At school, I enjoyed playing the bassoon. I was in the orchestra and played the melody when the other boys sang hymns at prayers time.

Exactly 5,126 attempts to make the first bagless vacuum cleaner were failures-some catastrophic disappointments, some minor defects. It took 15 years. Prototype 5,127 was the success ... Failure is painful, but it spurs on improvement like nothing else.

I just think things should work properly.

Successes teach you nothing. Failures teach you everything. Making mistakes is the most important thing you can do.

Today, computers are almost second nature to most of us.

I think people are realizing that engineering and science are extremely good degrees to get and you'll be very highly paid once you've got them.

I'm not into politics but I am committed to a cause: ensuring design technology and engineering stays on the U.K. curriculum, alongside science and maths - grounding abstract theory, merging the practical with the academic.