We appreciate the extensive help of our guest speakers, community leaders, partners organisations and colleagues.






The teaching team (David Grayden, Kwanghui Lim and Simon Wilkins) would like to express our gratitude to everyone who contributed to making BioDesign2024 a success, including:
Guest Speakers and Presenters:
- Alex Agudelo, CEO of Kemu.
- Alex Graham, Telstra Creator Space.
- Andrew Nash, Operating Partner, University of Melbourne Commercialisation & Entrepreneur-at-Large.
- Bob Soh, Brandon Capital.
- David Harrison, DWH Consulting.
- Esther Apos, Director at CMS Scidoc.
- Gary Haywood, D&I (Design & Industry).
- Guido Tresoldi, Liaison Librarian, University of Melbourne.
- Jordan Green AM, President Emeritus and Founder, Melbourne Angels; Chairman of Axletree Capital; Victorian State Chair and National Exco Member, Pearcey Foundation.
- Jia-Yee Lee, Director, Strategy and Alliance, BioNTech Australia.
- Kynan Taylor and Rachel Hook at Cobalt Design.
- Ludovic Labat, CEO, NeoBionica.
- Makenzie Thomas and Lizzie Laurence from The Actuator.
- Maria Pelipas, Research Acceleration Manager, TRAM Air program.
- Marina Chelak (Melbourne Accelerator), Katrina Gaskin (MAP Velocity Program) and Rory McNeice (Melbourne Entrepreneurial Centre).
- Sinthujan Jegaskanda, BioDesign2023 and MCRI on IP Strategy.
- Dr. Tam Nguyen, Associate Professor and Deputy Director of Research, St Vincent’s Hospital.
- Wei Sue, CFO of Navi Medical and Acting CEO, Climateworks.
Panelists
- Prof Ampalavanapillai Nirmalathas (Thas), Dept of Electrical and Electronic Engineering and Dean, FEIT.
- Prof Andrea O’Connor, Dept of Biomedical Engineering.
- Assoc Prof Andrea North-Samardzic, Associate Dean, Executive Degree Programs, MBS.
- Assoc Prof Daniel Heath, Dept of Biomedical Engineering.
- Assoc Prof David Ackland, Dept of Biomedical Engineering.
- Prof. David Nisbet, Dept of Biomedical Engineering. Director of the Graeme Clark Institute and the Head of the Laboratory of Advanced Biomaterials.
- Assoc Prof Hamish Meffin, Dept of Biomedical Engineering.
- Prof. Leigh Johnston, Dept of Biomedical Engineering. Director of the Melbourne Brain Centre Imaging Unit in the Department of Medicine and Radiology.
- Assoc Prof Marcus Watson, Enterprise Fellow, Dept of Biomedical Engineering.
- Asst Prof Najoung Lim, MBS.
- Pam Rebecca, MBS Alumnae and representative of the MBS Semba Class of 2003.
- Paul McDonald, MBS Alumnae and representative of the MBS Semba Class of 2003.
- Dr. Philippa (Pip) Karoly, Dept of Biomedical Engineering.
- Sarah Fink, Product Integration Engineer at SCHOTT MINIFAB and BioDesign Class of 2016.
- Stephen Ho and Tracy Ho.
- Assoc Prof Vijay Rajagopal, Dept of Biomedical Engineering.
Alumni
- Alex Newton, Brad Bergmann, Mubin Yousef, Shing Yue Sheung, and Wei Sue of NAVi Medical Technologies for helping us throughout the term.
- Amin Abbas on pitching and his BioDesign journey.
- Liam Murray on ideation.
- Lorace Zhang, CEO of Vysum.
- Anura Medical: Jess Anderson and Bec McCormick.
- Ellis Medical: Lee M Hanify, Liz Davis, Shirdheen Murali and Sinth Jegaskanda.
- Lenexa: Ajit Ravindran, CEO and Will Yang, Chief Scientific Officer.
- Sano Technologies: David Conidaris, Benny Li, Candice Bao and John A. Nguyen.
- Ventora Medical: Amy Yu (CTO) and Edward Bujis (CEO).
- All the alumni who came and supported us throughout.
Donors
- Stephen Ho for very generously contributing time and funding towards the student teams, along with his daughter Tracy Ho.
- Ian Kirk whose contributions to MBS makes this course viable.
- The MBS SEMBA class of 2003 for project funding and a commercialisation prize.