Cover Interview
“If you have a controversial piece of technology you have to be the person setting the agenda and controlling it’s message”
a big impact on preventing blindness caused by Vitamin-A deficiency in children, which is endemic in many parts of Africa.
“Secondly, at Aquapharm our first drug discovery programs have been focused on discovering new antibiotics because they have been abused and many nasty bugs like MRSA are becoming resistant very quickly. We were recently proud to announce that we’ve found two brand new classes of antibiotic that are effective against a lot of resistant gram- positive infections.
“Also, it’s now accepted practise to develop drugs needed by everyone – rich and poor – using a ‘tiered-pricing’ approach that means products can be sold at a profit in countries which can afford it and at cost in countries where they can’t.”
With that answer, Professor Best removed even the smallest glimmer of doubt I may have had in an instant, proving to be not just a seasoned entrepreneur who had successfully taking advantage of the growing Biotech industry, but a thoughtful man who seemed to truly understand his unique contribution to the world. Simon tells me that he has dealt with far worse in terms of the public opinion of scientific advancements, particularly whilst working within the GM food space. He divulges one of the biggest lessons he has learnt as an entrepreneur and scientist. “I knew a guy called Roger Salquist and he was one of the pioneers of GM Foods in the USA. He was the CEO of a company called Calgene and he and I were mortal enemies for a long while because we were both working on the same technology.
“We had a patent dispute and we settled it by his company taking fresh tomatoes and mine taking processed tomatoes forward to market. Through that dispute, Roger taught me how to deal with anti-science activists, the media, regulators and government.
“He told me that as an entrepreneur or a scientist you had to be right there from the beginning. If you knew you had a controversial piece of technology you had to be the first person to set the agenda and control the messaging behind what you were doing before anyone else did.
“He also taught me not to believe what the media or anti- biotech activists say that ordinary consumers feel – you always need to go and talk directly to the public. That made a huge difference in the US and largely explains why they accepted GM technology in the US and not in Europe. It is
because the industry made direct contact with thousands of consumers from across the US and listened to what they liked and didn’t like.”
And despite the US being quicker on the mark in its support for scientific innovation, Simon remains proud of the UK for nurturing Biotech companies. “The beauty of Biotechnology is that it provides the tools to understand the problems we’re trying to solve and then to design very specific solutions with minimal impact. The UK is very successful in building globally competitive Bio-Pharma companies and university rankings are reflective too. The UK ranks 7th in the top 20 of the world’s universities for biotech and we are number 2 in patent filings just behind the US.
I think that’s something to be proud and excited about and I’m looking forward to seeing what the future holds.”
Simon Best continues to fulfill his passion for music 13 entrepreneurcountry
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48 |
Page 49 |
Page 50 |
Page 51 |
Page 52 |
Page 53 |
Page 54 |
Page 55 |
Page 56 |
Page 57 |
Page 58 |
Page 59 |
Page 60