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Oxford+ In Brief with Gordon Sangera, Founder of Oxford Nanopore
Entrepreneurship·Startups·Venture Capital·Strategy·Fundraising

Oxford+ In Brief with Gordon Sangera, Founder of Oxford Nanopore

Susannah de Jager·Oxford, United Kingdom

Gordon Sanghera, Oxford Nanopore co-founder, discusses how Oxford can better commercialize its scientific discoveries through faster investment, stronger late-stage development support, and more focused collaboration across fragmented research areas.

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Oxford+ In Brief with Gordon Sangera, Founder of Oxford Nanopore

Bonus · 19 Oct 2026

0:00−0:00

Featured

  • Susannah de JagerHost
  • Gordon SangheraGuest

Production

  • Matt Eastland-JonesProducer
  • Story Ninety-FourProduction Company

Show notes

What would success look like if Oxford turned more of its scientific discoveries into lasting businesses?

In this Oxford+ in Brief episode, Susannah de Jager puts a series of quick-fire questions to Oxford Nanopore co-founder Gordon Sanghera. His answer starts with homegrown companies that remain independent and create jobs and wealth in the UK. He distinguishes independence from ownership, leaving room for overseas investors without abandoning that ambition.

Gordon describes an Oxford innovation ecosystem with growing energy, pointing newcomers towards OX Tech Week and the Lamb & Flag. But he also argues that Oxford recognises promising technologies too slowly and should commit investment more quickly when a breakthrough appears credible.

Looking towards 2050, Gordon imagines stronger late-stage development support in Oxford, drawing on the Fraunhofer model. His final proposal is more focused collaboration across fragmented research and spin-outs, organised around selected areas where Oxford could build stronger technology businesses.

Gordon Sanghera: Dr Gordon Sanghera CBE is the co-founder and former Chief Executive Officer of Oxford Nanopore Technologies. He helped build the business from its formation in 2005 through to its 2021 London Stock Exchange listing. His background combines bioelectronics, product development and manufacturing, including earlier roles at MediSense working on blood glucose testing systems. In October 2026, IP Group confirmed that he had joined Matter Machine, a University of Liverpool spin-out developing AI-powered materials discovery technology, to lead its commercialisation strategy. His experience of turning university research into a commercial business informs his views on Oxford's funding and company-building challenges.

Susannah de Jager: Susannah is a seasoned professional with over 15 years of experience in UK asset management. She has worked closely with industry experts, entrepreneurs, and government officials to shape the conversation around domestic scale-up capital.

Connect with Susannah on LinkedIn and Subscribe to the Oxford+ Newsletter for Exclusive Content

Oxford+ is hosted by Susannah de Jager and supported by Mishcon de Reya and HSBC Innovation Banking.

Produced and Edited by Story Ninety-Four in Oxford, UK.

Transcript

Susannah de Jager

This is Oxford Plus in brief. Gordon, we have for Season Five continuation of the In-brief episode. So I'm going to ask you a few quick fire questions. What would success look like if we got this right? And you get to define what this is.

Gordon Sanghera

This, I think, is a series of homegrown companies that remain independent. That's not to say they can't be owned by others, foreign, national, even US, but independent, and create jobs and wealth in this country.

Susannah de Jager

What advice would you give to someone entering the Oxford ecosystem tomorrow?

Gordon Sanghera

The Oxford ecosystem is alive and kicking, I think. We had OxTech week last week. We've got a lot of things happening. I'm conflicted, but the Lamb & Flag is the place to go and find people. So you just got to get out there and go and meet these networking events that happen are quite brilliant.

Susannah de Jager

What's the best one you've been to recently out of interest?

Gordon Sanghera

I'd say OxTech week. There's been nothing like it here and it's changing and we have London Tech Week and there was Founders Forum. There's just a lot of momentum and you've got people coming in. I met Peter Gabriel at Founders Forum. His son's doing a PhD using nanopore sequencing. That is something you just wouldn't have imagined 20 years ago. I love that.

Susannah de Jager

I love that. What is Oxford great at, and what is it structurally bad at?

Gordon Sanghera

Obviously, the level of technical innovation that comes out is unparalleled, I think, globally. I think what we're not good at, we're too slow in recognising some of these breakthrough technologies. We're too cautious. We should be looking at something that looks like a breakthrough and pouring money into it like it's going out of fashion. Move faster.

Susannah de Jager

Yeah, very interesting. What do you think Oxford will look like in 2050?

Gordon Sanghera

Ooh, 2050. I believe that we are in the foothills of building out the way that we perceive MIT and Stanford, Pittsburgh is another one. Great universities that sit alongside brilliant innovation ecosystems. I'd like to believe by 2050, we will have something akin to a Franhoffer Institute in Oxford doing late stage development and really harnessing the phenomenal innovation that comes out.

Susannah de Jager

I like that. What would you do if you had a magic wand? And it's not allowed to be a football answer.

Gordon Sanghera

What would I do if I had a magic wand? If you look at all the innovation that comes out of Oxford it is somewhat fragmented and if you could group, I see certain areas of innovation and spin-outs, if you could group them somehow, it'd be hard because herding cats, and it's very fashionable for an academic to have their own personal company. But I think there will have to be a way in which we learn to create target areas, like a company would actually, the way Abbott would, right? These are the four areas we're going to work in and here are the people we're going to go and find to work in them and something like that would be really beneficial to accelerate growth of the tech sector in Oxford.

Susannah de Jager

Thank you.

Thanks for listening to this episode of Oxford+, presented by me, Susannah de Jager. If you want to stay up to date with all things Oxford+, please visit our website, oxfordplus.co.uk and sign up for our newsletter so you never miss an update. Oxford+ was made in partnership with Mishcon de Reya and is produced and edited by Story Ninety-Four.

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