UC EVENTS

Learn effective strategies for opening doors to new industry partners.

About this event

Meet your presenter: Nick McNaughton

Nick McNaughton is a highly experienced CEO who has been a successful entrepreneur, mentor, investor and fund manager. Nick started his career in the software industry where he specialised in bringing US vendors into the Asia / Pacific region. He spent extensive time living and working in Asia. He has been a successful angel investor for over two decades. Successes include Soulmates Technology, Zookoda, Vocus (ASX:VOC) & Windlab (ASX:WND).

He is a veteran of the University IP commercialization field. He is the part-time CEO of ANU Connect Ventures a $37M seed investment fund (owned by the Australian National University and MTAA Super). He has reviewed and assessed a wide array of ideas, inventions and discoveries. The fund invested in several successful companies including Lithicon (Trade sale FEI), InterfereX (Trade sale – NYSE: Dolby), Instaclustr, Liquid Instruments and EpiAxis Therapeutics.

He led the initiative by the Group of Eight & the University of Auckland to partner with the IP Group to open their Asia / Pacific office in A/NZ. He has also had extensive interactions with the applied technology Universities (UTS, Wollongong, Deakin and Macquarie). He is the Chairman of the Discovery Translation Fund evaluation committee (ANU, University of Canberra, CSU) and spent 18 months on the UTS Commercialisation Advisory Panel.

Nick is also a specialist in the creation of territory wide early stage innovation ecosystems. He is the co-architect of the Canberra Innovation Network (CBRIN) which incorporates the essential building blocks of a successful ecosystem: co-working, acceleration, incubation, growth programs & capital.

PD+ streams: Foundational | Strategic