete an export market research project on behalf of local companies.

“On return from their year of placement or academic study abroad our students have developed a considerable degree of linguistic and cultural fluency. This represents an invaluable resource for local companies.

The projects have benefited from close collaboration with Invest NI’s Trade Division and have been closely aligned with the agency’s Export Development Programme.

Ciara Donnelly from Invest NI said: “We have been able to provide practical support and advice and offer ‘real-life’ international research projects to the student groups. Local firms who require bespoke research, have benefited from the students’ focused market research projects. This has been an invaluable resource to our businesses, especially those SMEs who lack in-house marketing and/or language resources.”

During the 2001-2002 academic year twelve projects were undertaken on behalf of eight local SMEs. These firms were seeking to enter markets in Europe (France, Germany, Netherlands and Spain), Japan and the USA with a wide range of products and services. A total of fifty-eight students were involved in teams of, usually, 4 or 5. In 2002-3 the number of groups had increased to fourteen, researching a similar range of markets.

For further information, please contact:

Press Office Department of Communication and Development
Telephone: 028 9036 6178
Email: pressoffice@ulster.ac.uk