CyberASAP collaborators celebrated in New Year Honours List

The New Year Honours List saw two of CyberASAP’s distinguished network of industry experts receive honours. In separate and significant ways, Budgie Dhanda and Melanie Oldman have made outstanding contributions to cyber and are best known to us as mentors and assessors for CyberASAP, the programme which provides comprehensive commercialisation support to academics in cyber.

Inclusion in the New Year Honours List is a celebration of the commitment to and influence on the sector shown by Budgie and Melanie. In expanding cyber skills and capability, building diverse communities and networks, delivering technology advantage and transforming culture, Budgie and Melanie’s work speaks to the importance of investing in the cyber community, encouraging diverse engagement, and developing the next generations’ skills in cyber.

Currently Managing Consultant at PA Consulting, Budgie was previously Co-Chair of the Cyber Security Council Formation Project. Budgie’s generous involvement with CyberASAP has seen him assess the academic teams and provide strategic advice and mentoring to many of them as they look to translate their research ideas into viable commercial propositions. “CyberASAP has been an excellent programme.  We need more innovation in cyber and we also need to increase the pool of ideas, people and companies.  Taking some great ideas from universities and putting a support wrapper around them to commercialise them has to be good for everyone.

On a personal basis, I’ve seen some great new ideas and had an opportunity to work with and learn from great entrepreneurs and business people”.

Melanie Oldman is CEO of Bob’s Business: with a strong human focus, this company is all about transforming businesses’ cybersecurity culture through training. Like Budgie, Melanie has been an independent assessor of CyberASAP teams and has also given them the kind of expert insight, support and mentoring that makes such a difference to their commercial development.

Congratulations from the CyberASAP team – it’s great to see your contributions to cyber so publicly recognised with these honours.

CyberASAP provides comprehensive commercialisation support to academic teams in cyber. Now in its fifth year, the current programme is approaching its climax with Demo Day on 17 February where our final 10 teams will be presenting their Pitches and Proofs of Concept to industry. Want to attend? 

CyberASAP is funded by the UK Government Department for Digital, Culture Media & Sport (DCMS) and delivered in partnership with Innovate UK and Innovate UK KTN.

Innovate UK KTN exists to connect innovators with new partners and new opportunities beyond their existing thinking, accelerating ambitious ideas into real-world solutions. Innovate UK KTN is part of the Innovate UK Group, the UK’s innovation agency.

CyberASAP 2022/23

Funding for CyberASAP 2022/23 has just been confirmed for academic teams with a cyber security idea they would like to commercialise. The funding competition opens on Monday 7th February 2022 and closes at 12noon on Wednesday 2nd March. To receive details of the programme and how to apply please provide your details here.