Surgeon and entrepreneur Dr Nick Hartnell has been named the Paul Shetler Disrupter of the Year at the 2025 InnovationAus Awards for his work to radically transform orthopaedic reconstruction.
Named in honour of the late Paul Shetler, inaugural chief executive of the federal government’s Digital Transformation Office and a friend to InnovationAus.com, this award recognises individuals who bring fearless ambition to solving entrenched problems.
Joining Dr Hartnell as finalists were Cool Beans Underwear founder Saara Jamieson and Uncapt founder Ebenezer Eyeson-Annan, spanning fields from advanced biomaterials to consumer technology.
Dr Hartnell, known as the ‘Bone Surgeon’ in the NSW’s Southern Highlands, won the award on Thursday night for his work transforming orthopaedic reconstruction, impressing judges with his technical depth, commercial maturity and global potential.
He founded startup Bone Ligament Tendon (BLT) after seeing first-hand the limitations of traditional metal and plastic implants – materials that have seen little meaningful innovation in decades.
BLT has pioneered a platform that uses structured collagen scaffolds – engineered to replicate the mechanical and biological properties of natural tissue – to deliver stronger, more reliable surgical outcomes.
The technology promises to rewrite what is possible in sports injury repair, trauma recovery and degenerative disease treatment, offering faster healing times and significantly reducing the risk of graft failure.
What began as a research concept has now advanced into commercial reality, with BLT preparing for clinical deployment in key international markets.
BLT’s approach is designed not only to reduce complications but to give surgeons access to implants that behave more like native tissue – a shift Dr Hartnell’s nominators described as “disruptive in the truest sense”, with clear pathways into global orthopaedics and sports medicine.
The InnovationAus 2025 Awards for Excellence are proudly supported by ACS, PEXA Group, the CSIRO ON Program, Griffith Hack, TechnologyOne, Q-CTRL, National AI Centre, University of New South Wales, KPMG, AgriFutures Australia, Investment NSW and IP Australia.
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