Promote Establish Translate Scale – new commercialisation framework for industry and innovation

Amy has been in rail since she graduated in 2007. In that time she has worked in maintenance, design and delivery. She started her career in Materials and Fire Engineering, she then worked in RAMS and Through Life Engineering. Amy has been in Engineering Governance for over 5 years, bringing together her learned experiences. As a people leader, Amy focusses on enabling the individual to deliver for the team.

Across her career, Amy has focussed on a ‘whole of life, whole of system’ view. She has a passion for sustainability and finding the balance for people, planet and profit.

A/Professor Noushin Nasiri is the Head of the NanoTech Laboratory at the School of Engineering at Macquarie University, where she leads a team of nine research personnel, including four PhD and five Master of Research students. Her research team is focused on design and fabrication of nanostructured materials, functionalised coatings, miniaturised sensing technologies and wearable devices for health, energy and environmental applications.

She is one of Australia’s 2021-2022 Superstars of STEM, 40 under 40: Most Influential Asian-Australians, and the recipient of 2023 NSW Cancer Institute Fellowship, 2022 L’Oréal-UNESCO For Women in Science Fellowship, 2021 Royal Society of New South Wales Warren Prize and 2019 NSW Young Tall Poppy Science Award. She has published over 50 peer-reviewed publications in high-impact journals including Advanced Materials, Advanced Functional Materials and ACS Nano, with more than 1700 citations, a h-index of 23 and i10-index of 31. Her vision is to combine state-of-the-art techniques in the field of nanomaterials, nanoelectronics, and chemistry to develop innovative nanomaterials that can potentially transform the landscape of nanosensing technologies. She is a passionate science communicator who has received considerable outside recognition for her research including TEDx Sydney Salon 2017, TEDx Macquarie University 2019 and TEDx Bligh Street 2020.

Professor Alan Wong is the founder and CEO of IND Technology. He invented and commercialised the award-winning EFD product that is used by utility companies around the world. The EFD detects and locates failing power assets before they eventuate into power outages or initiate arcing that can start a fire. The uptake of the patented technology has increased exponentially since 2013, from one single power utility to over 20 companies across Australia, Asia, Canada and North America.

Professor Saeid Nahavandi is recognised internationally for his work on intelligent systems and simulation technologies, including haptics. Haptic technology creates an experience of touch by applying forces, vibrations, or motion to the user. 

Saeid’s research has been translated into defence and civilian applications. He is particularly well known for his brainchild, the universal motion simulator, a world-first haptically-enabled robotic motion platform that functions as a vehicle or aircraft simulator for contested environments. 

The simulator allows users to experience situations in their entirety, including full range of motion that can be adjusted to suit many forms of training that aren’t possible in reality. Training using advanced virtual reality technology is useful for engineering, military, medicine, and education applications. 

Saeid consults to government, and civilian and defence industry in Australia, the USA, and Europe and has previously consulted to NASA and NATO. 

Dr Dimity Dornan, AO is a social entrepreneur, bionics advocate, speech pathologist, researcher, Founder and Director of Hear and Say, Founder and Chair of Bionics Queensland, past member of Senate of the University of Queensland, and is currently a Fellow of Australian Academy of Technology and Engineering (ATSE), the Queensland College of Arts and Sciences and also Speech Pathology Australia. Dimity has also been appointed to Adjunct Professor to the University of Queensland School of Health and Rehabilitation Sciences and Adjunct Professor to the Science and Engineering Faculty, School of Mechanical, Medical & Process Engineering, Queensland University of Technology, and is a member of the Advisory Board for the ARC Industrial Transformation Training Centre—Joint Biomechanics (ARC ITTC-JB).

In 1992 she established Hear and Say as a leading not-for-profit for deaf children learning to listen and speak, particularly with surgically implantable hearing technology like the bionic ear. She is currently sharing her experience for the benefit of the stakeholders in the wider bionics industry.

In 2016 she founded ‘Bionics Queensland’, which was formally incorporated in 2018 and officially launched in 2019. As Chair of the Board, she has been working to promote the Bionics Industry and help bring new bionics solutions to market for the benefit of people with previously untreatable medical problems. These include not only hearing but also visual, neurological, limb and organ conditions.

Dr Dornan is aiming to bring outcomes similar to those legendary ones possible for many people who use the bionic ear to other new spin-off devices (eg bionic eye, brain bionics, bionic organs and limbs etc.).

She is currently co-chair of the ATSE Industry and Innovation Forum and Chair of the Policy Steering Group.