Professor Keith Ridgway
After graduation in 1973 Professor Ridgway worked as a Special Apprentice at Mather and Platt Ltd., a Manchester based manufacturer of centrifugal pumps for the power generation and oil industries. In 1975 he joined Kennedy and Donkin, Consulting Engineers, where he worked on the design of thermal power plants, carrying out trouble shooting projects in Yemen, Venezuela and Northern Ireland.
In 1980 he joined the University of Manchester where he was supported by Shell International Marine to carry out research on the design of anchoring systems for large ships. In 1982 he joined Staffordshire University as a lecturer in Design and Manufacture and remained there until taking up a similar position at the University of Sheffield in 1988.
In 1997 he became Professor in Design and Manufacture at the University of Sheffield. In 2001 he worked with a local businessman (Adrian Allen) to establish the University of Sheffield Advanced Manufacturing Research Centre with Boeing.
Professor Ridgway was awarded an OBE in the Queens Birthday Honours in June 2006 and became a Fellow of the Royal Academy of Engineering in July 2006.
