Marina Santilli

Marina has played a pivotal role in the formation of many successful UCL spinouts since she joined in 2007, with a particular focus on AI companies, both foundational and applied.

A key objective during her Knowledge Transfer career has been to improve transparency and build for scale in the research commercialisation process. She has delivered a range of well-received initiatives in this area which also serve to cultivate academic entrepreneurialism, supporting the transition from research-led to market-led opportunity assessment and development. She was a contributor to TenU’s USIT Guide for spinouts, bringing her experience in developing and launching ‘Portico Ventures’ at UCL; a low-friction spinout path for researchers commercialising know-how or software.

In 2010 Marina conceived and developed E-lucid, an online platform to simplify licensing of intellectual property. The product has itself spun out and the service is sold to research institutions worldwide, generating significant revenue for them from previously hidden assets.

Prior to UCL Business, Marina was Director of Product Development at Verizon and worked in a software start-up.