Cambridge Angels has appointed its first female chair in Pam Garside.
The healthcare specialist will succeed Simon Thorpe from the start of October when his three-year tenure in the position comes to an end.
Founded in 2001, Cambridge Angels is a group of 60 high net-worth investors with proven track records as entrepreneurs which invested in 48 deals in 2021 alone.
Garside, a healthcare management consultant, is an angel investor in HealthTech startups.
A fellow of the Judge Business School at the University of Cambridge and a member of the investment committee of Cambridge Enterprise, she founded and co-chairs The Cambridge Health Network.
She is also a board member of Crown Place VCT, charities Whizz-Kidz and Punchdrunk, and several startups.
“Most of my time as chair has been through the unanticipated challenges of a pandemic which has brought about interesting and, in some cases, enduring changes to our model,” said Thorpe. “It has been a great honour to chair Cambridge Angels and I have thoroughly enjoyed doing so.
“Pam has been a member of Cambridge Angels since 2017 and has been on the board since October 2018. She is a very active contributor to our group and to the board and is an active angel investor.
“Our focus is on DeepTech and HealthTech and the future is very much IP and data rich; in turn, these strengths represent the future hope for the UK economy.”
He added: “While the majority of businesses we support will be based in the [Cambridge] cluster we also push wider, into London and Manchester among other UK locations; also, we have members in California, although we don’t ordinarily invest there.”