In 1972, Universiti Sains Malaysia established the School of Applied Science at the Main Campus in Penang and offered basic fields of engineering studies. The fields of studies offered at the time were Electronic Technology, Polymer Technology, Food Technology, Materials Technology and Mineral Resources Technology.
In 1984, the School of Applied Science was restructured and given a new name, the School of Engineering Science and Industrial Technology. This restructuring, which corresponded to the development of Malaysia’s Industrial Masterplan that is in turn related to the country’s human utilization needs, gave birth to three new schools. They were the School of Industrial Technology which focused on offering studies in fields such as polymer and food technologies, the School of Electrical and Electronics Engineering and the School of Materials and Mineral Resources Engineering.
The expansion that took place required an increase in the physical space of the campus. Since the physical area of USM in Penang at the time was rather limited, a new area in the state of Perak was identified as the site for the development of a branch campus.
A decision was reached whereby all fields of engineering studies were transferred to Perak while the School of Industrial Technology remained in Penang. In 1986, the School of Electrical and Electronics Engineering and the School of Materials and Mineral Resources Engineering moved to a temporary campus at the old Ipoh Town Council building while waiting for the construction of the USM branch campus in Bandar Baru Seri Iskandar, Perak Tengah District, Perak to be completed. The temporary campus was named USM Perak Branch Campus (USMKCP – USM Kampus Cawangan Perak).
In 1987, construction began at the site of USM Perak Branch Campus in Bandar Baru Seri Iskandar. On 1st January 1989, the scope of engineering studies was expanded further with the establishment of two new schools of engineering: the School of Civil Engineering and the School of Mechanical Engineering.
By the end of November 1989, all four USM engineering schools began moving to USM Perak Branch Campus in Seri Iskandar in stages and the moving process finally ended in April 1990. The Ipoh Town Council building which housed USM’s temporary campus was handed back to the Town Council in a glorious ceremony that was graced by the DYMM Seri Paduka Baginda Yang Dipertuan Agong, Sultan Azlan Shah.
In 1992, USM established its fifth engineering school, the School of Chemical Engineering. Two years later, efforts to offer studies in the field of Aerospace Engineering went underway. On 17th of May 1998, the USM Aerospace Engineering Unit was established and on the 1st of March 1999 the unit was upgraded to the School of Aerospace Engineering.
In 1997, the government decided to transfer USMKCP back to Penang. The new campus site was located in Seri Ampangan, Nibong Tebal, Seberang Perai Selatan, Penang while USMKCP’s campus site in Seri Iskandar was taken over by the Universiti Teknologi Petronas (UTP).
The Engineering Campus moved in stages in 2001. USM’s Engineering Campus in Seri Ampangan, Nibong Tebal began its operations in the 2001/2002 Academic Session in June 2001.
In 2007, USM was appointed as one of the four research universities by the Ministry of Higher Education [MoHE] through a rigorous evaluation process thus elevating its status to the top among more than 100 public and private universities and colleges in Malaysia. In the same year, USM was rated as the only “excellent” (or 5-Star) university in the Academic Reputation Survey conducted by the Malaysian Qualification Agency (MQA).
On 4th of September 2008, USM was granted with an APEX (the Accelerated Programme for Excellence) status by the Malaysian’s government. This status requires USM to transform its system in order to move up its World University Rankings with a target of top 100 in five years and top 50 by 2020.
USM's transformation plan, entitled “Transforming Higher Education for a Sustainable Tomorrow” will embark on numerous transformational journeys, including revamping most of its activities pertaining to nurturing and learning, research and innovation, services, students and alumni and the management of the university as a whole.
The University takes steps to improve the three core pillars of its strengths, [i] concentration of talent, [ii] resources and [iii] acculturation of supportive governance.