Fellow type
Honorary FellowPositions
Honorary Fellow, Alumnus 1978 Engineering
Biography
David Cleevely CBE FREng FIET is an entrepreneur, investor, policy adviser and author of Serendipity: It Doesn’t Happen by Accident (2025). He is Chairman of Focal Point Positioning and Chemify, and a Vice-President of the Institution of Engineering and Technology (IET).
He is the founder and former Chairman of telecoms consultancy Analysys (acquired by Datatec International in 2004). In 1998, he co-founded the web-based antibody company Abcam with Jonathan Milner and was Chairman until November 2009. He has co-founded and chaired several other businesses, including the award-winning restaurant Bocca di Lupo and its gelateria, Gelupo. He has been a director of two quoted companies.
He has played a central role in developing Cambridge’s innovation community. He was a prime mover behind Cambridge Network, co-founder of Cambridge Wireless and Cambridge Ahead, co-founder and former Chairman of Cambridge Angels, and Founding Director of the Centre for Science and Policy at the University of Cambridge. He also served as Vice-Chair of the Cambridgeshire and Peterborough Independent Economic Review.
His policy work has included advisory roles with Ofcom, the Royal Academy of Engineering and the Ministry of Defence. From 2001 to 2008, he was a member of the Ministry of Defence Board overseeing information systems and services.
His charitable work has included chairing the Raspberry Pi Foundation and Cambridge Science Centre, which he helped establish and fund ahead of its opening in 2013.
After being sponsored to study Cybernetics at Reading by Post Office Telecommunications, he joined their Long Range Studies Division. A PhD at Cambridge was followed by work at the Economist Intelligence Unit in London. He is a Fellow of the Royal Academy of Engineering and the IET. He was elected a Fellow Commoner of Queens’ College, Cambridge in 2013 and an Honorary Fellow of Trinity Hall in 2015. He was awarded a CBE for services to technology and innovation in the Queen’s New Year Honours List in 2013.