Innovation UBC is pleased to announce that Dr. Sean Lumb will take on an interim leadership role as of May 18, 2022. Dr. Lumb will be taking over administrative leadership of the entrepreneurship@UBC Unit following the transition of outgoing Managing Director, Kari LaMotte. We want to extend our immense gratitude to Ms. LaMotte for her outstanding leadership over the past nearly 4 years, and we wish her the very best in her future endeavours.
Dr. Lumb completed his PhD in Chemistry in 1999, and then joined the University Industry Liaison Office (UILO) in 1999, working in progressively senior technology transfer roles until 2006. In 2006 Sean moved to Melbourne Ventures at the University of Melbourne to continue his work on creating university spinout companies. After six years with Melbourne Ventures, Dr. Lumb returned to Canada and joined UBC in 2013 to help launch Innovation UBC (previously entrepreneurship@UBC). In 2016, Dr. Lumb drove the launch of Innovation UBC’s Life Science stream, and in 2020 expanded it to include other Deep Tech opportunities in cleantech, engineering, and hardware, with a rebrand as Lab2Launch. The expansion of the Life Sciences stream as Lab2Launch recognized that the venture development process and tools developed for Life Science companies are relevant to other B2B-based Deep Tech opportunities in regulated industries.
Dr. Lumb has been pivotal in leading the continued evolution of Innovation UBC venture development resources, as a co-author of Innovation UBC’s newly launched 4T’s Playbook; with the creation of Innovation UBC's Human Health Venture Studio; in furthering Innovation UBC's faculty collaborations with SBME, the Faculty of Medicine and Pharmaceutical Sciences, and industry-focused champions such as Life Sciences BC, GenomeBC and VCHRI; and with the development of and implementation of Innovation UBC’s EDI strategies and initiatives.
Since its inception, Innovation UBC has mobilized UBC innovation and helped to translate the university’s leading-edge research into tangible impact through the creation of ventures. As a key strategic unit within the VP Research & Innovation portfolio, Innovation UBC serves students, faculty, staff and alumni with programs and resources that combine business model validation, intensive mentoring for venture creation, venture incubation space, and funding to optimize the number of attractive and viable startups based on UBC-related innovation.
We are thrilled to have Dr. Lumb serve in this capacity, so that Innovation UBC may continue to support the translation of leading edge innovations, from invention to impact, through venture creation.
