President's weekly update
2 February 2018
I am sending this message from Beijing where I am on a short but packed visit with the Prime Minister and a business delegation of about 50 Chief Executives of large and small companies. Only one other Vice-Chancellor, Professor Dame Janet Beer from Liverpool, is in the delegation representing Universities UK. The three-day visit includes important events in three different cities. We are announcing several new University of Manchester partnerships with China during the visit.
The delegation all flew over together on a converted RAF plane from Heathrow to Wuhan, which is twinned with Manchester. I attended an educational event at Wuhan University with the Prime Minister, where we were met a huge number of press and media representatives, and talked to students who had studied in the UK. For much of the trip we were in the PM’s convoy, speeding through empty streets as traffic was stopped, but coming back from Wuhan we were in a bus on our own which got stuck in traffic then took a wrong turning. The driver took the interesting decision to drive for several miles the wrong way up a busy and fast moving highway!
We made it intact (only just) and flew on to Beijing. Straight from landing, I attended the inaugural meeting of a new UK-China CEO forum in the Great Hall of the People. This comprised of 16 UK and 15 Chinese CEOs (including those from some of the largest Chinese companies and several that we have collaborations with), but I was the only non-business leader. We each spoke briefly and discussed the current status of UK-China trade and how it can be improved. I talked about the importance of mobility and access for students and staff to work in the UK. Then we were joined by the Prime Minister and the Chinese Premier Li Keqiang who each spoke about the importance of UK-China interactions.
This was followed by a large banquet in the Great Hall with about a dozen courses eaten over an hour and a half. I will write about the second part of the visit to China next week, when I hope I will have caught up on some sleep.
Just before I left for this trip, I recorded messages for our many Chinese alumni groups to wish them happy Chinese New Year which is in a couple of weeks - it will be the Year of the Dog.
You may have seen the fantastic news that Jodrell Bank is the UK’s nomination for World Heritage status. This is thanks to the very hard work of Teresa Anderson and Tim O’Brien and their team.
I attended part of the Biomedical Research Centre (BRC) Scientific Advisory Board meeting. The members of the Board are all leading international biomedical researchers, some of whom travelled a long way to Manchester to help us assess progress in the first year of the BRC and advise on the future. Ours is the only BRC outside the South East and was awarded almost £30 million over five years. The parts that I heard suggested that the BRC has got off to a flying start in less than a year and the Board gave positive comments as well as some constructive criticism.
Several senior colleagues and I had one of our regular meetings with staff from the city region to discuss collaboration. Amongst the attendees were Eamonn Boylan, Chief Executive of Greater Manchester (GM) Combined Authority, and Joanne Roney, Chief Executive of Manchester City Council. We discussed the regional industrial strategy; GM is one of three so called ‘trailblazers’ (ie early test areas) along with the West Midlands and Oxford/Cambridge. We agreed to update the Science and Innovation Audit that we prepared a few years ago, particularly in light of advances in digital. We also discussed skills and schools, international partnerships and our plans to develop our North Campus.
At a lunch with staff from across the University which I hosted, we covered a wide range of topics. These included the membership of our Board of Governors and how it operates, global challenges given the major investments in universities in the Far East and the very large endowment funds of some US universities, environmental impact, student satisfaction, how Senate and School Boards operate and Brexit.
It was a pleasure to meet Sherry Coutu, an eminent investor and expert on ‘scale up’ companies. She later addressed what I gather was a very successful workshop (about half of the attendees were company representatives and half University staff) organised by Professor Luke Georghiou (Deputy President and Deputy Vice-Chancellor) and Dr Andrew James (Associate Dean for Business Engagement in the Faculty of Humanities).
Kent Mackenzie, who leads on digital for Deloitte’s, visited the University. After meeting me and Andrew James (who leads on fintech) he talked to our staff who are leading on wider research in digital and explained the major developments in Edinburgh which we could easily emulate.
Later that evening I attended a dinner hosted by the Chairman of Deloitte’s, Nick Owen, which focused on devolution. The main speaker was Sir Richard Leese, Leader of Manchester City Council, who talked about the long history of partnership of the Greater Manchester Combined Authority that led us to our current position and the future goals for the region and for devolution. Colleagues from Deloitte have acknowledged Manchester as the most successful city region outside London, with major growth and opportunities.
Nancy Rothwell, President and Vice-Chancellor
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