Engineering and Manufacturing Task Force

CIHE has launched an Engineering and Manufacturing Task Force bringing together representatives from industry with those from Higher Education Institutions. The Task Force is lead by co-chairs Nigel Thrift (University of Warwick) and Richard Greenhalgh (CIHE) and driven by a membership made up of leading business and higher education executives. The remit of the Task Force is to work collaboratively to help provide solutions and insight to strategic problems facing the UK, using the wealth of knowledge and expertise from around the table. The Task Force first met in March 2010 for its inauguration; identifying a number of themes that each focus on different ways business and universities can combine to grow the manufacturing and engineering base of the UK. The group will provide a mechanism for channelling innovative solutions to the problems facing the sector with the aim to incite action from business, HEIs and Government.

The group is currently addressing its first theme concerned with how industry and academia can combine to ‘drive collaborative research for manufacturing excellence’. The Task Force will launch its first report towards the end of the year and is working with a range of expert witnesses to better understand the issues that are faced in approaching collaborative R&D arrangements such as intellectual property commercialisation and procurement practices.

The group meets bi-monthly, and is next scheduled to come together in November 2010. The Task Force will continue to meet throughout 2011 to explore further areas of concern for the UK’s engineering and manufacturing sector including labour force skills shortages and how to widen the UK talent pool.

Task Force Members

Chairs

• Professor Nigel Thrift, Vice-Chancellor Warwick University
• Mr Richard Greenhalgh, Chairman, CIHE

Industry Members

• Mr Robert Booker, HR Executive Vice President, BG Group
• Professor Simon Bradley, Vice President, EADS
• Mr Allan Cook, Chairman, WS Atkins
• Sir Ian Gibson, Chairman, Wm Morrison Supermarkets
• Mr Nick Winser, Executive Director, National Grid
• Mr Simon Wright, Head of Engineering, Programmes & Support, Performance Excellence, BAE Systems
• Dr David Docherty, CEO of CIHE, Chair of DTG Group

Academic Members

• Professor Mike Gregory, Head of the Institute for Manufacturing, University of Cambridge
• Professor Joe McGeehan, Director, Centre for Communications Research, University of Bristol
• Professor Dame Anne Dowling, Head of Department of Engineering, University of Cambridge
• Professor Matthew Harrison, Director, Education, The Royal Academy of Engineering

Members click below to log in to the Engineering and Manufacturing Industries Task Force

http://engineering.cihe.co.uk/