21st Annual bioProcessUK Conference 2024

Steve Bates OBE

Chief Executive Officer,

What does your role at BIA involve?

Steve Bates is the CEO of the UK Bioindustry Association, the UK’s Trade Association for innovative life science companies with over 550 members. Steve is the visible face of the vibrant UK life sciences industry to government and media. He serves on the UK Government’s Life Sciences Council and the UK Biosecurity Leadership Council. Steve was a founder member of the UK Government’s Vaccine Taskforce in the Covid crisis, sitting on its steering Board alongside Kate Bingham. He is active member and former chair the International Council of Biotech Associations and has been a board member of EuropaBio since 2015.

Previous experience & achievements

Steve has championed, with government, effective industrial incentives like the Biomedical Catalyst, which have crowded in private sector investment into UK SMEs. He is a driving force behind the scale up agenda, spearheading policy agenda to unlock UK pension fund capital into productive UK growth in life sciences. He has forged several links for the sector across the USA, Europe and in China. In his time at the BIA, Steve has developed new member groups focused on cell and gene therapy, genomics and engineered biology. A strong advocate of partnership working, Steve champions sector collaboration with research charities and academia. Proud to lead an organisation with a diverse Board with over 40% female representation, Steve is committed to next generation talent and developing the skills needed for the sector to flourish. Before joining the BIA in 2012, Steve worked for Genzyme and was advisor to the UK Government of Tony Blair working on NHS reform and the Northern Ireland peace process. He was made OBE for services to innovation in 2017 and became a Fellow of the Academy of Medical Science in 2020.

: stevebatesuk
: @SteveBatesUK

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Bill Dawson

SVP, Global Head of Biologics and Devices, GlaxoSmithKline

Bill is a senior leader with over 25 years’ experience in the Vaccines, BioPharma, Pharmaceutical and Clinical Research (CRO) industries. He was recently appointed as Chair of the Medicines Manufacturing Industry Partnership and has held a number of executive roles across different countries, leading operations and in Global Quality roles working to FDA/MHRA/EMEA/WHO/ROW standards. Following his role as Global Head of Quality for GSK Vaccines, Bill now leads GSK’s Biologics and Devices Manufacturing Network delivering specialty and respiratory products to hundreds of millions of patients globally. Bill is the global sponsor of DEI for the GSK Global Supply Chain and has a strong people, performance and quality-compliance focus; driving growth through culture change and a passion for innovation and simplification.

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Kit Erlebach

Senior Director, Engineering & BIA MAC Chair, FUJIFILM Diosynth Biotechnologies

Kit is responsible for Engineering and EHS at FUJIFILM Diosynth Biotechnologies in the UK. Kit has also worked as a Biochemical Engineer for 20 years and holds a Lean Six Sigma leader Master Black Belt qualification. He has applied LSS to quality, engineering and manufacturing in the course of leading laboratory construction projects totalling more than £100M. Kit has a first degree from Nottingham University in Chemical Engineering and a PhD from Cambridge University in Chemical Engineering and is a Fellow of the Institute of Chemical Engineers. He an MBA from the Open University as part of the ATAC programme.

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Nick Gardiner

What does your role at BIA involve?
Nick is responsible for overseeing the BIA’s operations, ensuring that all activities are professionally delivered to the highest standard and providing an organisation-wide operational perspective to and support for, activities and projects. He has specific responsibility for office management/facilities; financial systems/processes and credit control; the people, skills and talent workstream; company secretariat; human resources and IT/telecoms.
Previous experience & achievements
Nick has extensive industry and not-for-profit management experience. Prior to this role, he ran the Clinical Laboratory Division of Lab21. This involved providing specialist laboratory services to the healthcare, pharmaceutical and clinical trials markets. In that role, Nick had management responsibility for all operations, income, laboratory and customer services and client liaison across the Group. He also has specific and extensive experience of diagnostic testing within the HIV and HCV disease areas. This was gained through building Delphic Diagnostics into a one-stop shop for clinicians, enabling more effective patient monitoring and subsequent treatment options. Nick also has broad management experience within the not-for-profit and charity sector, working for a trade body representing and building the profile of the business communication industry and prior to that working for the world’s oldest active society devoted to natural history.
If you could invite any scientist or entrepreneur to dinner, who would it be?
Alfred Russel Wallace, a naturalist, explorer, geographer, anthropologist, biologist and illustrator, independently conceived the theory of evolution through natural selection. He travelled the world and I would imagine had some excellent stories to tell.

: nick-gardiner-47a41818

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Laura Griffiths

Innovation Lead, Innovate UK

Laura joined the Transforming Medicines Manufacturing Team at Innovate UK in January 2021. As an Innovation Lead, Laura manages government funded projects, and engages with different organisations within the sector, to understand manufacturing challenges and the innovation needed to grow the UK’s medicines manufacturing economy. Laura is passionate that by working together, sharing knowledge, and driving innovation, the medicines manufacturing community can have a greater overall impact. Prior to joining Innovate UK Laura spent 7 years working for Eli Lilly and Elanco, as a technical and manufacturing leader, and 3 years working for a biologics contract manufacturing organisation, Eden Biodesign (currently Pharmaron). Laura has a BSc (Hons) in Biochemistry, and a PhD in Biotechnology, both from The University of Manchester. Laura’s technical scientific background is within upstream bioprocessing, with expertise in both mammalian and microbial cultures.

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David Gruber

Senior Director Bioprocess Sciences, IPSEN

David joined IPSEN in April 2017 and is currently Senior Director, Bioprocess Sciences. He brings in excess of 20 years’ experience in bioprocess development, tech transfer and cGMP manufacturing for biopharmaceutical products. Prior to joining Ipsen David spent 10 years working at MedImmune and 5 years at Xenova developing manufacturing processes for early and late phase clinical products. David’s expertise spans platform and novel technology development, process / product understanding and application of multivariate analysis. More recently his keen interest in sustainability has seen him engage in Ipsen’s sustainability programs, supporting both Engineering and Procurement activities. In 2023 David volunteered to lead the Manufacturing Advisory Committee’s Sustainability working group.

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Ian McCubbin

Chair of RoslinCT, Chair of Cell and Gene Therapy Catapult

Chair of RoslinCT and Chair of Cell and Gene Therapy Catapult; Chair of Manufacturing Advisory Group for IUK Industrial Challenge Fund; Member of the UK Government Vaccines Task Force. Ian retired from his role as SVP North America, Japan & Global Pharma Supply, GSK in April 2017. He joined GSK in 2006, his second spell with the company and was responsible for 17 factories and 7,000 employees globally whose role within GSK was to supply the New Product pipeline and the majority of GSK's pharmaceutical sales. Ian chaired the Advanced Therapy Manufacturing Task Force originally co-chaired with George Freeman, Minister for Life Sciences and the group published its Action Plan to 'anchor' commercial scale manufacturing in the UK. The Action Plan has subsequently been adopted in full as part of the Life Sciences Industrial Strategy. He led the manufacturing work stream of the UK Vaccines Task Force between March 2020 and May 2021. Ian is a pharmacist with 40 years of experience in the Pharmaceutical industry working for GSK, Merck Generics and IVAX. His core capability is in the field of manufacturing and supply chain leadership and new product introduction. His passion is cell and gene therapies due to their transformational medical benefits and the opportunity they create for UK economic benefit.

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Stella Peace

Executive Director for Healthy Living and Agriculture, Innovate UK

Dr Stella Peace is a purpose driven leader who is passionate about the role of science and technology to create transformational innovations. Stella’s experiences span academic research, international business and more recently UKRI where she is Executive Director for Healthy Living and Agriculture at Innovate UK Before joining Innovate UK, Stella had over twenty-five years’ experience as an international business leader in the consumer goods industry and Life Sciences sector. Throughout her career she has led R&D teams to deliver local, regional and global business innovations for iconic, household brands that that drive growth. Stella’s academic background is in Chemistry with a PhD in Polymer Chemistry. She is a keen runner and passionate foodie.

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Mark Proctor

Vice President and Site General Manager, AstraZeneca

Mark Proctor is the Vice President and Site GM for AstraZeneca UK Operations in Macclesfield (UK), where over 1500 colleagues perform a range of manufacturing across oral solid dose formulation, parenterals, sterile manufacturing, and packing for global distribution to over 117 markets worldwide. Prior to this role, Mark has held several senior roles across biopharmaceutical development, quality, supply chain, vaccine technical operations, and site leadership. In addition to his role at AstraZeneca, Mark is a lay-council member and trustee for the University of Liverpool – established in 1881 as the first red-brick University and part of the internationally renowned Russell Group. Mark is a Fellow of the Institute of Chemical Engineers, holds a Master’s degree in Biochemical Engineering (UCL), an Executive MBA (Bayes Business School, London), and Certificate in Company Direction (IoD). He was recognized nationally with a CBE in the 2021 Queen’s Birthday Honours in recognition of his services to the Covid-19 response. Mark is also the AstraZeneca representative on MMIP.

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