A final-year student from Queen’s University Belfast has outshone more than 3,000 competitors to be crowned the UK’s Universities Brightest Business Brain.

David Galbraith, from east Belfast, a final year student in Computing Information Technology, topped the leaderboard to take the title and the £1,000 prize in the grand final at Cass Business School in London.

Launched in September, the competition saw more than 3,000 students register and take four online exercises designed to assess their competencies, traits and aptitudes, and identify their commercial awareness. The 60 highest scorers were invited to the Grand Final where their challenges including teamworking and communication exercises and a business case study.

A former pupil of Wellington College, David said: "The exercises ranged from having to construct a LEGO tower to taking part in a debate about positive action. They were undoubtedly challenging and I had to think on my feet, but I also found them quite good fun.

"Obviously I’m delighted to have won, and I’m very grateful to the School of Electronics, Electrical Engineering and Computer Science and Enterprise SU at Queen’s for their support. The experience was really worthwhile. It not only opened up potential job opportunities for me after graduation, but also led to my acceptance by the Brightest Minds organisation, which is quite an honour."

The competition was sponsored by a number of partners, including Target Events, Brightest Minds, Cass Business School, CIMA, National Grid and RBS.

(GK)