QUT Commercialisation Club - "Academics do not make good CEOs for tech startups"

The Club is open!

The first QUT Commercialisation Club for 2025 will feature a lively debate on the merits of researchers becoming CEOs of spinout companies. Every researcher wants to see their discoveries in action, but is becoming a CEO a desirable or necessary step? What are the pros and cons?

Hear from industry and academic experts with many years' experience taking innovations out of "the lab" and into the marketplace. Continue the discussion at the networking function.

Our debaters are:

• Angela Poe Noronha - Venture Builder, Beanstalk AgTech
• Peter Laurie - Director, Inductive
• Michael Milford - Professor and Director, QUT Centre for Robotics
• Grace Dolan, Investor, UniQuest
• Steve Bradford, Senior Manager in the QUT Office of Industry Engagement
• Xanthe Ashburner, Manager in the QUT Office of Industry Engagement

Everybody is welcome to join us - staff, students, industry guests.

FREE ENTRY

What is the QUT Commercialisation Club?

The Commercialisation Club brings together QUT staff and research students, industry partners and key external stakeholders to build the culture and capability around real world impact of research. The aim is to encourage an informal and inclusive atmosphere to encourage questions and participation, as well as being highly informative on the different pathways for research commercialisation.

Guest Speakers:

Dr Grace Dolan

Grace has a PhD in Chemical Engineering from the University of Queensland, and has undertaken research internships and academic collaborations with two multinational food and beverage companies. Grace has over 7 years’ experience as a knowledge commercialisation professional, supporting innovators in the physical sciences to translate their research outcomes into industry impact through industry-funded research programs, licensing partnerships, and venture investment. This includes 5 years in the IP commercialisation team at UniQuest Pty Ltd and 2 years as Investment Manager of an early-stage venture capital fund, where she contributed to the growth of the fund’s portfolio by identifying and evaluating investment opportunities primarily emanating from research and strong intellectual property positions. Grace rejoined UniQuest in 2024 to work with the UniQuest Extension Fund’s investment team.

Angela Poe Noronha

Angela is currently a venture builder in Beanstalk AgTech's Drought Venture Studio. With prior roles spanning the tech ecosystem -- from startup employee to innovation program lead, partnership developer / fundraiser, venture designer, and management consultant -- she specializes in shaping and scaling high impact businesses.

Peter Laurie

Peter participates heavily in the Australian innovation ecosystem. He has been an entrepreneur in residence for over a twenty accelerator programs both commercially and at QUT, UQ, and Monash University. He presents regularly on all aspects of entrepreneurship and innovation to a broad range of audiences, and is running an accelerator program named Inductive (https://inductive.au). Peter is an electrical engineer by training, has an MBA from QUT, and has been doing commercial software development for the last thirty years. Peter won the Queensland Pearcey Entrepreneur Award for 2018.

Professor Michael Milford

Michael conducts interdisciplinary fundamental and applied research at the boundary between robotics, neuroscience, computer vision and machine learning. From 2022 – 2027 he is leading a large research team combining bio-inspired and computer science-based approaches to provide a ubiquitous alternative to GPS that does not rely on satellites. His team has worked on commercial autonomous vehicle technology with companies like Ford and Caterpillar, and been funded by and/or collaborated with organizations like Amazon, Intel and Google Deepmind. He currently holds the position of Director of the QUT Centre for Robotics and Australian Research Council Laureate Fellow, and is a Microsoft Research Faculty Fellow and Fellow of the Australian Academy of Technology and Engineering.