It says that British universities must act like cost-cutting multinational corporations and outsource work overseas if they want to continue to attract students and international investors.

The report surveyed the heads of 45 multinational businesses, asking them for their views on UK higher education and competitiveness, reports The Times Higher Education Supplement (April 28). They recommended the measures as part of a more management-oriented approach to higher education. The moves could also help to build partnerships with overseas institutions, says Richard Brown, chief executive of the CIHE, who points to outsourcing as giving universities a chance to “steal a march over the competition”. But to succeed, he says, they must learn from businesses the advantages of setting up partnerships in Asia.

Northumbria University may not have gone as far east as Asia yet — but it’s taken a step down the outsourcing route, reports THES in a separate story. After redundancies in the English Language Centre, the university has appointed a private training provider, Study Group International, to teach some English courses. Opponents say that the move is the first step towards privatisation, but others are open to the idea.

Robert Jackson, a former higher education minister, says the idea that universities will remain a state responsi- bility is unsustainable: “State-sponsored misery all round in the name of equity,” he says, will benefit no one.

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