CEO and Founder
Ananda Devices, Canada
Dr Margaret Magdesian, PhD, is the CEO and founder of Ananda Devices, a Montreal based company commercializing some of the technology she developed for faster evaluation of toxicity and efficacy of medications directly on human derived neurons organized on a chip. Dr Magdesian’s technology is being used by leading biopharmaceutical companies to accelerate drug development in 14 countries and was nominated to 25 awards in science and innovation, including the Top 10 Quebec Discovery of the Year 2016, 2017 L’Oréal Women in Digital, 2018 SheEO in Canada, and 2019 Cartier Women’s Initiative Awards, 2020 Bayer Innovation. Dr Magdesian is an INSEAD fellow for entrepreneurship and she also dedicates her time to support scientific entrepreneurship and innovation. She is a judge and mentor of the Cartier Pioneer Science Entrepreneurship Award and the Vice-President of the Society of Toxicology of Canada.