Leap Advisory Panel

Aahuti Rai
Strategic Advisor – Health Innovation at Four Points Consulting Ltd
Venture Partner with Conduit Connect

Aahuti is an active leader in the digital health ecosystem working at the intersection of innovators, investors, payors and providers of healthcare. Aahuti works with early-stage ventures helping them to figure out how to succeed and scale in their target markets. This includes commercial strategy development; the creation of go-to-market plans testing them with market entry tactics; and a focus on approaches to create patient engagement and clinical adoption. Before her move into health tech, Aahuti spent 20+ years delivering innovation strategies within well-respected organisations commissioned by their Boards and Executive Teams; this included multinationals across 13 industries as well as private and public healthcare providers.

Anji Gopal
Founder of BackCare Foundation
MSK Clinician at Royal London Hospital for Integrated Medicine

Anji brings together a background of growing and running a London-based SME, a role as an AHP in the NHS and a history of investment experience. After a degree in Econometrics, Anji began her career at Barclays, spending 10 years working as an Investment Director in SME equity funding. With experience assessing new opportunities, leading investments and sitting at board level, she has an understanding of fast-growth companies.

Retraining as an osteopath, she has grown a six-figure business in the last 8 years, treating, training and teaching across Europe as an expert in BackCare. She has spent 7 years running an innovative clinic at UCLH for patients with chronic low back pain. Over the last 5 years, Anji has worked with other healthcare SMEs providing them with mentoring and coaching support. As a diverse founder based in London herself, she understands the challenges of growing a business in the healthcare industry and is keen to share her knowledge with the companies who are accepted on the programme.

Barbara Domayne-Hayman
Entrepreneur-in-residence at Francis Crick Institute

Barbara has worked on the commercial side of life sciences for thirty years, first in a large organisation (ICI/Zeneca/AstraZeneca), before transitioning to the entrepreneurial world of biotech. Barbara joined the Francis Crick Institute in January 2018 as an Entrepreneur-in-residence, where amongst other things, she co-founded, led and now is Chair of the KQ Labs accelerator, which is focused on start-ups from all over the UK that are making use of data/AI applied to health. She is also the Chief Business Officer of Autifony, where she is responsible for strategic partnering, fundraising and commercial aspects of drug development for CNS disorders.

Barbara was also Chair of Puridify, a UCL spin-out with a breakthrough biotherapeutics purification technology, which was acquired by GE (now Cytiva) in November 2017. She is a member of the investment committees of the LifeArc Early Ventures Fund, and the Cambridge Enterprise Seed Fund. Previously, Barbara was CEO of Stabilitech, and she was Commercial Director at Arrow Therapeutics until the company was acquired by AstraZeneca. Barbara was also Senior Business Development Manager at Celltech. Barbara has a BA and D Phil in Chemistry from the University of Oxford, and is a Sloan Fellow from London Business School.

Chantal Cox
Healthtech Investor – Investment Manager at Octopus Ventures

Chantal is an Investment Manager in the Octopus Ventures Health team. Her focus is engaging with, investing in and supporting Europe’s most promising health tech companies. Octopus Ventures is one of the UK & Europe’s largest and most active venture capital (VC) investors, investing across six sectors: consumer tech and B2B SaaS, deep tech and biotech, fintech and health tech.

The Health team is the UK’s most active health tech VC investor and within the top 1% in Europe. Chantal is motivated by leveraging tech to drive health equity and is passionate about investing in diverse, underrepresented founders. She also sits on the boards of multiple UK and international Healthtech companies.

Before joining Octopus Ventures in July 2022, Chantal led projects at McKinsey & Company, supporting clients across the private, public and social sector with strategy, operations and culture. During this time, she was also the European Partnerships lead for the McKinsey Black Network. Chantal started her career in the NHS as a junior doctor in one of London’s busiest trauma centres, where she was exposed to multiple healthcare disparities; highlighting the urgent need for innovation and entrepreneurship to improve health outcomes.

Cleveland Henry
Delivery and Deployment Director at EMIS
Non-Executive Director at Leeds and York Partnership NHS

Cleveland is a Senior Technology Delivery professional with a career spanning 30 years, most notably within digital transformation in the health and care sector. He is a passionate thought leader who collaborates with the health sector to aid the progression of the industry, found presenting at conferences nationally and internationally, sharing his ideas and insight.

Cleveland is the Delivery and Deployment Director at EMIS, in addition to being a Non-Executive Director at Leeds and York Partnership NHS Foundation Trust and Chair of Leeds Community Foundation.

Dr Amanda Begley
Director of Digital Transformation at the Health Innovation Network (HIN) South London

Amanda is the Director of Digital Transformation at the Health Innovation Network (HIN) South London. Amanda’s focus is on building partnerships and expertise to deliver innovation at scale and pace for patient, staff and population benefit. She co-founded the award-winning NHS Innovation Accelerator (NIA), and – whilst on secondment to OneLondon – helped establish the Health Data Research UK Hub for Cancer – DATA-CAN, where she worked as Director of Strategy and Partnerships. Following her PhD, Amanda joined the NHS as an Assistant and Trainee Clinical Psychologist. She has worked as a commissioner and senior manager across primary, community and secondary care in South East London, as Head of Innovation at London’s Strategic Health Authority and as Director of Innovation and Implementation at UCLPartners.

Dr Annie Murphy
South West London Clinical Lead for Digital Services at South West London Healthcare Partners
General Practioner (GP) Partner at Wide Way Medical Centre

Annie is an alumnus of the DigitalHealth.London Digital Pioneer Fellowship programme. She is a GP and GP trainer who has operated within the Sutton and Merton locality since 2011 and became a Partner at Wide Way Medical Practice in 2017. Annie also oversees the Digital First team for large-scale projects such as online consultations, messaging platforms, the NHS App, and Robotic Process Automation. She often works alongside community pharmacies, the South West London Long-Term Conditions team and Clinical Networks, to offer guidance and leadership on projects requiring digital expertise.

Annie’s journey into digital healthcare started during her time at the DigitalHealth.London Digital Pioneer Fellowship Programme and the Yale Global Health Leadership Initiative. Through the NHS Digital Academy (Cohort 4), she pursued and earned her MSc in Digital Health Leadership. During this time, Annie also took on the role of Digital Lead for both the East Merton Primary Care Network and South West London Integrated Care Board, gaining invaluable experience in digital implementation, stakeholder engagement, process improvement, and navigating complex healthcare systems.

In her free time, Annie enjoys creating “How to do Digital” guide videos for GPs on platforms like TikTok and YouTube under the handle @Digidoc_Annie.

Dr Katrina Mason
Senior Clinical Fellow at Ufonia
Paediatric Ear, Nose and Throat (ENT) Fellow at Evelina Children’s Hospital

Katrina is an alumnus of the DigitalHealth.London Digital Pioneer Fellowship programme. She is also the Senior Clinical Fellow at Ufonia, an alumnus company of the DigitalHealth.London Accelerator. Ufonia is a digital health company specialising in autonomous clinical conversations using Artificial Intelligence. In this role, Katrina has led grant-funded work to automate head and neck cancer triage. She continues to support their research and evidence generation through collaboration with patients, clinicians and academics.

Katrina is also a Paediatric ENT Fellow at Evelina Children’s Hospital and has recently completed her higher surgical training in Otorhinolaryngology Head and Neck Surgery in London. She holds an MSc in Surgical Science and Practice with Distinction from The University of Oxford and is part of the faculty in their Surgical Innovation module.

Alongside her digital and clinical career, Katrina is the editor for The Unofficial Guide to Surgery. This surgical textbook proactively seeks to improve black and brown skin representation in medical textbooks and was featured in the Royal Society of Medicine’s Tackling Inequalities: Through Innovation and Entrepreneurship conference. She is passionate about finding digital solutions to real-world clinical problems and has also been an NHS Clinical Entrepreneur.

Dr MaryAnn Ferreux
Executive Medical Director at Health Innovation Kent Surrey Sussex
Associate Non-Executive Director at Kent and Medway NHS Partnership Trust

MaryAnn works as the joint Medical Director for the Kent, Surrey and Sussex Academic Health Science Network and is an Associate Non-Executive Director for the Kent and Medway NHS Partnership Trust. She has international experience working across both the Australian and UK health systems, with specialist qualifications in health system leadership, management, and public health. She has held Board level roles as a medical leader in both primary and secondary care and is passionate about improving the patient experience and delivering better integrated care.

She is a Fellow of the Royal Australasian College of Medical Administrators, the Australasian College of Health Service Management, the UK Faculty of Clinical Informatics and the Faculty of Medical Leadership and Management, as well as being a Certified Health Executive and leadership coach. She has a special interest in researching health equity and the impact of the social determinants of health; her current doctoral studies will explore equity and health inequalities within the Kent and Medway regions.

She is leading several initiatives to promote diversity and inclusion in healthcare and is a Trustee and Chair of the Royal College of Physicians Edinburgh Equality, Diversity and Inclusivity Committee and Chair of the Royal Australasian College of Medical Administrators Diversity & Inclusion Committee. MaryAnn is committed to using her position to role-model an inclusive leadership approach whereby she supports, mentors and coaches clinicians from disadvantaged backgrounds to widen participation in medicine and increase diversity within healthcare leadership and management.

Dr Michael Watts
Co-founder and CEO of Blüm Health Ltd

On a mission to break down the barriers to innovation within the global digital health industry, Michael is an NHS doctor, NHS Innovation Accelerator Fellow and MBA Graduate by background. Over the last few years, he has been the Co-founder and Managing director of Blüm Health Ltd, an industry-disrupting digital health organisation that collaboratively works with NHS trusts, Universities and SMEs to design, build, and scale digital health software solutions, in the hope to empower solo entrepreneurs to turn their ideas into reality whilst also enabling large, rigid institutions to unlock their innovation potential. Alongside the Blüm Team, his focus is to build NHS-ready software and get it right the first time. This means building solutions that are regulatory compliant, patient-centric, and accessible from the outset, and this model has seen the successful implementation of seven solutions across the public and private sectors in just three years. Michael also supports SMEs planning to internationalise early, with Blüm being on the Department for Business and Trades ‘Go Global’ Showcase.

Dr Mridula Pore
Co-founder of Peppy

Mridula is Co-founder of Peppy, an alumnus company of the DigitalHealth.London Accelerator. Peppy provides health support to employees going through life’s big transitions, such as becoming a parent or going through the menopause. Peppy brings together Mridula’s passion for affordable, accessible healthcare with her love of innovation. Before moving into digital health, she led NHS service redesign projects as a management consultant at McKinsey and launched several high-profile generic pharmaceuticals as head of the UK retail pharmacy business at Sandoz, a Novartis company. Mridula was educated in India, the UK and the USA. She holds an MEng from Cambridge, a PhD from MIT and an MBA from MIT Sloan. She lives in West London with her husband and young children.

Dr Rishi Das-Gupta
Chief Executive of Health Innovation Network (HIN) South London

Rishi Das-Gupta is the Chief Executive of the Health Innovation Network (HIN) South London. He has worked to improve healthcare, patient experience and outcomes for over 20 years in a variety of roles focused on shaping and implementing government policy, working with health and care providers and redesigning services. He is passionate about the use of technology to enable clinical and operational change and to empower patients to manage their conditions. Rishi’s experience spans UK and US healthcare systems and he is a fellow of the Sciana programme collaborating with German and Swiss healthcare leaders. Before this role, he held executive roles at NHS trusts as CITO, Director of Innovation and Director of Operations and worked as a medical doctor. Rishi also has experience working as a strategy consultant at Oliver Wyman and McKinsey and Company. In addition to his primary medical qualification (M.B., B.S.). Rishi holds an M.A. in law (University of Cambridge) and an M.B.A. (London Business School).

Dr Sadia Khan
Consultant Cardiologist at West Middlesex University Hospital

Sadia is a Consultant Cardiologist with an interest in heart failure, atrial fibrillation, community cardiology and digital transformation and innovation. She is the service lead for cardiology and has helped set up community heart failure services and improved care for heart failure patients. She has led nationally recognised work in atrial fibrillation care, with her work being adopted across London. Sadia has a keen interest in research and innovation and has been clinical lead in several studies. She also has a teaching role with Imperial College London, acting as a personal and academic tutor to a group of up to 25 undergraduates and supervising PhD, MD and MPH students.

Dr Thomas Schreiber
Chair of BfB Labs Ltd
Trustee at Hatch Enterprise UK

After supporting Shazam in launching its music recognition service, Thomas traded playlists for data dashboards, focusing on digital advertising and partnerships at Google. There, he honed his sales, strategy, operations, and collaboration skills.

Thomas is also deeply involved in supporting underrepresented founders, working as a trustee for Hatch Enterprise, chair for BfB Labs in digital mental health, and as an angel investor and startup mentor. He can help with scaling operations, taming funding mysteries, or conquering sales hurdles.

Beyond technical skills, Thomas believes in the power of empathy and loves learning from his mentees. Having navigated the startup landscape, Thomas understands the challenges diverse founders face. So, whether you’re building the next game-changing healthcare app or making a medical diagnosis as seamless as recognising a song, he is here to support you.

Elizabeth Klein
Investment Director at Calculus Capital
Board member of MIP Discovery and Laverock Therapeutics

Elizabeth joined Calculus Capital in 2022 and has over 20 years of experience in Life Science investing. Elizabeth joined Calculus from Klein-Edmonds Associates, which she founded in 2015 to support and advise stakeholders in the UK’s Life Sciences industry. Her career spans equity research and investment analysis, and her client base included – amongst others – Radnor Capital Partners, Grant Thornton, and the Bio-Industry Association. She has a BSc in Applied Biology, an MA in History of Medicine, and an MBA. Elizabeth’s role is to source and execute new deals, as well as advise several of Calculus’ portfolio companies.

Katie Bell
Co-founder and CEO of Kidney Beam

Katie is the Co-founder and CEO of Kidney Beam, a current DigitalHealth.London Accelerator company. Kidney Beam is a clinically proven exercise and lifestyle-management app for people living with chronic kidney disease currently being implemented throughout NHS England.

Katie has been in the world of tech startups for the past 16 years in founding CEO and CTO roles. She is a born risk-taker, having left her first job as an IT consultancy in the finance industry to follow in the footsteps of her entrepreneurial family. Katie founded her first start-up at 25, which was acquired within five years of launch. She has been through multiple accelerator programmes including the Oxygen Accelerator, Google Campus for Mums and Dads, the DigitalHealth.London Accelerator; thriving on the fast-paced, uncertain nature of start-up life.

Katie holds First-Class Honours in Computer Science from Bristol University and the University of California. She currently lives with her young family in Brooklyn, New York.

Kelly McCabe
Founder and CEO of Perci Health

Kelly is the Founder and CEO of Perci Health, a current DigitalHealth.London Accelerator company. She is a healthcare executive with 15 years of cancer care experience, a registered oncology dietitian and head of therapies within a large NHS cancer centre. Kelly has published academic research on the detection and management of sarcopenia to improve cancer treatment tolerance. She is also the COO of HCA International Cancer Network, managing 7 cancer centres across the UK. Kelly founded Perci Health, the UK’s first virtual cancer survivorship clinic in 2020. She has raised over £5m to date to support the growth of the business and built a network of >80 cancer specialist healthcare professionals delivering care on the platform.

Lara Mott
CEO and Co-founder at ImproveWell

Lara Mott is the CEO and Co-founder of ImproveWell; the award-winning, real-time feedback solution for improvement and everyday innovation in the NHS. With an impressive array of experience in healthcare private equity, biotechnology and life sciences consulting businesses, Lara has a genuine passion for tackling key issues facing the NHS and other healthcare systems around the world. She co-founded ImproveWell in 2016 to empower frontline healthcare professionals to drive change.

In November 2017 Lara was named a “rising star” among the top 50 female leaders in UK healthcare. In 2019, Lara was a finalist for ‘Entrepreneur of the Year’ at the ‘Women in IT’ and Inclusive Tech Alliance Awards and became the British Medical Journal’s first Entrepreneur in Residence. ImproveWell has been nominated for several awards, such as the Nursing Time’s Workforce Summit’s 2023 Retention Shortlist and Health Service Journal’s ‘Workforce and Wellbeing Initiative of the Year’, while also winning ‘Major Project Go Live’ award at HTN’s Health Tech Awards and ‘Digital Solution of the Year’ in the Integrated Health Awards 2023. Lara holds a first class degree in Pharmacology from Bristol University where she was awarded the Hans Heller Memorial Prize for outstanding performance.

Ronke Adejolu
Chief Clinical Information Officer (CXiO) at Buckinghamshire, Oxfordshire and Berkshire West ICB (BoB) and NHS England South East Region

Ronke is an experienced, multifaceted, dynamic senior healthcare systems digital leader and clinician, with specialist qualifications in Healthcare Leadership, Digital Health, Nursing and Systems Leadership. Her 29-year career, portfolio and experience are diverse, and span work across senior strategic leadership roles in the private and public sector (Management Consultancy, Private Healthcare, AHSN, NHS, national and international experience working across Southeast Asia, Europe, USA and UK Telecommunications systems).

She is passionate about inclusive leadership, digital innovation, system-wide thinking, matrix-style working, influencing, and leading with impact, building, growing, and nurturing an equitable, partnership style, and practice to support pan-sector working across organisational, integrated health care system, boundaries, and the health economy. She creates an impact by providing tailored, evidence-based applied learning that fosters tangible behaviour change and performance enhancement on the ground. Her influence is most evident in shaping effective and enduring leadership, culture, and growth.

Ronke is an advocate of user-centred care and choice but also that no one should be left behind in the digital space, alongside an agile and adaptable clinical workforce equipped to influence, leverage, lead and respond to innovative and emerging digital technologies for improved patient experience and outcomes.

Tiba Rao
Chief Innovation and Co-founder at Soar Beyond

Tiba is Chief Innovation and Co-Founder of Soar Beyond, an alumnus company of the DigitalHealth.London Accelerator. Her background in sales and training with Eli Lilly and change management consultancy with Accenture has helped shape the services and solutions that Soar Beyond innovates to overcome resistance to change and transformation in the health system, particularly related to medicines. Soar Beyond is now an established digital health provider consultancy and with an extensive client base of both NHS and pharmaceutical companies. Tiba leads on both the innovation and commercialisation of pioneering solutions that meet the needs of the clinical and non-clinical workforce in the NHS. She is passionate about identifying health system gaps and boldly inventing simple, intuitive solutions and methodologies that address these.

The SMART workforce and i2i Network digital solutions are commissioned nationally by NHS England and global pharmaceutical companies. The SMART workforce was recognised for its innovative nature and is now featured on the Microsoft marketplace. Tiba was identified as a ‘One to Watch’ on the LDC and The Times Top 50 most ambitious leaders in 2022 and is a Health Executive in Residence at UCL Global Business School for Health.