Women in Biotech - Manchester

Kate Barclay

Skills Strategy Consultant, BIA

What does your role at BIA involve?
As an experienced Biochemical Engineer, Kate leads skills and talent programme development across STEM industries using over 30 years of experience within large pharma and small company networks. Working with BIA, she represents the sector ensuring access to the incredible talent and addressing skills gaps to start, grow and scale innovative life sciences and biotech organisations.

Previous experience & achievements
In addition to her role at BIA, Kate works as an independent consultant supporting organisations to develop their skills and talent strategies. She has oversight for quality governance of technical and professional education as IfATE Non-Executive Director and is a Board member of North Hertfordshire College. Kate holds MBA from Open University and a PhD in Bio-Chemical Engineering from UCL. As a Chartered Engineer (CEng FIChemE), she held previous senior leadership roles across diverse pharmaceutical manufacturing and R&D portfolios including Solid Dose, Parenteral & Inhaled Devices.

If you could invite any scientist or entrepreneur to dinner, who would it be and why?
Rosalind Franklin, as she made contributions to the understanding of the fine molecular structures of DNA and RNA. She studied science at a time when few women attended university and led pioneering work on multiple viruses. Kate would love to know what she thinks about what we know now!

Natalie Kenny

CEO, BioGrad Group

Dr. Natalie Kenny is the multi-award-winning CEO of The BioGrad Group, a pioneering organisation at the forefront of biomedical science and education. Under Dr. Kenny’s visionary leadership, The BioGrad Group has grown into a dynamic consortium of companies, each specialising in a critical area of science and medicine.

Her distinguished career includes research roles at prestigious institutions such as St. George's School of Medicine in the Ecuadorian Amazon, Johns Hopkins Medical School in Peru, and the Universidad de Extremadura in Spain. Additionally, she served as a Research Fellow at the Institute of Environment and Health, where she further refined her expertise.

Dr. Kenny has also specialised in degenerative neurological diseases at Charles River Laboratories and led a team of researchers at Pfizer Global Research and Development for three years, making significant contributions to groundbreaking advancements in the field.

Kath Mackay

Chief Scientific Officer, Bruntwood SciTech

Dr Kath Mackay is Chief Scientific Officer for Bruntwood SciTech and Managing Director of its Alderley Park campus, the UK’s largest single site life science innovation campus.  Her responsibilities include stimulating new business ventures and managing further development of the campus.  

Kath joined Bruntwood SciTech in 2019 from Innovate UK, the UK’s innovation agency, which is part of UK Research & Innovation, the £7bn body tasked with creating the best possible environment for research and innovation to flourish. In her most recent role there, Kath was Director for Ageing Society, Health and Nutrition, and part of the executive management team.  She led a team of PhD educated Innovation Leads and was responsible for growing and scaling businesses working in the biomedical, health, agriculture and food sectors, including development of new challenges under the Government’s Industrial Strategy. 

Previously she was on the senior management team leading initiatives in biomedical innovation and was Innovation Lead for Advanced Therapies, which spearheaded the delivery of investment into the UK’s growing cell and gene therapy industry. Kath’s earlier career included Business Development Director with Epistem, then an AIM listed, VC backed personalised medicine company

Kath has a PhD in Pharmacology from the University of Manchester.  She is an experienced public speaker and internal and external industry events.  Additionally, she has a keen interest and been actively involved in mentoring and developing employees.  She has been a mentor with MassChallenge UK, (part of a global not-for-profit start up accelerator for entrepreneurs) and the Healthcare Businesswomen’s Association.

Caroline Phillips

Chief Scientific Officer, Redx

Caroline Phillips joined Redx in 2015 and held a number of senior management roles before being appointed Chief Scientific Officer in May 2024. Caroline has extensive experience in drug discovery and early clinical development, with over 25 years’ industry experience including 14 years at AstraZeneca. Caroline has been instrumental in the development of Redx’s oncology pipeline, including progressing Redx’s lead oncology asset, RXC004, a potential best-in-class, orally bioavailable porcupine inhibitor into clinical studies. Additionally, Caroline has led many of the discovery projects from early-stage target selection through pre-clinical testing and has also been fundamental in securing research collaborations and partnerships with Jazz Pharmaceuticals.

Caroline has a PhD in pharmacology form the University of Cambridge.

Linda Randall

Associate VP, Biologics Development, Manufacturing & Control, Pharmaron Gene Therapy

Linda is Associate Vice President, Biologics Development, Manufacturing and Control for Pharmaron Gene Therapy in Liverpool, UK. Linda and her team support their clients with the development and manufacture of gene therapy products. Linda established and grew the gene therapy capabilities at the site and since 2016 has been actively engaged in the CMC development of these products, with a career highlight leading the development of a CRISPR gene editing product for retinal disease that was the first in vivo CRISPR product to be dosed to a patient. Linda is passionate about forming strong collaborative relationships to develop gene therapy products and develop the science through innovation.

In addition to her 14 years in senior roles in the development of biologics, Linda has held senior roles in drug product formulation and pharma manufacturing. She has a degree and PhD in Chemistry and is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Chemistry.