Cambridge Network Board

Nicola is the Head of HR at Amadeus Capital Partners. Having joined Amadeus in 2016, bringing over two decades of HR experience.

Prior to Amadeus Capital Partners, Nicola spent over 10-years with Accelrys, a global scientific software company, where she served as European HR Director based at their Cambridge office, overseeing HR leadership for employees across six entities in Europe, before the company was acquired by Dassault Systemes.

Nicola’s earlier roles include HR Consultant to Fen Technology, Recruitment Manager at Symbionics - a Cambridge based tech company acquired by Cadence Design Systems, MBDA, and Hays Accountancy Personnel. 

Nicola is a Chartered member of the CIPD and has a BA Hons degree in Business.

Dr Diarmuid O’Brien is Pro-Vice-Chancellor for Innovation at the University of Cambridge and Chief Executive of Cambridge Enterprise. In these roles he has responsibility for all elements of innovation, enterprise partnership, research commercialisation, investment, local and national government engagement on innovation and innovation and place.

During his time at Cambridge, Diarmuid has led the creation of a number of initiatives to unlock innovation and offer enhanced support for translational funding and company creation, including Founders at the University of Cambridge and the Technology Investment Fund. He co-founded and continues to be an active leader in Innovate Cambridge, a highly collaborative initiative defining and delivering an inclusive innovation future for the Cambridge ecosystem.

Previously Diarmuid was Chief Innovation & Enterprise Officer of Trinity College Dublin and has held senior management roles in several university-founded start-up companies, including NTera, Xoliox, and Deerac Fluidics. Diarmuid was a Research Fellow at Princeton University. He has a PhD in Physics from the University of Sheffield and a degree in Materials Science from Trinity College Dublin.

Marcus Johnson is the Senior Director in terms of years of service and his connections with the company go back to its foundation. At that time he was writing research on the gilt-edged market and one of his Edinburgh clients was a founding director of the company. Today he is actively engaged in all elements of the company’s activities. He is active in local business groups including as a Director of Cambridge Network (where Kirly Group Holdings is one of the original founding shareholders). 

Peter is Managing Director of TTP Group. In 1987 he was one of the founders of TTP and subsequently built the science-based half of it. He is on the board of a number of external organisations involved in education, the arts, entrepreneurship, and promotion of high-tech industry. Peter has been responsible for product and technology developments in major markets including healthcare, communications and consumer products.

Lee Welham is a partner in the Deloitte Cambridge office with 14 years’ experience in serving a range of businesses in the FTSE, AIM and high growth private market sectors. Lee leads the Deloitte Equity Capital Markets group in Cambridge which provides a range of services to companies with an aspiration to IPO.  He has led and been involved in all major areas of capital markets work including acquisition due diligence; reporting accountant work and demerger projects.

Andrew Lynn is an entrepreneur and executive with a focus on life-science and physical-science ventures. Andrew founded Orthomimetics, a regenerative orthopaedic devices company, based on his PhD research conducted jointly at the University of Cambridge and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Dr Lynn subsequently led solid-state-lighting venture CamGaN Limited as CEO from the commencement of operations to the company’s acquisition in 2012. His efforts have earned him recognition in Europe as an inaugural winner of a Science|Business Academic Enterprise Award and in the US as a member of Technology Review Magazine’s TR35 list of the world’s top young innovators, leaders and entrepreneurs. 

Colin is an Executive Director at Brown Shipley. After starting his career in banking, Colin joined a Cambridge-based stockbroking firm which subsequently became the nucleus of the Cambridge team in 1988. Colin looks after a wide range of private clients, charities and pension funds. He is a Chartered Fellow of the Chartered Institute for Securities & Investment and holds the Institute's Diploma.

Prof Watkins first joined Anglia Ruskin in 2014, as Pro Vice Chancellor and Dean of Arts, Law and Social Sciences, before being appointed Deputy Vice Chancellor (Research and Innovation) in 2015.  Prior to joining ARU, he was Dean of the Faculty of Arts and Humanities at Canterbury Christ Church University, where he was appointed Professor of Composition and Contemporary Music in 2005.

With more than 20 years of experience in Human Resources at companies such as Domino Printing Sciences and Marshall of Cambridge, Vicki brings a vast amount of people management expertise and cultural knowledge. Vicki has achieved a BA in History and a CIPD.

Andy Williams is Vice President – Cambridge Programme & Strategy for AstraZeneca. As well as delivery of the company’s strategy for its Cambridge footprint, Andy works with Cambridge and national stakeholders to develop the local infrastructure, promote the life sciences sector and inspire the next generation of scientists through AstraZeneca’s extensive local community outreach activities. With the arrival of AstraZeneca’s new strategic R&D centre at the Cambridge Biomedical Campus, Andy has been an active contributor to evolving Cambridge’s thinking in areas such as transport, skill development, amenities for the community and affordable housing.

Ken is Deputy Managing Director at Microsoft's Cambridge Research Lab with responsibility for the lab's business-facing activities, including technology transfer, incubation, licensing, spin-outs, and other models for utilising the intellectual property generated by the lab's research groups. Woodberry joined Microsoft Research in September 2002 from RealVNC, a start-up he co-founded with colleagues from AT&T Laboratories in Cambridge.

David Mardle is a partner in Goodwin’s Technology and Life Sciences group with 20 years of experience advising on financings and M&A transactions in the life sciences and technology sectors. Leveraging his significant M&A experience combined with his general corporate and capital markets expertise, David now concentrates his focus on representing emerging biotech companies providing counsel on corporate and capital markets transactions.  Prior to joining Goodwin in 2019, he was a partner at Taylor Wessing LLP.

Claire Ruskin has long been part of the Cambridge Phenomenon, starting in chip design as an electronics engineer at Cambridge Consultants and then delivering increasingly ambitious technical product developments for a range of clients around the world. She has extensive technical and practical knowledge and experience with developing products, people and companies. Claire travels worldwide, when needed, to talk about what makes Cambridge such a special place and how it has created so many technologies and companies.

Claire was a Board Director of both Cambridge Consultants and Arthur D Little, then moved to PA Consulting to combine the art of management consulting with continued technical developments. Claire helped form start-ups including CSR [sold to Samsung Electronics and Qualcomm] and Alphamosaic [sold to Broadcom] and was on the Council of Advisors for Redgate Software. She is an Executive Board member of the Greater Cambridge Partnership, trying to help Cambridge grow in a good way, with housing, access and skills.