Who We Are

Prof. Dr. François Therin is the Deputy Vice-Chancellor for Research and Enterprise at the University of Cyberjaya, Malaysia, providing strategic leadership in advancing the university’s research, innovation, and enterprise agenda. With over 25 years of global academic experience, he has held senior leadership roles at Africa Business School (Morocco), IMT Dubai (UAE), De Vinci Business School (France), and Curtin University Sarawak (Malaysia). A Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts (FRSA), Prof. Dr. Therin holds a Doctorate in Business Administration from Newcastle University and Grenoble École de Management. He is the Founding Editor of the International Journal of Techno entrepreneurship and author of the Handbook of Research on Technoentrepreneurial Ecosystems.

At the University of Cyberjaya, Prof. Dr. Therin provides strategic direction in research management, institutional rankings, industry engagement, and research grants and awards. Under his leadership, the university continues to strengthen its research governance framework, enhance global research visibility and ranking performance, and build strategic partnerships with industry and government to promote innovation with real-world impact. He also leads initiatives to expand competitive research funding opportunities and recognize scholarly excellence through institutional grants and awards. Through these efforts, Prof. Dr. Therin is positioning the University of Cyberjaya as a dynamic and globally connected hub for research, innovation, and enterprise excellence.

Role & Responsibilities
Dr. Ashok leads the strategic direction, governance, and oversight of research at the University of Cyberjaya through the Research Management Unit (RMU). His key responsibilities include:

• Formulating and implementing research policies, guidelines, and standards across the university in alignment with its vision, mission, and regulatory requirements.
• Providing institutional support in research planning, monitoring, evaluation, and performance, including oversight of research key performance indicators (KPIs).
• Ensuring quality assurance, compliance, integrity, and ethics in all research activities, including review of internal research proposals, plagiarism checks, conflicts of interest, and regulatory adherence.
• Facilitating alignment between faculty / schools / departments and central research strategy; promoting cross-disciplinary collaboration and research culture.
• Representing the university in external bodies, funding agencies, national/international research networks, and overseeing external research partnerships and collaborations.
• Overseeing resource allocation, budget planning for research initiatives, grants, infrastructure, and institutional research support.
• Providing leadership, mentoring, and guidance to RMU staff and coordinating with the university’s senior leadership on research development initiatives.

Role & Responsibilities
Khairun acts as the operational lead within RMU, bridging strategy and execution. Her core responsibilities include:

• Coordinating and supervising daily operations of RMU: ensuring smooth workflow, staff assignments, and meeting research support deliverables.
• Supporting Dr. Ashok in translating research strategy into tactical plans, including monitoring progress, risk management, and reporting.
• Acting as primary liaison with faculties, departments, and researchers: advising on regulatory and procedural matters (pre-award and post-award), guiding on processes, and resolving bottlenecks.
• Overseeing the proposal submission process: coordinating internal reviews, compliance checks, budget validation, budget justifications, and submission timelines.
• Monitoring awards post-approval: ensuring proper award setup, disbursement, grant tracking, financial controls, reporting, and close-out.
• Leading process improvement initiatives (SOPs, workflows, digital tools) to enhance RMU efficiency, service quality, and user experience.
• Preparing regular reports, analytics, and dashboards on research outputs, grant success, expenditures, and compliance to university leadership.

Role & Responsibilities
Hidayu handles the detailed administration, technical support, and compliance of grants and awards operations. Her responsibilities include:

• Assisting researchers in identifying relevant funding calls (local, national, international), interpreting call guidelines, and eligibility criteria.
• Providing administrative support in the preparation of grant proposals: budget templates, justification, CVs, timelines, project narratives, supporting documents, and submission packaging.
• Coordinating internal reviews and ensuring compliance (ethics, human subjects, safety, intellectual property) before proposal submission.
• Once awards are granted, managing administrative tasks: award documentation, agreement processing, sub-award management, budget setup, financial monitoring, cost transfers, and amendments.
• Monitoring and tracking grant expenditures, ensuring alignment with approved budgets, compliance with funding terms and conditions, and preparing periodic financial reports.
• Supporting audit readiness and responding to audit queries: maintaining records, reconciliation, and documentation.
• Serving as point of contact for funding agencies on clarifications, queries, reporting requirements, and liaison on amendments or extensions.

Role & Responsibilities
As a trainee in RMU, Kuga supports the RMU team while gaining exposure to research administration functions. Typical responsibilities include:

• Supporting day-to-day administrative tasks across RMU: communications, scheduling meetings, maintaining records and databases, managing correspondence with researchers, uploading documents to portals.
• Assisting with proposal and grant application preparation: helping compile documents, formatting, checking attachments, ensuring completeness, following up with researchers.
• Assisting in tracking proposal and award status, updating internal dashboards, and ensuring timely reminders and follow-ups.
• Helping with grant financial monitoring: gathering expenditure data, reconciling budgets, preparing reports, and flagging variances.
• Supporting events, training, workshops, or awareness outreach (e.g., research seminars, grant writing workshops) organized by RMU.
• Learning and participating in process improvement projects, standard operating procedure (SOP) development, or system implementation under supervision.