Our board

Ian Hamilton - Chairman

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Ian chairs the board and holds senior positions within the agricultural sector, including Chairman of Scottish life sciences business Horizon Proteins, global bovine technology company Vytelle and agrochemical supply business Zantra. He also is a Non-Executive Advisor to Wheatsheaf Investments and chairs his own private portfolio of companies. Ian holds a BSc (Hons) degree in Agriculture from the University of Edinburgh.

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Fiona Marshall - CEO

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Fiona has over 15 years working in the diagnostics sector for SME’s and international groups such as Alere, BBI Solutions and AgPlus Diagnostics. She has multidisciplinary skills from R&D through to commercialisation of diagnostic products in various fields such as Clinical, Veterinary and Defence. She has led many businesses from start-up to delivery and combines strong leadership and mentoring skills to support SMEs to grow and scale.

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Ross McDermid - Director of Commercialisation

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Ross brings over 25 years of sales and marketing experience to the team. Before joining Biotangents, he spent the last 13 years working for Covetrus (formerly Henry Schein Animal Health), latterly as European Marketing Director leading and managing 12 country teams to deliver commercial success.

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Lina Gasiūnaitė - Director of Science

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Lina is one of the Founders of Biotangents and leads our diverse research and development team of molecular biologists, bioinformaticians and engineers in the delivery of AmpliSpec™ products. She is a winner of AccelerateHer and was highly commended at the Scottish Women’s Awards in 2019, both competitions celebrating the achievements of female entrepreneurs. Lina holds an MSc in Biotechnology from the University of Edinburgh.

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Dr Andy Hall-Ponselè - Director of Operations

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Andy designed and led development of the Leapfrog Assembly™ DNA assembly technology upon which Biotangents was founded in 2015. One of the Founders of Biotangents, he became Director of Operations in August 2018 as the team grew and broadened its expertise. Andy holds a DPhil from the University of Oxford, where he used metabolic engineering approaches to provide new insights into the control of metabolism in plants.

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Ole Kring - Non-Executive Director

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Ole has extensive knowledge of the veterinary diagnostics sector and has developed and sold diagnostics for companion animals (pets) for more than 10 years. He is the former CEO and president of Zoetis Denmark, Zoetis being the number 1 global player in the agritech sector. As CEO of Scandinavian Micro Biodevices he achieved an €80m exit in the form of an acquisition by Zoetis, which mirrors our ambitions. Ole is a partner at VF Venture with responsibility for life science investments.

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Alan Hale - Non-Executive Director

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Alan, one of the founders and former Biotangents CEO, has over 35 years’ industrial experience in biotech and technology. His breadth of experience across industry sectors, plus hands-on operational knowledge of how to make an organisation work effectively, complements experience working with entrepreneurs and early-stage technologies. Alan provides strong strategic focus, and his clear vision, balanced with the understanding of how teams can deliver, is supported by his strong people skills.

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Professor Steve Howell - Investor Director

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Steve is an experienced entrepreneur and founder of over a dozen Life Science companies including investment company Innova Partnerships and Unilever joint venture Penrhos Bio. He has been involved in the M&A activities of six companies, three on the buy side and three on the sell side. Steve is also Visiting Professor of Commercial Innovation at Kings College London.

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David Glen - Corporate Advisor and Finance

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David joined DC Consulting in 2008 having trained and qualified with an independent chartered accountancy firm in Broughty Ferry, Dundee. Now heading up DC’s Edinburgh office, David has a strong track record in supporting clients across a broad spectrum of assignments, including helping clients to become “investor ready” prior to guiding them through the raising of investment capital, incorporating equity, debt and grant funding. David brings this expertise to Biotangents, where he advises on corporate and financial strategy.

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Professor Chris French - Scientific Adviser

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Chris is Professor of Microbial Biotechnology at the University of Edinburgh and has considerable experience planning and supervising research, with numerous high-impact publications on DNA assembly and biosensor development. Chris has a history of advising companies within the life sciences and has overseen the University of Edinburgh’s entries in the iGEM competition since 2006. He is also a member of the Flowers Consortium, which was awarded a £6M EPSRC grant for the development of synthetic biology infrastructure for the UK.

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