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Dr Danielle Miles

Dr Danielle Miles

Profile

I am a Technology Innovation Manager working in the Medical Technologies Innovation team on both the Grow MedTech and Translate Programmes.

As Programme Lead for Grow MedTech and Translate I am responsible for day-to-day leadership and programme management – reporting to the Director of Medical Technologies Innovation at the University of Leeds.

Forming part of the Technology Innovation Management my role also entails:
- Working with companies to understand their technology development and innovation needs, and barriers to engaging with the knowledge base.
- Collaborating with clinicians, patients, and NHS organisations to identify local and national challenges and priorities.
- Strategically matching academics and companies, some of whom may not currently apply their know-how to med-tech challenges, to create combination and convergent technologies that are ripe for commercial development.
- working with academics and company partners to validate and de-risk new technologies to progress them towards market deployment and safe clinical practice.
- managing a pool of proof of market, feasibility, and proof of commercial concept funding – leading to: validated and de-risked technology opportunities with established market need; technical prototypes that are positioned to secure proof of commercial concept funding; and product prototypes that have been de-risked to provide investor confidence.

Career history

I come from a research background, gaining my PhD in chemistry on self-assembling peptides. This lead to me becoming a Research Fellow specialising in hydrogels for biomedical applications, where I as actively involved in shaping and implementing project IP and commercialisation strategies, as well as creating clinical collaborations. I also bring industrial experience with me to this role having spent time in both the pharmaceutical and the medical devices industries, where  I gained intelligence on evaluating early stage technologies and regulatory pathways in particular for advanced therapeutic medicinal products.

Responsibilities

  • Programme Lead - Grow MedTech
  • Programme Lead - Translate MedTech

Qualifications

  • PhD in Chemistry – Self assembling peptides for biomedical applications
  • MChem Ind
  • PGCert Professional Innovation Management

Research groups and institutes

  • Institute of Medical and Biological Engineering