Biotech VC turned
Bio-Futurist, Keynote Speaker and SF Writer
About
Dr. Elsa Sotiriadis is a synthetic biologist, bio-futurist and science fiction writer (Elsa Solaris) interested in fixing the world with the science of biohacking.
As a venture capital investor, she helped invest in, build and launch 25 pioneering biotech startups and during her Ph.D. at Imperial College London and HKU, she worked on making DNA nanorobots to kill cancer cells. She has been featured by Silicon Republic as one of 15 women to follow in biotech, worked with the BBC on an eco-fiction show and her debut novelette Replicon won an honorable mention at the Writers of the Future competition in Hollywood, L.A.
Prior to this, she worked in the field of startup-driven innovation and emering technologies as management consultant for F500 companies covering areas like artificial intelligence and robotics.
Today, she’s a Bio-Futurist to combine it all - what the heck is that? That means she helps others understand how emerging (bio)technologies change our lifes and how to use science fiction to accelerate disruptive business innovation. For this, she uses her technological and company-building expertise paired with her visionary science fiction mindset.
For instance, she helped an iconic ICT/tech company to innovate key business areas by harnessing digital biology and cyberpunk-inspired interfaces. She also writes science fiction and travels the world as a keynote speaker (all flights are carbon neutral).
Check out the Book Bazaar for forthcoming books.
Psst - she became a cyborg live on stage to tweet by handswipe...and trigger a genetic orchestra.
The mission
We tend to overestimate what we can do in a short amount of time (look at our to do lists!) but underestimate what we can achieve in a decade. That's because our thinking is linear. However, disruptive technologies are accelerating exponentially fast. So we need to bridge that gap. Science fiction can help us do that.
The Biofuturist's mission is to help companies use science fiction prototyping to create products that solve tomorrow's problem.
Elsa is an experienced and popular global keynote speaker and innovation consultant on the disruption between biology and technology. She delivers highly tailored keynotes for corporate and public events as well as bespoke workshops and innovation consulting services.
Topics include:
- The digital biology revolution - dystopia or utopia?
- Human augmentation: How we are biohacking our relationship with love, death and our own evolution
- From sci-fi to reality: How companies can unleash moonshot thinking for disruptive innovation
What clients say
Working with The Biofuturist helped us understand the innovation potential of digital biology from an ICT perspective, both strategically and technically and find practical ways and contacts how we can deliver value to our customers in the future.
Derrick Nirmalan, Director - Research Planning
A Global Top 3 Tech/ICT Company
Elsa is both professional and personal and I love that combo. She provided great examples and ideas on stage and was very helpful beforehand with prep calls etc. Also, I love that she attended the rest of the conference and mingled with the attendees. |
Dr. Elsa Sotiriadis was an absolute enrichment for our Children |
Elsa has been incredibly receptive to our suggestions and managed to weave a red thread throughout her inspirational opening keynote, presenting a motley of exciting biological technologies and visions of future to our astounded attendees. |
The Oxford University Scientific Society was delighted to host Dr. Elsa Sotiriadis as our speaker. Dr. Sotiriadis joined our elite list of speakers (which includes numerous Nobel Prize winners) as she enthralled her audience by combining her technical rigour with her sci-fi inspired visions of the future of humanity. |
Elsa is a superb speaker with an amazing ability to distil the most complex scientific ideas into easy to follow talks. Elsa kindly agreed to talk at the Imperial College London Fringe Festival where she spoke about biohacking. |
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Speaking Examples
Elsa Sotiriadis: The next big tech revolution could change our species forever
When the next great software revolution is life itself, you will never look at yourself the same way again. If the lines between humans and machines are blurring, how digital do we want to become? In this eye-opening talk, Dr. Elsa Sotiriadis, a bio-futurist and real-life cyborg, dives into a terrifying and uplifting world, where science fiction is becoming reality.
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Latest Releases
BBC's flagship eco-science fiction thriller FOREST 404 starring Dr. Who's Pearl Mackie. Listen here.
The Writers of the Future Honorable Mention Winner is a novelette about a trauma-plagued geek battling for survival in a bioengineered future. Buy it here.