Dr. JiaYee Lee, Director of Strategy and Alliance, BioNTech Australia

Dr .JiaYee Lee is based at the BioNTech Innovation Centre in Melbourne where she shapes and grows the mRNA innovation ecosystem for immunotherapeutics and vaccines by engaging with researchers, clinicians and early-stage companies in advancing research translation and portfolio development. Her career spans technology innovation, venture creation, medical research, commercialisation, and policy development, giving her an end-to-end perspective on how ideas move from the lab into real-world healthcare solutions. Before joining BioNTech, JiaYee was Professor in MedTech at the University of Melbourne and Centre Director of the Centre for Advanced Defence Research and Enterprise (CADRE), where she led multidisciplinary programs at the intersection of research, industry, and national priorities. She previously served as Director of the Health and Life Sciences Business Team at National ICT Australia (NICTA, now Data61 CSIRO), driving research translation and commercialisation across diagnostic genomics, biomedical informatics, and assistive technologies. JiaYee formerly led virology research funded by the Australian National Health & Medical Research Council at the Victorian Infectious Diseases Reference Laboratory and the MacFarlane Burnet Centre (now the Burnet Institute). She currently holds an Adjunct Professor appointment at La Trobe University, Australia.