Researcher,
Research & Development Group
At DENSO IT Laboratory (ITLAB), researchers are encouraged to pursue doctoral degrees while continuing their professional careers. Many people at ITLAB have taken this path before, so practical advice and support are readily available for those considering it. We asked Jun Nagata, who earned his PhD in 2024 while working full-time, to share his experience.
I earned my PhD in Engineering in my fourth year as a working professional. When I was completing my master’s program, I struggled with the decision of whether to proceed to a doctoral program or enter the workforce. In the end, I chose to join ITLAB, partly because I thought I could continue my research there and still pursue a PhD. Even during my time as a student, I had heard from colleagues that there were several cases where people earned doctorates while working at ITLAB, so I had always hoped to pursue it someday.
Rather than postponing the decision and risking a loss of motivation, I decided to take on the dual roles of employee and student while I was still young and able to commit fully. I enrolled in a doctoral program at the same time I began working. At ITLAB, I was conducting research on sensing technologies for recognizing a vehicle’s surroundings using millimeter-wave radar, while at the university I worked on a different topic: estimating optical flow using event-based cameras.
Throughout this period, ITLAB provided encouragement and institutional support for pursuing a PhD alongside my work. What mattered most to me was the clear message that academic growth and long-term research development are genuinely valued and supported within the organization.
ITLAB offers flexible working hours, allowing researchers to manage their schedules independently. This gave me a high degree of control over my time, which was invaluable as a working doctoral student. I typically worked until around 5 p.m. and then focused on my graduate research remotely in the evenings.
With a work style that requires on-site presence only two days a week and allows remote work on the remaining days, it was relatively easy to switch between company research and university research activities. That said, the mental shift between the two was sometimes challenging. There were periods when my university research did not progress as I had hoped, but I was ultimately able to work through those phases and complete my PhD over the course of four years.
My honest reaction after earning the degree was a sense of relief, as if a heavy burden had been lifted. During my time in the university laboratory, I often worked independently, whereas at ITLAB I was able to advance my research through open discussions with many colleagues. Approaching my doctoral studies with a broader perspective and diverse insights, rather than being confined to a single field, was a significant factor in successfully completing the degree.
After gaining experience as a working researcher, I revisited my graduate research with a new perspective and came to appreciate the importance of structuring research as a coherent narrative. By clearly understanding the background of a problem and the motivation for addressing it, and by first formulating hypotheses, it becomes easier to design experiments, deepen analysis, and find ways forward when research reaches an impasse.
During my master’s program, I was fully occupied with tackling assigned topics. In contrast, in the doctoral program, everything—from selecting the initial research theme to constructing the logical framework—had to be designed by myself, with the goal of earning the degree always in mind.
The insights I gained through this experience are directly applicable to my current work. Rather than examining everything in an unfocused way, I now begin by clearly outlining the story from problem definition to solution. I feel that I have become much more capable of constructing such narratives in my research.
Where engineering curiosity
meets real-world impact
