AXSChat with Dr. Cathy Holloway & Dr Tim Adlam
Channel: AXSChat
Date: 2019-06-14

Dr. Cathy Holloway is the Academic Director and co-founder of the Global Disability Innovation Hub (GDI Hub) and Associate Professor in UCL’s Interaction Centre. GDI Hub exists to accelerate disability innovation for a fairer world and Cathy’s research revolves around supporting this aim. GDI Hub is part of a partnership which has grown out of the Paralympic Legacy and crosses traditional discipline boundaries to pool expertise to tackle the issues faced by society in realising the Sustainable Development Goals.

Cathy has recently created the new undiscipline of Disability Interaction (DIX) which takes an issue-based design approach, drawing on specific disciplinary methods as and when required to create solutions for disabled people globally.

Cathy leads the Research and Innovation strands and is UCL PI for the of the £10m UK Department for International Development grant called AT2030. AT2030 is investing in a long-term solution to understand how we can develop a demand-driven ecosystem for AT which ensures innovations can quickly come to market globally. As part of this work Cathy leads the development of a new Inclusive Innovation ecosystem in Nairobi, Kenya whilst researching inclusive and innovation.

Catherine is a member of:

The Commission for Mission-Oriented Innovation and Industrial Strategy (MOIIS), created to solve grand challenges in innovation and industrial strategy with a mission-oriented framework.
The Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (SPSRC) Healthcare Strategic Advice team (SAT)
Prior to joining UCL Cathy worked as a Research and Development Engineer for Medtronic. Cathy is a former JSPS fellow and has delivered a range of keynotes and discussion pieces including to the British Council in Tokyo, the World Health Organisation and at the Paralympics in Rio. Cathy is also a Director and co-founder of two social enterprises – Movement Metrics and the GDI Hub Community Interest Company.



Dr Tim Adlam is an Associate Professor of Global Disability Innovation at the Global Disability Innovation Hub in UCL, London. He is also Principal Engineer at Designability, an engineering and design charity in Bath. Tim has over 20 years of experience creating useful and usable technology for adults and children with physical and cognitive disability; and is co-director of UCL’s MSc in Disability, Design and Innovation.

Tim is working to enable disabled children to discover what they can do, and explore their full capability to express their rights as children and disabled people. Like all of us, they learn to move, and move to learn; discovering themselves, their community, the world, and their place in it as they explore.

Tim is leading research in technology to support functioning and participation in children with complex movement disorders; and sustainable global approaches to powered mobility for young children. Tim’s current portfolio includes a clinical trial of seats for children with dystonia and the evaluation of powered mobility for preschool children in Kenya. Previous projects at Designability include development of the Wizzybug powered wheelchair for preschool children, a modular robot for care (CHIRON project), and the Gloucester Smart House for people with dementia.

Before working in disability innovation, Tim was a production engineer for a bridge girder manufacturer, where he modified and recommissioned four 50m long goliath cranes.

Tim is a chartered engineer and a clinical scientist. He loves being dad to both his children, one of whom is an adventurous neurodiverse 14 year old with cerebral palsy, from whom he has learned much about what matters and what children can do.