Dr Kate Turner-Smith

director

CONTACT

[email protected]

EDUCATION

B.Sc. Med (Hons); PhD; MBA
(University of Cape Town)

I have a passion for innovation and entrepreneurship, particularly in the fields of science and engineering. As an investment principal and an incubation manager at Savant, I get to work with very smart and innovative people and businesses – like FACTS. Working with the team at FACTS is incredibly rewarding.

EXPERIENCE AND SKILLS

Venture building
Investments
Financial analysis
Technology and IP evaluation

BIOGRAPHY

Kate is a scientist and an entrepreneur at heart, but with a keen commercial mindset. She has co-founded two start-ups, and spent over 10 years as a research analyst in international and local investment banks, covering SA and SSA healthcare, real estate, telecommunications and media companies. Through Savant, she has also invested time, effort and funding in almost 30 technology start-ups.

Savant was co-founded by Kate in 2004, with a mission to help businesses based on South African-developed science and engineering innovations to get to market successfully. Savant supports long-term economic growth and job creation by selecting, mentoring and incubating the best technology innovators and entrepreneurs South Africa has to offer. Savant’s 26 companies have created over 250 jobs, raised more than R180 million in funding and generated in excess of R3.5billion in revenue.

When Kate isn’t buried in spreadsheets or cheerleading entrepreneurs, she enjoys reading, bird watching, hiking, and riding her mountain bike (slowly).