Professor Sir Mike Ferguson CBE FRS FRSE FMedSci is Regius Professor of Life Sciences, with direct responsibility for Life Sciences research strategy and commercialisation. He has played a significant role in helping build Life Sciences research at the University of Dundee to its current size (almost 1,000 people with £50 m pa research funding) and international reputation. He is particularly interested in the translation of discovery science into societal benefit, and in delivering economic impact for the University’s principle stakeholder – the tax payer. To these ends, he founded the Drug Discovery Unit (DDU) at the University of Dundee in 2006. The DDU is a unique facility among the UK universities that works with academics across the UK to convert biological discoveries into developable and investable assets. He is Vice-Chair of the Board of Governors of Wellcome. He also serves on the Board of Directors of the Medicines for Malaria Venture and the scientific advisory boards of the Francis Crick Institute and the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine. He co-leads ‘Growing the Biomedical Cluster’- a project to create wealth & job opportunities in Tayside and beyond through life sciences innovation.