Dr Aylin Ates is a Reader in Strategy and Innovation at Strathclyde Business School with an internationally recognised research profile. She is co-leading the University Research Theme “Innovation and Entrepreneurship”. Her research delivers clear academic, policy, and business impact by advancing understanding of how manufacturing ecosystems including SMEs build adaptive and resilient capabilities in response to technological disruption, economic shocks, and sustainability challenges.

Aylin’s work has directly informed international policy and practice, including expert advisory roles for the UNIDO and citations in ILO policy reports on business resilience. Through sustained collaboration with industry and policymakers, her research has shaped debates on SME viability, co-opetition, circular economy and digital transformation within high-value manufacturing ecosystems.

She has secured and led a total of £4.5M external funding from bodies including UKRI, Innovate UK, ESRC, European Space Agency, ERDF, and EU Framework Programmes, with a strong emphasis on knowledge exchange and translational impact. She has delivered multiple high-impact Knowledge Transfer Partnership (KTP) projects resulting in demonstrable organisational transformation, energy and resource efficiency, productivity gains, and new business models.

She is a highly regarded educator, teaching across Master’s and MBA programmes, and brings extensive expertise in strategy, innovation, and growth in dynamic and uncertain environments. With over 80 research outputs and deep industry collaborations, she blends academic rigour with real-world relevance, a hallmark of the Strathclyde MBA/ Exec MBA experience.

She holds a Ph.D. from the University of Strathclyde, and a BSc (Hons) in Industrial Engineering from Istanbul Technical University, Faculty of Management in Turkiye.

External Roles:

• Expert Evaluator and Rapporteur for the European Commission Horizon programme
• Expert Evaluator for The Swiss National Science Foundation
• Expert Advisor for the United Nations Industrial Development Organisation (UNIDO)
• Expert Evaluator for the National Science Centre Poland
• Co-Editor in Chief, International Journal of Productivity and Performance Management
• Editorial Board Member, European Journal of Management & Research-Technology Management
• European Academy of Management – Scientific Council Member, Grants Committee Member, Mentor for Early Career Researchers
• Expert Reviewer for UKRI Future Leaders Fellowships
• British Academy of Management - Member of the Peer Review College, External Reviewer for Grants

• Strategic management (with particular reference to manufacturing small and medium enterprises-SMEs)
• Organisational resilience 
• Innovation & Digital transformation 
• Co-opetition strategies  and circular business models in manufacturing ecosystems 

I supervise UG, MSc, MBA and PhD/DBA projects in the area of strategic management, performance management, innovation, technology and change management.

Currently, I am the Module Leader for Applied Strategic Management for Stratchlyde MBA/Exec MBA and International Centres.

I design and deliver modules on Strategic Management, Technology and Organisational Change and Consulting within post-graduate MSc and MBA levels as well as post-experience corporate education programmes.

My research interests cover the areas of strategic management, innovation, digital transformation, circular business models, and manufacturing ecosystems mainly in small and medium enterprise (SME) context. I use qualitative data analysis techniques and happy to consider PhD applications in these fields.