Cicada x Tech23: Is Coming to Sydney to Celebrate Deep Tech Leadership & Innovation

Cicada x Tech23 has always been about championing bold ideas and the brilliant minds behind them—and in 2025, we’re taking that spirit on tour.

In the lead-up to Cicada x Tech23 in September, we’re bringing together deep tech innovators, industry trailblazers, and emerging leaders across Australia—to celebrate the people shaping the future. Because innovation doesn’t happen in isolation. It happens when we dare to push boundaries, challenge conventions, and forge new frontiers together.

At Cicada Innovations, we believe in the power of deep tech to change the world—but change is driven by leaders willing to take risks, visionaries willing to experiment, and communities willing to back them. Our Sydney event is your chance to connect, learn, and spark the collaborations that will shape the next wave of Australian deep tech breakthroughs.

Hosted by Sally-Ann Williams, will feature candid conversations with exceptional founders who have navigated the highs and lows of building deep tech ventures—sharing insights on leadership, resilience, and what it takes to drive real impact.

Meet The Panel

Lucie Semenec, CEO at Newera.bio
Nathalie Gouailhardou, Co-Founder at Neurode
Stefan Mazy, CEO and Founder at dermR Health

Tech23 isn’t just an event. It’s a movement. A movement of relentless curiosity, audacious ambition, and unwavering belief in what’s possible. This is your chance to be part of it.

Why Attend

Meet the minds redefining industries
Celebrate the leadership within the Tech23 alumni
Connect with Australia’s deep tech community shaping the future

Join us on the Road to Tech23. Be inspired. Be part of something bigger.

Speaker Bios

Lucie Semenec, Newera.Bio

Newera Bio are developing the next generation of textile dyes being both sustainable and high-performance. They are blending natural dyes with their proprietary technology to enhance vibrance and lasting colour. By improving the performance of natural dyes, they not only provide a clean renewable source of colour but also enable eco-friendly dyeing conditions. The positive impacts will re-colour our world in a sustainable way, promoting clean water, land, biodiversity and healthy communities.

Lucie Semenec is a microbiologist that has worked on elucidating pathways and genes involved in electron transfer, bacterial pathogenesis, microbial plastic degradation and corrosion. She is passionate about harnessing the power of microbes to help solve some of the world’s most polluting problems. She and her co-founder/CSO of Newera Bio are driven to provide the world with clean sustainable colours.

Nathalie Gouailhardou, Co-Founder at Neurode

Neurode is developing a wearable headband that treats and track ADHD in 20 minutes day from home, drug-free. Their technology is a world’s first to combine non-invasive brain monitoring with neuromodulation in an integrated, and personalised way. ADHD is just the beginning, this type of treatment and monitoring platform can be applied to many other mental health condition, improving our understanding of mental health and ultimately improving patient outcomes

Nathalie Gouailhardou is the co-founder and CEO of Neurode. She’s a neuroscientist with a belief that understanding the brain in the real world, at scale will be the next frontier for innovation. She is working to enable this by building high quality, portable and affordable brain imaging wearables for use in the clinic and at home, that have real world utility today in personalising and improving mental health treatments.

Stefan Mazy, CEO and Founder at dermR Health

The DermR® Patch is a world-first microneedle device that painlessly collects skin cells for genomic analysis. Our proprietary skin cancer RNA assay, which can be performed by any genomics-enabled pathology provider, screens across the spectrum of skin cancers, including melanoma, using just a few cells. The outcome serves as a pre-screening solution to identify potentially cancerous lesions, with biopsies or excisions recommended only if anomalies are detected. Using the DermR Patch to reduce benign biopsies by even 5% could prevent millions of unnecessary procedures and save healthcare systems billions globally.

Stefan Mazy pioneered consumer skin genomics 15 years ago with the world's first direct-to-consumer skin genetic test. Leveraging his year of expertise, Stefan has now developed the DermR® patch, a groundbreaking method for non-invasive skin cancer detection that utilises RNA expression and microneedle technology. This innovative approach offers a significant shift towards less invasive, more effective healthcare solutions.

About Cicada x Tech23

Cicada x Tech23 is Australia's biggest deep tech festival, showcasing 23 of the nation's most promising ventures, and connects visionary founders to a network of investors, leaders and big thinkers.

+ Register your interest in the main event here
+ Explore more about the festival on our website

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