Greetings everyone, would like to ask for some expert and mature advice on pursuit of knowledge in the field of AI. I'm from EE Engineering background but majoring in signal processing and have always been interested in AI field. I have been working for a few years now in one of the MNCs in malaysia and would like to further improve myself.

A few doubts i have are:
1) Is a PhD in this field worth it or better to gain industrial experience? my aim is to be working in industry + lecturer (have passion for teaching). perhaps might convert to full time lecturer in my later years.
2) Usually how does one graduate from a PhD? On average, completion of thesis and how many journals/papers do i need to publish before one can graduate?
3) Any good institute for this? (UM/USM/UTM or overseas[have insufficient funding for full Xyears of PhD:(])?

Would greatly appreciate your advice in the matter above. Thanks.

1) Have a look at MyPhD Industri.

1 - Industrial PhD is relevant if you're working on a long-term project in your current company - but it fulfills OP's requirement (industrial + academic). 'Normal' PhD by nature is very academic & fundamental (theoretical)

2 - University dependent - IPTA esp those RUs have strict requirements related to graduation criteria, which include no of journal & conference

3 - Expertise - better do own homework looking for your potential supervisor. Simple guideline, they have published in reputable journals

This post has been edited by bitterbutter: Mar 4 2015, 09:36 AM

Stay in industry or academic. Both experiences are not direct interchangable. Staying in middle is not good for career.

You have no advantanges in academic with much industrial experiences. Academic is about knowledge creation through publication and trainning students. If you have deep industrial experiences and a PhD, you can work in a teaching university. Research intensive university requires you to produce top ISI papers. Academics provides consultancy occasionally to industry because industrial connection is an addon to academic profile and it is not compulsary.

Welcome to academic if you enjoy the freedom of time and freedom of work. History of this freedom can be traced back to the time of University of Bologna in 11 century ' ...free to travel to pursue the knowledge ...' We called it academic freedom now !