David Uhlir holds the position of Chief Strategy Officer (CSO) at JIC (South Moravian Innovation Centre), a leading innovation centre in the Czech Republic located in the city of Brno, the second largest city in the country with a reputation of a national technological hub. He is co-responsible for the overall strategy of JIC, for its international outreach. In addition, he also leads a JIC team of technological cooperation helping clients to connect to external technological expertise, establish B2B contacts, organise open innovation sessions, including support in preparation of international R&D projects (especially Horizon 2020).

David holds degrees from Charles University in Prague, Czech Republic (demography and human geography) and a PhD from the Open University, Milton Keynes, UK (geography). Over the last 15 years he worked at different positions in regional policy and research and innovation policy (Czech Ministry of Regional Development, Regional Development Agency of South Moravia, and Czech Ministry of Education). He also spent four years as a seconded national expert at the European Commission, DG Research (6^th and 7^th Framework Programme).

His professional interests revolve around regional development theory and practical science and technology and development policies, especially the interaction between public research and business sphere; role of universities in regional development; design and implementation of R&D and innovation policies.

Since 2013 David represents Czech BICs on the EBN Board.