Advisory Board

Mr Larry Lopez BSc
Larry Lopez is Executive Director of RedDog Capital Partners, a technology focused investment bank in Perth, Western Australia. Prior to co-founding RedDog Capital Partners, Lopez spent 18 years at Silicon Valley Bank (SVB) Financial Group, a publicly traded US bank (NASDAQ: SIVB) occupying a variety of executive roles including President of the SVB private bank, Managing Director of SVB Securitises and and Managing Director of the International Venture Group. During his tenure at SVB the company managed several billion dollars of funds ranging from venture capital and private equity to fund of funds. Larry served on various management committees of the Bank including the Bank’s Loan Committee, Information Technology Committee, Internet Committee, International Committee, Joint Leadership Committee and Employee Recognition Committee. During Lopez’s tenure at SVB, beginning in 1997, the group made over 300 investments.

Whilst Larry was the Managing Director of SVB’s International Venture Capital Group (SVB Global Financial Services), where he was responsible for working with foreign venture capitalists, investors and businesses to facilitate foreign technology and life science companies interested in expanding to the United States. In this capacity he was also responsible for the Bank’s foreign venture capital activities and investments in Europe, Australia, Israel and New Zealand. Larry also worked with government agencies in Australia, England, Israel, Sweden and New Zealand to assist investment communities with the development of venture capital policy and investment models to enhance growth in emerging technology and life science sectors.

Larry has served as non-executive Chairman of Steele Productions in Belmont, California and Atrico in Perth, Australia. He was on the investment committee at the IdeaHub in London and on the Advisory Boards of eChron in Stockholm and Crossbow Ventures in West Palm Beach, Florida. Lopez is currently on the Advisory Boards of Bandwidth Capital, Blumberg Capital and Stone Ridge Ventures. Larry is non-executive director of NWQ Capital Management in Perth, Australia.

Lopez earned a Bachelor of Science degree in business administration from Menlo College and is a graduate of Pacific Coast Banking School at the University of Washington. In 1980 Lopez completed a six-month internship at the Council for Inter-American Security in Washington, DC, where he focussed on open market economic policy in developing economies. Larry is fluent in Spanish and English.

Professor Fiona Wood AM
Fiona Wood, AM is a plastic surgeon working in Perth, Western Australia. She is the director of the Royal Perth Hospital burns unit and the Western Australia Burns Service. In addition, Dr Wood is also a Clinical Professor with the School of Paediatrics and Child Health at the University of Western Australia and Director of the McComb Research Foundation. She was named Australian of the Year for 2005 by Australian Prime Minister John Howard at a ceremony in Canberra to mark Australia Day.

She has become world renowned for her patented invention of spray on skin for burns victims, a treatment which is continually developing. Where previous techniques of skin culturing required 21 days to produce enough cells to cover major burns, Fiona has reduced that period to five days. Via her research, Fiona found that scarring is greatly reduced if replacement skin could be provided within 10 days.

In October 2002, Fiona was propelled into the media spotlight when the largest proportion of survivors from the Bali bombings arrived at Royal Perth Hospital. She led a courageous and committed team in the fight to save 28 patients suffering from between two and 92 per cent body burns, deadly infections and delayed shock.

Professor Neil Weste BSc, BE, PhD
Neil Weste is one of Australia’s most successful technology entrepreneurs, having co- founded Radiata Communications, a developer of WLAN chipsets and on sold to Cisco Systems in 2001 for some $500M. After exiting Radiata, Neil started his own angel investment company, NHEW R&D Pty Ltd. This has led to investments in four companies so far, including, g2microsystems (active RFID), Emotiv Systems (brain waves for PC games) and Avega Systems (WiFi HiFi). Since 1999, Neil has been an advisor to the Australian Government on technology R&D issues. Initially, as a member of the Australian Research Council’s IT committee, responsible for assessment of university R&D projects and subsequently as a member, then chairman of the Australian Government AusIndustry IT&T Commercial Ready Committee, responsible for R&D grants. Previously, Neil was a member of the Australian Government’s Industrial Research and Development (IR&D) Board which oversees many of the Australian Government’s R&D incentive schemes.

Neil holds a BSc, BE and PhD from the University of Adelaide. Neil is also an adjunct professor at Macquarie University and the University of Adelaide. Neil is a Fellow of the IEEE and was elected as a Fellow of the Australian Academy of Technological Sciences and Engineering.