Sarusha’s career began in the pharmaceutical sector, where she gained experience across the value chain at global companies such as Cipla, Johnson & Johnson and Pfizer Consumer HealthCare. Her main areas of expertise included regulatory affairs, quality assurance, manufacturing technology transfer and international auditing. She left Big Pharma to join a Development Finance Agency in South Africa that supported technology innovation projects and ventures. Sarusha had the opportunity to work with many bio-innovation start-ups, assisting with technology/product appraisal, life cycle management, demand analysis/forecasting, business development and business modelling. The combination of this role with her pharmaceutical industry experience yielded a unique skills set, and she then turned her attention to leading the establishment of industry development programmes, characterised by collaborative industry-innovation structures that assemble key role players in a partnership that can collectively address hurdles to growth and competitiveness within an industry. Sarusha spearheaded such programmes for Medical Devices and Diagnostics, Active Pharmaceutical Ingredients, and Nuclear Medicines. Over the past 16 years Sarusha has built advanced stakeholder relationships with local and international business partners and government players. She is commercially minded and innovative, adopts a pro-active approach to problem solving and has a keen sense of systems thinking. In recognition of her professional achievements, Sarusha was a national finalist in the, ‘Standard Bank Rising Star Awards’, for the category, ‘Service: Public and Private’, in 2018. Her ambition is to transition into entrepreneurship, and she relocates from South Africa to Ireland in where she aims to establish a sustainable health-tech start-up. Her academic qualifications include and MBA (University of Stellenbosch, 2014), a Post Graduate Diploma in Management Practice (University of Cape Town, 2008), a Diploma in Production Management (Damelin College. 2005) and a B. Pharmacy (University of Port Elizabeth, 2004). Sarusha enjoys spending quality time with family and friends, a perfect Sunday is good food, good conversation and board games.