David Cairncross is a senior policy adviser in the CBI's enterprise and innovation group and secretary of the CBI Innovation, Science and Technology Committee. He also acts as secretary of the Inter-Company Academic Relations Group (ICARG), which brings together managers from a wide range of CBI member companies who are responsible for their organisations’ research links with universities and has recently produced a guide for members on business-university collaboration. David prepared the CBI responses to recent consultations by the Higher Education Funding Council for England (HEFCE) on the Research Excellence Framework (REF), and the CBI submission to the review of the impact of full economic costing which was conducted for Research Councils UK (RCUK) and Universities UK. He was a member of the team which supported the CBI Higher Education Task Force, whose report ‘Stronger together: Businesses and universities in turbulent times’ was published in October 2009. He is the lead point of contact for engagement on innovation, science and technology policy with the CBI’s 65 university members, and is a member of the Better Exploitation Strategic Advisory Team of the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC).