Melanie has a Masters degree in Innovation and Marketing and is currently completing a Masters degree in Biomimicry. Previously, she launched a successful digital startup in the UK, creating impetus for her next move into the innovation consulting arm at the University of Sussex Innovation Centre in the UK.

There, she co- designed hundreds of business models, ranging from the electric car charging posts to game design. In that capacity, she contributed to winning awards such as ‘UK Business Incubator of the Year’ and the ’Queen’s Award for Enterprise’. She was asked to deliver innovation keynotes to the European Union and to judge the prestigious Eureka Prize.

More recently, in the Australian university sector, she has negotiated and managed multi-million-dollar cross-sector research projects, launched investor networks and turned cultures around (winning an international award for impact in this arena). She now co-facilitates the NASA 4-D program for high-performing teams and is the first Australian businesswoman to qualify in the practice of biomimicry. She lives with her husband and dog, Holly, at the foot of the Blue Mountains in Sydney and plays piano, guitar and kayaks on the Nepean River for a change of pace.