Professor Hassan Abdalla is the Provost and Vice-President at the University of East London and a globally recognized higher education leader with expertise spanning academia, research, industry partnerships, and innovation-led transformation. His work focuses on smart and sustainable cities, immersive learning environments, green technologies, AI-enabled education, and research innovation. He has led major European projects worth several million euros, published over 200 internationally refereed publications, and serves on several international advisory boards, government, Journals, winners of several international awards. Under his leadership, the university achieved national recognition for teaching quality, student success, social impact, and global partnerships driving economic growth and sustainable development. Recently, in an exclusive interview with Higher Education Digest, Prof Abdalla shared insights into how his career began with a frustration that brilliant research stayed trapped in journals while industry and communities faced real problems. That disconnect drove him to bridge academia, industry, and government, turning universities into engines of economic growth and social mobility. As Provost & Vice-President at University of East London, he now leads major projects in smart cities, green tech, and AI-enabled immersive learning. On AI, he believes by 2030 data-heavy tasks like literature reviews and simulations will be AI-assisted, but curiosity, ethics, and judgment must stay human. His advice to leaders: build curricula that teach graduates to work with AI using critical thinking and empathy, and design technology that enhances humanity rather than diminishes it. The following excerpts are taken from the interview. Hi Dr. Abdalla. Your career spans research, academia, industry, and policy. Looking back to your earliest research project, what problem made you realize academia could directly shape industry and society, and what did you do next? One of the earliest moments that shaped my belief in the power of academia to transform industry and society came during my early