Edinburgh Innovations announces new Non-Executive Directors
Edinburgh Innovations has announced the appointment of two new Non-Executive Directors to its Board.
Old College quad
Sam Stills
The appointments demonstrate the organisation’s continued growth and ambition, as new statistics reveal a strong year for innovation during 2024/25, including:
- 64 company launches, including 55 student startups, five staff startups and four staff spinouts (where the University retains intellectual property)
- £113m secured in funding from industry or for research with commercial potential
- £113m invested into the University’s portfolio of associated companies, managed by in-house venture investment team Old College Capital
- 172 patents filed to protect new technologies
- 62 licences entered into for companies to use University technologies.
Left: Gary McRae, right: Dr John Cassidy
Of the new Board members, Dr John Cassidy is a founder turned investor, with 15 years’ experience in drug development. As a PhD student from the University of Cambridge, he founded a precision oncology spinout and later scaled it in Silicon Valley. He is currently a general partner at Kindred Capital, investing in seed-stage deep tech companies.
A former corporate director at Laird PLC, Gary McRae transformed startup Laird Technologies into an electronic component global business with annual revenues in excess of £1 billion, 17,000 employees and facilities across Europe, the Americas and Asia. He currently holds Non-Exec Director posts at Frimley Health NHS Foundation Trust and FAC Technology Ltd and is Interim Senior Governor at the University of Aberdeen.
The pair join eight other Board members, including Dr Catherine Martin, Vice Principal of the Corporate Services Group at the University of Edinburgh and Professor Liz Baggs, acting Vice Principal of Research and Innovation. Chair of the Board is biotechnology consultant Dr Frank Armstrong, who joined in June 2025, following a long career in the pharmaceutical industry.
Dr Andrea Taylor
We are delighted to have been able to attract such a wealth industry and ventures experience to our Board to provide robust corporate governance and help shape our ambitious strategy for the year ahead.
Universities have huge potential to unlock research excellence to create social and economic benefits regionally and beyond, and we have seen this through our companies, technologies and partnerships this year. Examples include spinout Trogenix, which is targeting aggressive cancers; a collaborative research project to turn plastic waste into paracetamol, and student startup MiAlgae, which is creating new green jobs.
Steered by an able and experienced Board, working in partnership with the University, EI looks forward to a powerful year of innovation and impact in 2026.
Dr Andrea Taylor
CEO, Edinburgh Innovations
I am convinced that innovation has the power to drive change in the world. The University has cutting-edge research and world class researchers. Edinburgh Innovations is the partner that can facilitate the impact of research and make ideas work for a better world.
Dr Frank Armstrong
Chair of the Board, Edinburgh Innovations
I’m really looking forward to using my experience of founding, launching and investing in spinouts to advise, guide and support exceptional ideas from the University of Edinburgh. In addition, I’d like to build global awareness of the incredible tech that is being developed in universities across Scotland.
Dr John Cassidy
Non-Executive Director, Edinburgh Innovations; General Partner, Kindred Capital
I hope my experience of university innovation and commercialisation, including in the US, will help to accelerate ideas from the University of Edinburgh out into the world, where they can make a difference.
Gary McRae
Non-Executive Director, Edinburgh Innovations
