This was a panel presentation on the preparation of a Master degree from the perspective of those working in the industry. The panelists looked at what are their needs in terms of mathematical knowledge used in their field and how we can establish a better connection between the industry and universities when preparing future professionals.

The panelists were David Drain from Intel Corp., Larry Greller from SmithKline Beecham Pharmaceuticals, and Ed Hall from Motorola Corporation.

David Drain is a trained statistician who worked for Intel many years. From a mathematical stand point, Intel needs well prepared statisticians, somewhere beyond a BA but not as far as a PhD. Here are some of the expectations of a candidate for a position in stats at Intel:

• Good communication skills. Explain complicated mathematical terminology in simple terms such that those not prepared in the field can follow your ideas. This is a very important skill that Mr. Drain stresses as the most important when evaluatiang a potential candidate.
• Bussiness Inclination and Orientation. This basically means how innovative a candidate is in making money for the company. You must have the ability to converse with anybody in the compnay, and quickly explain to them why a certain investment in worth pursuing from the stnad point of making profit.
• Be Familiar with the Technical Literature. How much does the candidate know when it comes to important journals in the field where new technology is presented and discussed. I assume here is where some technical publications whould do good - of course, Mr. Drain will be looking specifically to see your knowledge on the journals that matters to them (Technometrics was one cited title). Good SAS programming skills are also investigated in an interview.

Next, Larry Greller from SmithKline introduced the work his company does and what are some of the skills needed to succeed in obtaining a job in the Math-Bio field. His presentation was very fast, there seemed to be a lot of mathematical skills needed in this field. His first point was that they rely on student input heavily - either through an initial internship or a permanent hiree. Although he agreed with some of the points made previously by Mr. Drain, his emphasis was clearly on skills.

• Be familiar with some non-standard analysis of data (non-linear, non-statistical and non-gaussian). Some of the mathematics used by the company are ODE, PDE, linear algebra, stochastic processses, optimization, and simulation.
• Be familiar with various software used in mathematical modeling.
• Be able to evaluate proposals.
• Have an attitude of awareness: be able to extract from other sciences.

The Motorola representative was at first blunt in recognizing that technically speaking their company needs professionals prepared in engineering more than just in mathematics. Most of the work is done as a team, starting with formulating the problem to analizing it, simulating the processes involved on a computer and solving it. Most of the problems require knowledge in chemistry, physics, and enginnering at the PhD level. He sees there is a need to bridge the gap between mathematics and Motorola via internships, seminars and possible sabbaticals.