Paul is a former partner at KPMG and the global head of public services and government. In his career, he has been Head of the Number 10 Policy Unit, as well as working in the media, education, transport and urban regeneration sectors. Paul is a Visiting Professor at the London School of Economics & Political Science and was a Director of Bethnal Green Ventures and a Non-Executive Director of the Cabinet Office.

Ella is a former Strategy Director at IPG Mediabrands, one of the world’s largest media agencies, working with global leading brands. She is the Co-Founder of NewCo UK, which connects the most successful large corporates with the most innovative start-ups in the UK. Ella started her career as an engineer in Tel Aviv’s hi tech aerospace industry, before becoming a consultant to tech firms.

Rachel is an Associate Consultant for UCL’s Centre for Behaviour Change and a former Senior Behaviour Change Research Advisor at Bupa. Rachel has a PhD in Psychology, and has worked across a range of settings embedding social science research in tech-enabled businesses.

Julia joined Zinc at the very beginning. Since then, she has led the delivery of two company builder programmes. Her role builds on her previous experience in setting-up and scaling start-ups in market research and building design. In her earlier career, Julia worked in TV and international development. She has an MSc from SOAS and a passion for high-impact social innovation.

Eleanor joined Zinc in Oct 2019 to launch the new Zinc Academy. Most recently Eleanor was Director of the Good Lab, a radical innovation collaboration of 12 of the UK’s largest charities, looking to transform how they raise funds through venturing. Eleanor started her career as an anthropologist and documentary filmmaker, before landing in the world of start-ups in 2006, founding a technology company, LikeCube, which was acquired by Oakley Capital Private Equity and the Time Out Group, where she stayed for 5 years as Global Innovation Director.

Lily started her career at Ernst & Young (‘EY’), where she qualified as an accountant. She gained a wide range of experience working across many different sectors, including working on advisory projects with sporting clients such as World Rugby, Rugby Football Union, as well as working in M&A structuring with large private equity houses.

After EY, Lily joined Entrepreneur First (‘EF’), a talent investor and venture builder, where Lily fell in love with early stage investing. During her time there, Lily was Fund Manager, and funds with >£160m in commitments.

Outside of Zinc, Lily’s main love is being outdoors, walking, running, playing sport, dog walking, and even a spot of gardening!

I come to Zinc with 10 years of experience as a psychotherapist and co-founder coach in early stage startups, and prior to that a 4-year stint working on alumni engagement for Harvard University’s development office. My passion lies in building meaningful relationships and diverse communities, and connecting the right people to one another.

Rosie has a passion for applying scientific knowledge and methods to the development of digital products, to make them the best they can be. She has a PhD in Health Psychology, and many years experience as a UX researcher and applied behavioural scientist within health tech startups.

Diellza has a BSc in Psychology from the University of Warwick and a MSc in Global Public Health and Policy from Queen Mary University of London. She joined Zinc to combine her interest in startups with her passion for social science research and golden purpose of creating a positive social impact.

Luke has a PhD on Uncertainty in Climate and Energy Systems at UCL, a Masters in Sustainable Energy Futures from Imperial College and an undergrad Physics at Oxford. Luke’s broad experience spans government covid policy/science, climate finance, energy consultancy and R&D investment strategy.

At Zinc, he specialises in Deeptech and the Environment, investing in early-stage mission-driven deep tech companies and supporting their growth.

Natalie has a PhD in medical science (ophthalmology and inflammation), then biotechnology and healthtech startup operator across Canada, UK, EU and globally, then venture building and investing, culminating in ~15 years of 360 healthcare experience. She can be found sometimes lecturing, advising and consulting for cool and impactful organisations like WHO, European Innovation Council, Hult Prize, and UK Parliament.

Shelley has 20 years of experience in environmental technologies as an engineer, researcher, startup CEO, innovation platform manager in R&D-intensive corporates, and investor. Shelley has an undergraduate degree in Chemical Engineering, a Ph.D. in Electrochemical Engineering, and a Postdoc researcher in Bioelectrical Engineering. This academic experience spanned Australia, Sweden, Japan, and the Netherlands, covering energy and water sectors, materials spawned from chemical catalytic and biological processes, and consistently combined experimental work with physics-based modelling. Shelley also has experience spinning innovation out of academia, winning the UQ Enterprise award in 2010 with the support of a Technology Transfer Office.

Apoorva has a BSc in mechanical/industrial engineering, an MSc in entrepreneurship, and an MBA. Her career began in the financial services, specialising in intellectual property valuation and licensing for high-stakes IP disputes. She later shifted her focus to working with early-stage businesses across US, India, Italy, and UK – supporting them with developing commercial and IP strategies.
More recently, she worked as an Innovate UK EDGE Advisor and as a technology transfer manager at UCL Business. Apoorva is a co-founder of advancii, an online platform dedicated to helping SMEs develop effective IP strategies. Apoorva is a mother to a 3-year old – the best role of all!

After working for a travel start-up in Croatia, Alex studied for an MSc in Entrepreneurship at UCL alongside co-founding a sustainable fashion platform, aiming to reduce the environmental impact of the fast fashion industry. The results of a financial feasibility study conducted as part of my master’s dissertation (amongst a series of mistakes and failures) led Alex to join Seedrs, where he worked on their investment team. At Seedrs, he worked closely with founders to successfully set up and launch their crowdfunding campaigns, complete due diligence and execute the legal documentation required for investment. As an industry agnostic investor, Seedrs enabled Alex to work with various passionate and driven founders across various sectors, including food & beverage, climate tech and fintech, which allowed me to realise that he wants to focus on helping build impact-led businesses.

Kate has spent the past decade working with founders of early stage B2B startups, helping them to find product market fit and to scale. Her key areas of expertise include marketing and go-to-market strategies, building thriving B2B communities, and the people & culture aspects of team building.

Prior to joining the Zinc team, Kate was a founder in Zinc’s fifth cohort, focussed on transforming the industries that have the most damaging impact on the environment. She is passionate about things climate and sustainability – and is on hand to share her experiences navigating the Zinc founder journey!

Saul is a partner at LocalGlobe, a UK-based venture capital firm. His investment career includes being a partner at Index Ventures and he specialises in early-stage tech companies. Saul was co-founder of Seedcamp, the first tech accelerator in Europe.He has been closely involved in the formation of many successful businesses, including Lovefilm, MOO and Kano.

Julia is the Pro Director for Research at the LSE, and from 2016-17 served as LSE’s Interim Director. She is on the board of UK Research and Innovation. At the LSE she is a member of the Law Department, with a primary research interest in regulation of Financial Services and Biotechnology. She holds a PhD from Oxford and was elected a Fellow of the British Academy in 2015. She chairs the ASPECT Consortium of LSE, Oxford, Manchester, Sheffield, Sussex universities which is working with Zinc to drive entrepreneurship and commercialisation in the social sciences.