Success breeds success: Catalysing commercialisation with Dr Megan Baldwin

07/12/24 • 32 min

In this episode of Med Tech Talks, Robert Klupacs is joined by Dr Megan Baldwin, Founder, Chief Innovation Officer and Executive Director of Opthea Limited.

Opthea limited is a global biopharmaceutical company aspiring to become the leader of therapeutic innovation in retinal diseases. They have a world class team of ophthalmology experts working to develop breakthrough therapies for those who suffer from retinal disease.

Megan has over 20 years of experience focusing on angiogenesis and therapeutic strategies for cancer and ophthalmic indications. With a PhD in medicine from the University of Melbourne, and having conducted her postdoctoral studies at Genentech, Megan joined Circadian Technologies Limited, now Opthea, in 2008 as Head of Preclinical R&D, and became Chief Executive in 2014. Today, she's a member of the Australian Institute for Company Directors, a board member of AusBiotech and serves on the boards of public and private companies.

In this episode you will hear about:

How Opthea is working to improve outcomes for patients with wet AMD.
Insight into Opthea’s strategy for attracting investment in its early-stage research and beyond
What Megan thinks Australia needs to do in order to support translation of Australian innovation
Megan’s advice for seeking mentorship and the importance of looking outside of your network.

Learn more about Opthea.

Read about Megan Baldwin.

Updated version 05/08/22

In this episode of Med Tech Talks, Robert Klupacs is joined by Dr Megan Baldwin, Founder, Chief Innovation Officer and Executive Director of Opthea Limited.

In this episode you will hear about:

How Opthea is working to improve outcomes for patients with wet AMD.
Insight into Opthea’s strategy for attracting investment in its early-stage research and beyond
What Megan thinks Australia needs to do in order to support translation of Australian innovation
Megan’s advice for seeking mentorship and the importance of looking outside of your network.

Learn more about Opthea.

Read about Megan Baldwin.

Updated version 05/08/22

Previous Episode

The power of digital health with ANDHealth CEO and Managing Director Bronwyn Le Grice

In the latest episode of Med Tech Talks, Robert Klupacs is joined by Bronwyn Le Grice, CEO and Managing Director of ANDHealth.

Bronwyn has over 20 years executive experience in health technology commercialisation, venture capital, capital raising and industry advocacy.

In 2017, she founded ANDHealth – which is now one of Australia’s leading health technology commercialisation organisations.

It’s flagship ANDHealth+ program has a successful track record in taking businesses to scale, with companies selected in the program raising over $150 million in dilutive and non-dilutive funding, creating 400+ jobs, undertaking 72 clinical studies and impacting over 700,000 patients over the past 6 years.

In this episode, you will learn more about:

How digital health technology could shape the future of health care.
Opportunities digital health provides to increase efficiency of care.
Advice for digital health companies thinking of being part of an incubator or accelerator.
Some of the key challenges faced by Australia in building a world class digital health industry.

Discover more about ANDHealth.

Read about Bronwyn Le Grice

Updated version 05/08/22

Next Episode

Seeding success at WEHI Ventures: Funding early-stage research with Dr Anne-Laure Puaux

In this episode of Med Tech Talks, Robert Klupacs is joined by Dr Anne-Laure Puaux, inaugural CEO of WEHI Ventures and Head of Business Development at WEHI.

WEHI Ventures manages 66ten, a first of its kind pre-seed and seed strategic investment fund of $66 million, dedicated to ideas developed by or in collaboration with, WEHI. With a grand vision of investing $66 million over 10 years in groundbreaking medical innovations, 66ten is the largest internal pre-seed and seed fund created by an Australian medical research institute, established to bridge the gap between scientific discoveries and commercial viability.

Before joining WEHI, Anne-Laure worked in Europe, US, Asia and Australia as part of biotech companies and multinational pharmaceutical companies such as GSK. Through these roles, she gained extensive global experience designing, evaluating, negotiating, and closing deals between academic research institutions, biotech companies, private investors and large multinational companies. She has also completed a PhD in Immunology and an MBA.

In this episode you will hear about:

How WEHI Ventures is focusing on turning early-stage discoveries into commercial successes, and its strategic management approach to high-risk, high reward projects that may be too risky or too early-stage for traditional investors
The importance of collaboration between academia and industry in translating early-stage discoveries into market-ready therapies
Anne-Laure’s insights into how Australia needs to strengthen its innovation ecosystem to catalyse biotech commercialisation
The strategic importance of mentorship when opportunities to explore different career pathways may be limited.

Learn more about WEHI Ventures
Learn about Dr Anne-Laure Puaux

Updated version 05/08/22