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In this episode, I had the opportunity to talk with Megan Steele, from CGIAR Accelerate for Impact Platform. Perhaps more accurately, she spoke with me as I offered my thoughts on Scouting and Mobilising Intellectual Property.
We frame the conversation around a series of questions 'What problem are you solving?', 'How can you solve this problem and create value for stakeholders?' through to 'What does your solution / contribution look like?' I reflect on the phenomenon of technologies looking for problems to solve rather than starting with the problem in mind. A concept we often discuss with guests and indeed, with our partners at Spiegare, is the Value Pool and the importance of considering the breadth of partnerships needed to bring technologies into utilisation and the distribution of benefits among those Value Pool participants.
While the webinar involved some slides, I hope that the conversation and subsequent questions catalyse some thoughts around the early considerations in mobilising Intellectual Property. The webinar is also accessible as are the other related webinars from Maurice Moloney and Anne Roulin.
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In this episode, we discuss the current challenges in tech transfer capacity, capabilities and resourcing within the Australian innovation system with Natalie Chapman. Natalie found her passion for tech transfer in her time at the Australian Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation (ANSTO) after a short stint in the finance sector. Missing the science, she found a way to combine her interests in science and commercial outcomes, bringing together technology and industry opportunities. In 2012, Natalie established gemaker, who provide tech transfer communications, consulting and advisory services to the Australian research and private sectors.
We explore the absence of the tech transfer community’s voice in current discussions around innovation and research, and the pathways to and interfaces with industry and government policies. We discuss the challenges that are being presented as multiple, arguably uncoordinated innovation programs are initiated from various government departments and statutory corporate entities. These efforts, while arguably well intended, are straining the available Tech Transfer Office (TTO) resources, be it through work volume or through loss of capacity as programs compete for talent to drive innovation and tech transfer. The problem is exacerbated by a lack of pathway and training for entrants to the profession which is compounded by a lack of industrial experience amongst new hires.
Natalie outlines the case for TTO investment, framed around the returns on public monies invested in research and innovation. This is a contrast to a more typical cost-centre framing when looking at organisational and divisional budget allocations. We explore FOMO, a related Australian innovation culture challenge (also related to the reluctance to say “no”), and the importance of managing risk through active portfolio management and market intelligence gathering to underpin decision making.
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Saknas det avsnitt?
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In this episode, we discuss a different lens through which to look at entrepreneurship with John Bloomer. John has taken a journey from chemistry to agricultural seed technologies through advisory and board roles to his newly found vocation within the Church of England. John started his career at ICI and through a period of active mergers and acquisitions through the 1980s and 1990s, arrived at Syngenta, establishing the wheat and barley breeding business and migrating into an intrapreneur role with that organisation, before heading into independent consulting. His current business activities, alongside being a priest and chaplain, include advisory work with a range of agritech companies, Non-Executive Director with Elsoms Seeds, and co-founding TraitSeq as a spin-out from the Earlham Institute.
We explore his twin journeys through technology transfer and theology, and reflect on the Doctrine of Participation that John wrote about in Faith in Business Quarterly. We explore how his faith, science and technology commercialisation sit alongside each other and some unusual moments of transition (where John started pitching God alongside pitching business ideas!) and his reflections from his theological studies and training at Westcott House at Cambridge. John discusses how he sees strong compatibility between his theological and scientific training, framing these in terms of the why and how of the world around us.
The Doctrine of Participation connects to entrepreneurship and technology transfer through five features. We explore how the infinite of theology and the typically finite value that technology transfer activities merge to create new opportunities. These, and the overarching doctrine (which is a theological perspective or framework) reveal some interesting perspectives on how entrepreneurs and technology transfer activities are creative as part of the broader world, be it economic, social and / or theological. John highlights the need for relationships (over transactions, a concept the podcast explored with David Mitchell) and how relationships drive building the networks that underpin successful technology transfer, built on humility, selflessness, curiosity, perseverance and an unconventional mindset.
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In this episode, we have the opportunity to reflect on the recent National Innovation Policy Forum in Canberra last month with my colleague, Dr Faisal Younus, who participated in the event. Thanks to Cooperative Research Australia, we also have been able to weave some excerpts from the panels into our discussions to try to offer some reflections and insights from the day’s events.
We open with Faisal’s key reflection from the Welcome to Country, followed by some of what Minister Ed Husic said in his keynote address.
We then look to the scale up challenge, which was initially identified at the same event 12 months ago and discussed on the podcast with Dr Katherine Woodthorpe AO in January 2023. With a brief reflection on the challenge of needing midsize firms to take up innovation yet noting their dwindling numbers in the Australian economy, we then reflect on comments made by Dr Cathy Foley AO and Professor Roy Green. We also touch upon the challenging policy landscape over the past 30 years, and the dispersion of investments and resources, likened to the spreading of Vegemite on toast.
We follow these government challenges with a few reflections on competition, or perhaps hyper competition, in the innovation system, before turning to the role of markets and the need to be solving a problem. This was highlighted in some of the remarks made by Dr Leanna Read, and Glenn Keys from Aspen Medical. We explore the notion of whether patenting could be the very beginning or the end of the beginning depending on the philosophies of market pull or tech push in various parts of the innovation ecosystem. Time, the one non-renewable resource, which we explored on the podcast with Allison Haitz and through soliloquy in 2022, where Glenn Keys and Phil Morle shared some perspectives from the podium.
We close by drawing some thoughts and themes from the panels around the innovation culture in Australia and the need for collaboration, which was encapsulated by Sally Ann Williams in her remarks, and the complexities and chaos of collaboration remarked upon by Catherine Livingstone AO.
While we couldn’t draw together all the incredible content from the panels, our thanks go to the other panellists who provided the inspiration for this podcast. Professor Andrew Parfitt, Matthew Wilson, Sophia Hamblin Wang, Professor Elanor Huntington, Dr Kerstin Oberprieler, Julia Spicer OAM, Dr Michelle Simmons and Dr Cori Stewart.
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In this episode, I have the great pleasure of having our first omnipresent guest, Jim Lane, who is everywhere within the biobased economy with his leading daily publication The Digest. In the midst of driving the Bold Goals Initiative, catalysed by the US Inflation Reduction Act, and running the Advanced Bioeconomy Leadership Conference (ABLC), we catch up with Jim on current perspectives on the bioeconomy and a little soothsaying on what the next few years might look like.
We take a broad tour across ethanol, bio and renewable diesel, biochemicals, biomaterials and hydrogen. We briefly examine the origins of the current North American bioeconomy from the mid-00’s, reflecting on the drive for employment, energy security and emissions reduction and how the financial crash of 2008 and the discovery of shale gas affected early growth.
Through our discussions Jim introduces a concept of 'Skyfill', to describe carbon emissions (akin to Landfill for material waste) and reflects on the need for transparent mechanisms for dealing with carbon and the inevitable unaffordability of government subsidies currently seeking to drive industrial and consumer behavioural change. Jim refers to this situation as 'unsustainability in the name of sustainability'!
We touch on feedstocks and the lack of abundance of what we need, arguing we have too many sugars and too few oils from which to drive the industrial bioeconomy. Jim reflects on a little industrial history as we discuss the current energy and chemical market structures and how some thought should be given to not creating future strong oligopolies when it is hard to anticipate what the right mix of technology solutions might be. In discussing transport, while I suggested thermodynamic efficiency should be the key driver, Jim points to economics and consumer preferences that will drive consumer behaviour, particularly in transport (energy) markets.
We close by traversing the world of biopolymers, the challenges around no renewable chemicals standards (unlike fuels), how drop in molecular equivalent products are playing out against their functional equivalents (or new polymers) in the market and the respective challenges in delivering functional, cost-in-use competitive products. Jim concludes with some optimism, noting that we need to grow faster to meet the carbon targets being set by governments and the private sector.
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I'm delighted to bring you a special podcast leading up to the 2023 National Innovation Policy Forum, presented by Cooperative Research Australia, to bring leaders from business, government, research – and boundary spanning organisations to focus on the future of the Australian innovation system.
I had the opportunity to have a pre-forum conversation with co-patrons Catherine Livingstone AO and David Thodey AO for their thoughts on the current innovation landscape, the role of policy, and the importance of a shared vision for Australia's future. In our discussions we touch on the notion that innovation is a fundamental part of what we do as individuals and as a society and discuss how that inherent tendency intersects with government policy and its role in the national innovations system. We touch on the challenge of individuals being caught in small pockets of the system and the need to view the broader innovation landscape, the previous diagnoses of the innovation system, most recently reflected on by Dr John Howard and the need to reach beyond the political cycle to establish stable policies that encourage longer term investment from research and corporate sectors.
We also set the scene for the Forum around the challenges of translation and scaling innovation into successful businesses. We reflect on research translation and the gap between innovation exiting the research and early stage (venture) sectors and moving through scale and into more commercial, customer orientated settings and explore aspects of market, research culture and the local tolerance of failure.
We hope you enjoy this special podcast that sets the stage for the National Innovation Policy Forum, where these critical discussions will unfold.
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In this episode, I have the great pleasure of having our first guest, Maurice Moloney, make a return appearance to revisit what’s been happening in protein over the past two years since our first discussion. Coming off the back of the International Rapeseed Congress (in September 2023), we explore the decline, or indeed collapse, of the alt-meat market and what the prospects are for it reaching its next growth phase. The role of plant sciences in supporting the alt-protein scale up, and particularly brassica species, is also explored.
We specifically reflect on the importance of ingredients in the alt-protein space and Maurice’s interest in growth factors for cellular agriculture through Core Biogenesis. We discuss the importance of a diversity of addressable markets for emerging technologies and product offerings.
The importance of alternative casein for alt-dairy markets is discussed through the lens of Miruku, where Maurice is in a science advisory role and we also reflect on the utility of safflower as an oilseed, not only for Miruku but also the role it has played from its use in the Crop Biofactories Initiative (funded by GRDC and CSIRO) and currently being commercialised by Go Resources.
Maurice shares his reflections on the challenges that plant-science can address for alt-protein and the importance of processing technologies to improve texture and mouth feel in this product category. We close our discussions reflecting on the emerging opportunities and challenges for the alt-protein market.
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In this episode, my guest is Shona Faber, Non-Executive Director of ARB Corporation, previously Managing Director CRC Industries, and General Manager of Specialty Gases & Chemicals at BOC. We talk about her experiences in bringing EDN, a novel fumigant chemical, licensed from CSIRO Entomology to market in her role at BOC. In discussing the journey that unfolded in this product coming to market, we touch on risk management and managing constant change as a new chemical is shepherded through various regulatory systems to market. We also reflect on a few key moments as we look at how the relationship between the licensee and licensor unfolded, and the twists and turns associated in any post-license engagements. We also touch on the role Dravlovska has played on the journey to global product launch.
Shona shares her journey into tech transfer from the bench to the boardroom, and how her interest in customers and problem solving took her to solving complex product marketing challenges in a number of heavy industries. What really resonates is that in managing risk there also comes a bravery to act in getting things done in complex environments. We also discuss how assumptions and conditions for success are critical to establishing a shared view between partners on what are typically convoluted journeys.
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In this episode we talk with Elena Kelareva, CEO and Founder of GippsTech, about her experiences in establishing innovation systems in regional areas, and her reflections on the behavioural and cultural settings behind successful regional innovation ecosystems. We touch on the definition of tech transfer and tease out a distinction between innovation translating scientific outcomes and entrepreneurship, the latter being more broadly around the establishment of ventures to address new opportunities.
Elena has a diverse background having completed her PhD and having also worked in a number of product development roles including Google Maps. Elena recognised the opportunities associated with regional entrepreneurship and established Gippstech to build new networks and ecosystems to stimulate new venture establishment. Through her efforts she has identified the importance of behaviours and culture in building distributed innovation ecosystems and the key success factors in these ecosystems. We also discuss her observations that 'fly-in, fly-out' advisory services have limited sustained ecosystem impact in regional areas but FIFO does have a role in some specialisations.
Elena also shares her observations in agtech innovation and identifies the need for 'digital agronomists'. She identifies some success criteria for agtech innovation and has seen most success where producers with specific technical skills sets can leverage their production experience to address particular challenges and opportunities. She shares a terrific example around Invest in your Farmer from Northeast Victoria.
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In this episode we had the chance to catch up with Cameron Hibbert, a long-standing colleague and friend, who has been in global licensing roles at LyondellBassell Industries and Genomatica. We talk about when I first met Cameron at Montell and his journey to Germany through carrying responsibility for technology transfer at the Geelong polypropylene production plant. We explore his experiences moving from licensee to licensor in his role with LyondellBassell Industries, taking responsibility for polyolefin licensing activities.
Cameron had somewhat of a biobased epiphany around 15 years ago as the early foundations were being poured for the global industrial biobased economy. We discuss what drew him towards Genomatica and the different licensing perspectives, from working with well-established technologies to being present for the first few licenses of the 1,4 BDO technology licensed to Novamont and, more recently, Cargill. We wrap up our chat with some reflections on why transactions don’t work out sometimes, and the importance of competencies and relationships.
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In this episode, we were pleased to have a wide-ranging discussion with Professor Paul Wood AO. We talk about his start at CSIRO and the pathway to his breakthrough in TB tests for cattle in the Northern Territory, and how it opened a pathway into animal and human health research leadership. We discuss a few 'sliding door' moments with Paul around Qiagen, Cellestis, CSL and Pfizer, and how he ended up with the 'keys to the lolly shop' with Pfizer Animal Health (now Zoetis) in North America.
On Paul’s return to Australia, as both mentor and entrepreneur, we discuss external collaborations, coaching and the need to be thinking globally early in terms of markets and financing. We close with Paul’s reflections on innovation leadership and management in Australia, and his current commentary and insights into the tech transfer challenges of alt-protein, pointing to the Business 101 failures as much as the scale-up challenges.
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In this episode, I have the great privilege of chatting with Alan Finkel. We revisit key formative moments at Monash University and ANU, and the opportunities that emerged from the challenge of accessing and developing the best fit for purpose equipment. We discuss the difference between framing questions and solving problems through a discussion of the Engineering Method, an approach that underpins Alan’s career at Axon Instruments and beyond. Through instrument development, Alan recognises that development needs to be orientated towards needs, those spoken and those yet to be identified, and move past 'what a customer wants'.
We spoke of time, timing and timeliness in Podcast 13 and we discuss a terrific example of how networks and preparedness catalyse the first key inflection point in the journey of Axon Instruments. That preparedness is founded on the bedrock of 'The Relentless Pursuit of Quality'. We then discuss the growth of Axon, covering subsequent product launches and explore the one year that didn’t quite meet expectations, reflecting on market surveys and the internal rigour needed for market intelligence and its interpretation.
Our discussion then moves towards post Axon life, a moment of (failed) retirement and the next journeys undertaken with The Florey Institute, Chancellor of Monash University and Chief Scientist of Australia. We close on reflecting on the role the Chief Scientist plays in Australia and in technology transfer closing with Alan’s current writings on the current renewable energy transition.
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In this episode, we continue our discussions with Paul Martin exploring the challenges of clean hydrogen scale up, the market forces and Hopium driving current government and industry activity. We discuss distributed production of ammonia and urea and the impact of diseconomies of scale and consequences of parallelisation. We reflect on alternative feedstocks, such as lignocellulose, with a passing nod to our mutual colleague Paul Bryan, and how Wright’s Law of the cost benefits arising from increasing scale and experience may not apply as anticipated by many in the race to scale green hydrogen production.
We close out our discussions reflecting on the next journey with Spitfire Research, the joy and hazards of providing 'unvarnished advice', maintaining a healthy scepticism as part of the technology transfer journey and making sure the right resources flow into the right opportunities. -
In this episode, we are delighted to have Lesley Lightfoot and Jeremy Wurm join us from Brooker Consulting discussing the challenges of building the right teams in the early stages of technology transfer and new ventures. We look at their philosophies and approaches on how to engage candidates for the dynamic roles associated with startups. We discuss the 'Founder's Dilemma' around building teams and the catalytic role that strong HR Due Diligence processes can have in getting the right people at the right time. We also discuss the 'shopping list job description' and how seeking aspirational 'unicorn' candidates often leads to pragmatic 'zebra' hiring outcomes! We conclude, perhaps unsurprisingly, on the importance of culture.
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In this episode, we are delighted to have Paul Martin join us to explore the challenges of clean hydrogen scale up, the market forces, and Hopium driving current government and industry activity.
In Part 1 of our discussions with Paul, we reflect on the history of hydrogen as a fuel, which traces it way back to the 1990s, the rise of Hopium and the associated belief systems that don’t pay the attention to thermodynamics that they should! We explore the current sources and uses of hydrogen, the 'colours of euphemisms' and why hydrogen is good in its current use cases but generally an inappropriate compound for energy applications.
We close discussing green hydrogen in its current uses has inherent advantages being produced and then converted nearby at scale into advantaged industrial compounds.
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In this episode, Dr Katherine Woodthorpe AO joins us to explore the challenges of moving from start-up to scale-up. From addressing foundational tech transfer challenges such as articulating product benefits and identifying market needs, we discuss tech transfer as being the first step on a journey of technology commercialisation and business establishment. Scaling up emerged from the recent National Innovation Policy Forum as a challenge to the Australian innovation ecosystem and we explore the contrasting nature of ICT and bio-physical technology scale up challenges. Katherine reflects on observations from Fishburners and Cicada Innovation, their respective supporting ecosystems and the pathway to the first Minimum Viable Product and ongoing product and market development.
We also explore the strategy of shelving IP, and whether it’s a deliberate or emergent strategy and the factors that influence shelving, such as people, timing, market analysis and resources and touching on the ability to say 'no' - the 'sunk cost' fallacy as a countervailing force to saying 'no' and the ability to strategically assess patenting options. We reflect on the nuances Australian system of the need to publish in contrast to the need for secrecy around know-how to create value and the domestic settings around academic career development and the ability or inability to migrate between the university and CSIRO research communities and industry.
An episode for those working at the intersection of start-up and scale-up challenges.
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In Part 2 of our discussions with Dr Victor Pantano, co-founder and former CEO of Digitalcore and current Director of Liquid Instruments, we hear about the highs and lows of taking a deep tech start up along the journey from establishment, through market engagement, team building, growth and financing rounds to exit success.
Building upon our last podcast with Victor, the conversation reinforces our earlier discussions around a risk balanced approach to due diligence, the importance of people and role timing has in new ventures (as we explored in our September podcast). The dynamic external environment, the changing needs of investors and the hard yards of building business with customers are all explored in this fascinating discussion. A must listen episode for anyone contemplating or indeed engaged in a tech start-up.
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In the first of two discussions with Dr Victor Pantano from ANU, Founder and former CEO of Digitalcore and current Director of Liquid Instruments, we hear about the first phase of transitioning research into a commercial spin-out including the importance of due diligence and building a comprehensive understanding of IP assets and their role in value creation.
Building upon our last podcast with Julian Turecek, our conversations with Victor really highlighted the importance of people and balancing risk in tech transfer and new venture success. What was also apparent was that the resources and time required to do so cannot be underestimated. We also hear about the complexity of the relationships and funding that enabled the research from which the technology was developed and the role of market analysis in catalysing the decision to spin out.
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In our discussion with Julian Turecek, Executive Director of Corporate Carbon, former Investment Manager at Cleantech Ventures and previously in leadership roles at Energy Australia and Origin Energy, we hear about some of his experiences and reflections on the importance of technology, teams and markets in assessing venture investments.
This podcast is timely with increasing demands on capital markets for investment in innovative and emerging technologies. Julian shares his thoughts on what matters most in assessing the numerous opportunities that are brought before investors and the challenges of anticipating 'where the puck is going to be' to paraphrase Wayne Gretzky. He reflects on his experiences in venture capital and the learnings that translate across the boundaries of innovative startups and corporate operating environments.
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We are delighted to share episode #13 where Cameron, our podcast host, reflects on the range of themes we have had through our first 12 podcasts and in which he specifically explores the importance of time and timing in tech transfer.
- Visa fler
