Tim Davis was until recently the Director of Quality & Automotive Safety for Jaguar Land Rover, based at Gaydon, Warwickshire, and now owned by Tata Motors of India. Formerly he was Quality Director for the Ford Motor Company's North American Truck business, and was made a Henry Ford Technical Fellow as recognition for his internationally leading work applying statistical science to automotive engineering problems, and the first statistician to be awarded this rare title. Professor Davis has a PhD in statistical science from the University of Birmingham, and is a chartered statistician and Fellow of the Royal Statistical Society, as well as being a chartered engineer and Fellow of the Institution of Mechanical Engineers. He was awarded the Royal Statistical Society's Greenfield Industrial Medal in 1993 for effective application of statistical methods in industry, and in 2005 he was awarded the Institution of Mechanical Engineers' Donald Julius Groen prize for his work in reliability, based around the theory of failure mode avoidance.

Professor Davis publishes on quality engineering in the professional journals, is joint author of a book on experimental design in engineering, and lectures widely in industry and academia. Born in Kidderminster in 1960, Professor Davis says he learnt about manufacturing while spending his summer vacations from University making bread in his father's bakery. He received a degree in Statistics from the University College of Wales, Aberystwyth in 1981 and after this joined the former Dunlop Tyre Company in Birmingham as a mathematical technologist. He was responsible for testing tyres, and analysing reliability problems, the subject of his Birmingham PhD thesis. Professor Davis's personal web site is at www.timdavis.co.uk.