Speakers

Sir Jon Symonds

Jon has extensive international financial, life sciences and governance experience. In July 2021, Jon co-chaired with Professor Sir John Bell the preparation of the UK Life Science Vision, which sets out a strategy for UK life sciences in the post-Covid world and seeks to capitalise on many of the UK’s scientific successes through the pandemic.

In financial services, Jon served as an Independent Non-Executive Director of HSBC Holdings plc from April 2014, and as Deputy Group Chairman from August 2018, until his retirement from the Board in February 2020. He was previously Chairman of HSBC Bank plc from April 2014 to July 2018 and oversaw the formation of the ring-fence bank HSBC UK plc. He was also a partner and managing director at Goldman Sachs between July 2007 and September 2009.

In life sciences Jon is the current Chairman of GSK, he was Chief Financial Officer of Novartis AG from September 2009 to January 2014 and Chief Financial Officer of AstraZeneca plc from October 1997 and July 2007, a period which included the negotiation and completion of the merger with Astra. As a CFO Jon chaired the 100 Group of Finance Directors, co-chaired the HMRC business tax committee and co-founded the Centre for Business Taxation at the Said Business School.

Douglas Dundonald

Douglas is a founder and director of Scientific Venture Partners and Anglo Scientific and a number of other technology companies.

Previously, Douglas served as an executive main board director of Anglo Pacific Group, a quoted (London, Canada and Australia) public company. When an active member of the House of Lords, held a position on the council of the Parliamentary Information Technology Committee. He has been the honorary consul for Chile in Scotland for over 25 years

Neil MacDougall

Neil joined the pan-European, mid-market buyout firm Silverfleet in 1989, led the buyout of the company from Prudential plc in 2007, and was Managing Partner from 2004 to 2019. He has led some of Silverfleet’s most profitable investments as well as three successful fundraisings.

Neil chaired the UK & European Committee of the BVCA (British Private Equity and Venture Capital Association), before joining the Council in 2019 and became Chairman of the association in April 2020, a post that is held for a year. In January 2022 He joined the board of the UKBAA (the UK Business Angels Association). Neil is an active angel investor working alongside groups such as 24 Haymarket and Par Equity with a bias towards hard tech.

Prior to joining Silverfleet, Neil was a management consultant at Bain & Co. He read Natural Sciences and Computer Science at St Catharine’s College and received an MA from Cambridge University.

Sophie Costello

Sophie Costello was a member of the inaugural Masters in Bioscience Enterprise class in 2002. In 2008 Sophie and her husband founded Costello Medical, a consultancy providing scientific support in the analysis and communication of clinical and health economic data. Sophie is CEO of Costello Medical and has built the company from a team of 2 in the spare room of her first house to over 350 people in 7 offices in 4 countries. The company continues to grow and the ambition of the team is as high as ever. In her role as CEO, Sophie provides strategic guidance and scientific direction to the company. She is responsible for overseeing the leadership team and ensuring that everyone at Costello Medical is working in line with the core values of exceptional scientific quality and commitment to outstanding customer service. Sophie has delivered dozens of highly successful projects including NICE and SMC submissions, value dossiers, scientific publications, advisory boards and a host of medical education materials. Sophie is particularly driven by the opportunity to help the talented team at Costello Medical realise their potential, and spends much of her time engaging with individuals across the company to understand and facilitate their aspirations. Sophie also has a passion for ensuring Costello Medical is a force for good and is closely involved with our pro-bono team and outreach activities to ensure our growing company has a positive impact. She led the successful B-Corp certification of the company.

Clemens Kaminski

Clemens Kaminski is Professor of Chemical Physics at the University of Cambridge, UK, and head of the Department of Chemical Engineering and Biotechnology. He is Director of the EPSRC Centre for Doctoral Training in Sensor Technologies for a Sustainable and Healthy Future. He obtained his PhD at the University of Oxford, UK, in 1995, held a Marie Curie post-doctoral fellowship and Associate-Professorship at the Lund Institute of Technology in Sweden before his appointment at the University of Cambridge in 2001. He pioneered ultrahigh speed imaging techniques for the study of chemistry both for gas phase reactions and, more recently, in biological systems. He is recipient of the Cyril Hinshelwoold Prize 2004, Philip Leverhulme Prize in 2005, SAOT Research prize in optics, 2008, and the Morris Sugden award in 2013. In 2015 he was elected as a Fellow of the Optical Society of America. Kaminski is cofounder and co-director of the Cambridge Advanced Imaging Center (CAIC) and director of CamBridgeSens, the strategic network to unite sensor research across the University of Cambridge. He is furthermore director of the Cambridge Infinitus Research Centre where his methods are used to probe the bioactivity of peptides derived from nature.

Jake Taylor King

Prior to co-founding Relation Therapeutics Jake was an award-winning mathematician (G-Research prize, Lee Segel Prize) with degrees from the University of Bristol (BSc), the University of Oxford (MSc, D.Phil), and the University of Cambridge (MPhil). Jake completed his postdoctoral work at the ETH Zürich in single-cell genomics, focusing on integrating his mathematical knowledge with next generation experimental techniques. Immediately prior to Relation, Jake undertook a number of ventures: from technology spinout at Cambridge, directing novel functional genomics screens at Empyrean, to running technical due dilligence at Juvenescence.

Kristin-Anne Rutter

Dr Kristin-Anne Rutter joined Cambridge University Health Partners as the organisation’s Executive Director with a remit to lead the vision for life sciences in Cambridge, harnessing the talent, expertise and potential of the city’s cluster to deliver breakthrough scientific discoveries and rapidly prove and scale these to improve healthcare outcomes for all. She is working collaboratively across the ecosystem to understand what infrastructure, talent, funding and networks are required to maintain Cambridge as a global destination for talent and investment.

Previously as a Partner in McKinsey & Company’s London Office, she worked across lifesciences and healthcare systems and supported the UK government to identify opportunities to strengthen the UK Lifescience industry and accelerate the deployment of innovation in the NHS.

Prior to joining McKinsey, Kristin-Anne worked as a doctor in Iceland, had experience with Eli Lilly in manufacturing quality assurance and was a product manager for Neuromonics, a start-up company in Australia bringing a treatment for Tinnitus to market. She is currently a Trustee and Board member of Marie Stopes International.

Liseli Sumbwanyambe

Liseli was a member of the 20/21 MPhil Bioscience Enterprise Cohort. On completion of the MBE, she returned to Unilever to lead UK&I Innovation for the Beauty and Personal Care Division. Liseli is the Co-Founder and Chair of Unilever’s Race Equity Network (Empower) and has used this position to drive change within the Diversity and Inclusion space. This has been through consultancy work, public speaking, and leading cross industry workshops. Outside of work, Liseli is a committee member of the Amos Bursary Charity where she focuses on helping young black talent reach their potential. Following a short career break over the summer, Liseli will be joining McKinsey & Co this Autumn as a management consultant.

Milla Marinova

Dr Milla Marinova is a medical doctor and Clinical Research Fellow at Imperial College, with a focus on hospital patient flow. She recently worked with the Scottish Government for the Redesign of Unscheduled Care Programme and the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh in partnership with the World Health Organisation on quality governance in healthcare internationally. She is part of the Centre for Quality in Governance.

Until October 2019, she was principal at GrayBella Capital, a venture capital fund providing growth capital to build the next generation of great European healthcare companies and has since continued to advise Med-Tech companies. Consequently, she founded R8ER, the world's first, professionally vetted, digital evaluation platform for disruptive healthcare that connects technology with investment. Her particular interests lie in the fields of longevity and nutrition including cultivated proteins, as well as robotics and artificial intelligence.

Nooman Haque

Nooman Haque is the Head of Life Sciences and Healthcare at Silicon Valley Bank for EMEA. He leads a team supporting early, growth-stage and established multinational businesses in all sectors of life sciences. Nooman is responsible for expanding the bank’s business across Europe. As part of an international team he helps clients with innovative financing solutions through the bank’s broad platform of investment & commercial banking and investment capability.

Nooman’s background includes management consulting and investing. He was also a Government economist specialising in competition & innovation

Raphael Peralta

Raphael is Co-founder & CEO of CardiaTec. He is a graduate of the University of Cambridge MPhil Bioscience Enterprise, and holds an MSc in Industrial Biotechnology and BSc in Biology from the University of York. He has worked across various industrial settings on the translation of early-stage life science technologies, including consulting for cardiovascular life science companies. He is now determined to develop CardiaTec into a cornerstone company for the next generation of cardiovascular therapeutics, driven through the application of state-of-the-art machine learning capabilities.

Safwan Akram

Muhammad Safwan Akram is working as an Associate Professor for Biomanufacturing at School of Health and Life Sciences at Teesside University. Safwan obtained his PhD in Analytical Biotechnology from the Department of Chemical Engineering and Biotechnology, University of Cambridge where he also did his post-doc developing low cost diagnostics. Prior to that he completed his M.Phil in Bioscience Enterprise. His work has been published in reputed journals like Nature Biotechnology, Lab on a Chip, Analytica Chimica Acta and Annual Reviews of Analytical Chemistry. He has been awarded Medimmune Award and CambridgeSens Innovative Idea award for research excellence. Safwan was voted by the students to win university wide Star award for most outstanding teaching. He is an elected member of the Teesside University’s Board of Governors and also holds scientific advisory board position at GlycoSelect Pvt Ltd and Neurogenic Pvt. Ltd.

Stefan Bostock

Stefan undertook the MBE programme (2014/15) in order to reengage with transformative healthcare technology. From a background in finance (Investec) and BSc Physics & Biology (Durham), the aim of the MBE was to act as a springboard for a career in innovative entrepreneurial health tech. Work with various start-ups ensued followed by a DPhil in Biomedical Engineering and Digital Biomarkers (Oxford). In Summer 2021, while completing his thesis, he co-founded Kanjo Health which aims to digitally confront the rapidly escalating problems in the children’s mental health sector.

Thelma Zablocki

Thelma is Co-Founder & COO of CardiaTec. She is a graduate of the University of Cambridge MPhil Bioscience Enterprise, and holds a BSc in Bioengineering from École polytechnique fédérale de Lausanne. She is passionate about translating science and innovation and has investigated novel investment opportunities in the metabolic disease space at her previous position in Venture Capital. She is now committed to accelerating treatments for cardiovascular disease to make a compelling impact in the lives of those affected by severe illnesses.

Victor Dillard

Victor Dillard is currently VP Corporate Development at Resolution Therapeutics, a Syncona-backed therapeutics company developing macrophage cell therapies for inflammatory organ disease. There, he leads the company's strategy, business development and IP functions covering both autologous and allogeneic cell therapy platforms from early discovery through translation to clinical development. Victor began his life sciences career as a Venture Fellow at Flagship Pioneering in 2012, after which he founded Desktop Genetics, a genome editing bioinformatics and AI company. Victor led the company through multiple financing rounds, industrial partnerships, product launches and ultimate sale of the company in 2018. In 2019, Victor joined medical technology company Owkin where he supported the growth of the company through to Series B as VP, Head of Commercial Operations. His career has been shaped by the intersection of cutting edge technologies in life sciences and healthcare, from CRISPR genome editing to artificial intelligence, digital pathology and federated machine learning, through cell therapy development from early discovery through to IND and clinical development. Victor was nominated 30 Under 30 by Forbes, and MIT Innovator Under 35, Entrepreneur of the Year 2017 by the MIT Technology Review. He holds an MEng in chemical engineering from Imperial College London and an MPhil in Bioscience Enterprise from the University of Cambridge.

Benedikt Von Thuengen-Reichenbach

Benedikt started his entrepreneurial journey during his undergraduate and has since built multiple companies across renewable energy, enterprise software, deep tech, drug discovery, and healthcare. As an experienced entrepreneur, he has raised millions in venture funding, scaled winning teams across multiple geographies, and closed over 100 deals, with some of the largest global organisations. He completed his MBE 2013/14 and loves working at the interface of software and life sciences.

Benedikt also supports several early-stage companies, where he helps with fundraising, company strategy and founder journeys. He has mentored more than 50 early-stage companies, many during a trip across the African continent.

His long-term vision is to build human digital twins that monitors everyone’s health to detect changes as early as possible and to enable early intervention. For this future to happen, the current health data explosion needs to be harnessed and translated into actionable clinical diagnostics. Sanome is developing an AI-driven biomarker platform that identifies winning combinations and turns them into IVDs – AI in diagnostics discovery.

Charlie Foreman

Charlie graduated from Durham in 1983 and has worked in Investment Banking for the majority of his career, most recently as a Partner, and now a Senior Advisor, at Lazard, where he ran their Capital Markets Advisory group and advised of many of the Worlds largest IPO’s, the most recent of those being the IPO of Aramco in Saudi Arabia.

Charlie came up to study at Cambridge as a member of the 20/21 Masters in Bioscience Enterprise class. Since finishing that he continues to spend time with Lazard as well as supporting Cambridge University Health Partners as a strategic advisor. Charlie is a Trustee and Director of The Institute of Cancer Research and a Trustee of the Tennis and Rackets Association. He is passionate about increasing the amount of funding for crossover/growth companies in the UK and in his spare time he works with founders of emerging BioScience companies.

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