Our Team

Lucy Smith

Lucy Smith is Head of Transformation at the Materials Processing Institute, Co-chair of the Critical Minerals Association Circular Economy Committee and part of the Transforming Foundation Industries Future Leaders Group. Lucy has a background in Materials Engineering, Environmental Management, Material Sustainability, and Circular Economy.

"I love working in the Foundation Industries (FIs), but to achieve Net Zero and delivery on the Sustainable Development Goals, we need to change the way we manage innovation; we can't do things as we've always done them. FIVe is our answer to unblocking some of the challenges faced by start-ups and spin outs by accelerating sustainable innovation across the FIs."

Sarah Harrold

Sarah Harrold is Strategic Partnership Lead at Glass Futures, where she develops networks, partnerships and strategies for collaborative programmes. With a background in materials science and engineering, Sarah previously led the technical delivery of the Transforming Foundation Industries Challenge at Innovate UK, where the concept of FIVe was born.

"The Foundation Industries are integral to all UK manufacturing supply chains, and therefore the sustainability of all of the products that we manufacture. As such, there is a huge driver to transform, and incremental innovation will not get us there in the timelines required. Disruptive transformation can be so difficult to see from within an organisation and this is where FIVe comes in: connecting fantastic innovators from spin-outs and startups into a supportive ecosystem to demonstrate their concepts at scale and get their products and services to market."