Against the odds
Chris Evans is Britain鈥檚 biotech boy wonder. Aged 38, he has started about 10
companies, among them three biotech high-fliers鈥擡nzymatix, Chiroscience
and Celsis鈥攁nd has plans for dozens more. 鈥淎s soon as I have an idea, I鈥檓
already thinking about what I am going to do with it,鈥� says Evans. 鈥淚 think very
commercially.鈥� Indeed, he doesn鈥檛 believe there is such a thing as 鈥減ure鈥�
science.
Evans did his PhD at the University of Hull in two years and complains that
his postdoc years were 鈥渁 waste of time鈥� in terms of lost income. 鈥淚 don鈥檛 do
things that won鈥檛 make me money.鈥� After just two years working in other people鈥檚
biotech companies, ambition drove him to set up his own. He was 29. These days,
Evans works every day from 7 am till 1 am, which leaves very little time for
joyrides in his Aston, Ferrari or any of his eight other sports cars. But at
least he鈥檚 his own boss. 鈥淚 can鈥檛 stand working for other people,鈥� he says.
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Although he鈥檚 raised more than 拢120 million from City
investors鈥攎ore than any other British scientist, he reckons鈥攈e
didn鈥檛 always know the ins and outs of finance. To educate himself, he borrowed
other people鈥檚 business plans and made friends with financiers. He thinks
scientists are too hung up on their own genius. 鈥淭hat鈥檚 all crap,鈥� he says.
鈥淚t鈥檚 the money that allows it all to happen.鈥�
Evans simply doesn鈥檛 buy the idea that scientists aren鈥檛 respected in this
country. 鈥淚 have a higher profile because I am a scientist,鈥� he insists. 鈥淢y
audiences are captivated by the ideas, how they are applied and how I make money
out of them.鈥�
He criticises what he calls British conservative jealousy. 鈥淎s soon as you
become reasonably financially successful, people insist you can鈥檛 be a good
scientist,鈥� he says. 鈥淧eople in Britain want people like me to fail.鈥�
This is unlikely: today he is worth at least 拢50 million. And he is
aiming to double his wealth by the time he reaches 40.
No surrender
Back in the 1970s, when he couldn鈥檛 find a backer, David Rhodes set up a
workshop in his garage and test equipment in his bedroom. There he designed
parts of the radar and electronic warfare system for the Tornado fighter
aircraft. 鈥淚 don鈥檛 like to be defeated,鈥� he confesses. Rhodes, who is professor
of electrical engineering at the University of Leeds, is the largest single
shareholder in the 拢135 million electronics company Filtronic Comtek.
Rhodes became a professor in 1975 and began his entrepreneurial career almost
immediately. 鈥淚 knew that a lot of products built in the US could be built in
this country,鈥� he says. It annoyed him that it wasn鈥檛 happening. 鈥淚鈥檓 a
Yorkshireman,鈥� he explains. By 1981, Rhodes was designing for Ferranti, Marconi
and Racal and had 15 employees鈥攁nd an overdraft of 拢100 000.
Investors told him that he would only be financed if he agreed to be a
part-time academic, something the university had repeatedly refused. So one
morning he resigned. That afternoon, he was granted part-time status. 鈥淚t didn鈥檛
change things a great deal,鈥� admits Rhodes. He still kept the same teaching
load. But the new contract did allow him to get his hands on 拢500 000 of
venture capital.
During the 1980s, Rhodes鈥檚 company made microwave products for the military,
including parts of the American Stealth bomber B-2. But winning American
military contracts was not easy for a foreign company.
By the end of the decade, Rhodes got fed up and started looking elsewhere for
opportunities. On the horizon, he spotted cellular telephone networks which
would need sophisticated microwave circuitry. His team began to make components
for the transmitters and receivers. In June 1994, he separated the
communications technology arm off from the rest of the company, floated it on
the stock exchange and raised 拢25 million. Since then, the shares have
trebled in value. This sector will grow tenfold over the next few years, Rhodes
predicts. 鈥淪o will we.鈥�
Rhodes鈥檚 shares in Filtronic Comtek alone are worth 拢15 million, but
wealth hasn鈥檛 changed him overmuch. He has lived in the same house for 20 years
and holidays in his caravan, though he did venture to Jersey this year: 鈥淚t鈥檚
the furthest we can go and still take the dog.鈥�
To the limit
When the British government announced plans to clamp down on drinking and
driving in 1965, Tom Parry Jones was a lecturer in inorganic chemistry at the
University of Wales Institute of Science and Technology at Cardiff. He was
approached that year by Bill Ducie, an engineer who had a nose for an emerging
market: if the government was going to enforce its blood alcohol limit, Ducie
reasoned, it would need a detection device. He suggested Jones invent one.
Jones beavered away in the evenings for two years before he came up with an
instrument he called the Alcolyser. It is a simple device: a small tube
containing yellow potassium dichromate crystals and a bag to collect a set
volume of breath. Boozy breath turns the crystals green. The two men were on the
road to a fortune.
At first, they could find no one to buy the idea and manufacture the
detectors so they scraped together 拢2000 and set up Lion Laboratories to
make them themselves. 鈥淲e had cheap premises and second-hand typewriters,鈥�
recalls Jones. 鈥淲e made a profit the first year.鈥�
Britain had opted for an imported breathalyser from the Continent, so Jones
and Ducie sold their machine to the US, Scandinavia and Australia. In Britain,
they promoted the Alcolyser in pubs, clubs and garages, in an effort to convince
drivers to check their breath before they got behind the wheel.
But the Alcolyser, says Jones, was only an innovation. His next machine, the
Alcolmeter, was 鈥渞evolutionary鈥� in the way it converts alcohol vapour into
electrical energy using fuel cell technology, he says. The drunker you are, the
greater the electrical potential鈥攁nd the more likely the little red light
will signal that you are over the limit. Britain began to convert to Jones鈥檚
machines in 1978. Some 40 other countries also use Alcolmeters; as a result Lion
has 80 per cent of the world screening market.
When Ducie died in 1977, Jones bought up all the shares and became Lion鈥檚
sole owner. He sold the company in 1991 to an American firm called MPD. Two
years after that, he set up another company, PPM, which uses the same technology
to measure potentially harmful formaldehyde levels in the clothing and furniture
industries and glutaraldehyde levels in hospitals.
The secret of Jones鈥檚 success鈥攁t 61, he could be worth as much as
拢5 million 鈥攊s not just having a good idea. 鈥淵ou鈥檝e got to get on
your bicycle and sell your product around the world,鈥� he says.
Grand strategy
Bodo Linnhoff came up with 鈥減inch鈥� technology while doing his PhD at the
University of Leeds. He first applied the principles when he joined ICI fresh
from his doctorate in 1977. 鈥淭o everybody鈥檚 surprise,鈥� he says, 鈥渢hey worked.鈥�
Now pinch technology forms the basis of a 拢2-3 million business, Linnhoff
March, which helps the likes of Du Pont to save millions on their energy costs.
鈥淣obody in industry will ever reduce energy if it costs more money,鈥� he
says.
Pinch is based on 鈥渙ld-fashioned thermodynamics鈥�, says Linnhoff, 47, who was
a professor of chemical engineering at the University of Manchester Institute of
Science and Technology until two years ago. In a given chemical process there
are hundreds of places and points in time where energy can be transferred, and
it鈥檚 the job of the engineer to build the best into the design of the plant.
鈥淎 chemical engineer,鈥� says Linnhoff, 鈥渋s a bit like a little child standing
in front of a chessboard.鈥� The rules are easy but it is difficult to weigh all
the options. Pinch is a collection of principles, rolled into a software
package, that helps identify crucial temperatures, or 鈥減inch points鈥�. The
methodology allows you to assess all the alternatives simultaneously. The
Kasparov of chemical engineering? 鈥淣o, more like the upstart computer programs
that now threaten him.鈥�
Bacardi and beaches
鈥淚 like the freedom that writing a textbook gives,鈥� says Peter Atkins, a
lecturer in physical chemistry at the University of Oxford. 鈥淵ou could write a
textbook on a tropical island . . . In fact, that鈥檚 what I do,鈥� he chuckles.
Since it was first published in 1978, Atkins鈥檚 undergraduate text Physical
Chemistry has been the world鈥檚 number one bestseller in the field. He wrote
parts of the third edition in Morocco, bits of the fifth on the island of
Grenada and began the upcoming sixth edition in Hawaii.
But the life of a serious science writer is not all Bacardi and beaches. 鈥淚
put in long hours,鈥� he cautions. Atkins starts writing at 6.30 in the morning
and doesn鈥檛 stop until 7 at night. Although he still teaches, he gave up
research 15 years ago. 鈥淵ou can only have a few obsessions in life,鈥� he
says.
Atkins, who is 56, has half a dozen popular science books to his name, as
well as a clutch of textbooks. Others speculate that Physical Chemistry
alone has earned Atkins almost a million. He says only that it is 鈥渉ighly
lucrative鈥�. He had no idea when he started that writing would make him a rich
man. 鈥淭hey told me textbooks don鈥檛 travel West,鈥� says Atkins. 鈥淭his one
诲颈诲.鈥�
Ungodly success
Paul Davies is a physicist, popular science writer and religious philosopher.
At least, that鈥檚 how the panel of the Templeton Prize for Progress in Religion
described him last year, when they awarded him the world鈥檚 richest prize for
intellectual endeavour鈥斅�650 000. The University of Adelaide, where
he had been professor of mathematical physics since leaving Britain in 1990, has
even created a special chair for him, professor of natural philosophy.
With some 20 books to his credit, bearing titles such as God and the New
Physics and The Mind of God, Davies has engaged and enraged
theoretical physicists and a host of others. He gets a lot of hate mail. 鈥淭he
atheists complain about contaminating science with discredited God-talk,鈥� he
says. 鈥淭he religious people complain I鈥檓 a heretic.鈥�
The books have been a runaway success. God and the New Physics, for
example, sold better last year than at any time since it was published in 1983.
But the money now comes up front: he attracts 鈥渟ix-figure鈥� book contracts.
Davies, who is now 50, still keeps his university job, which attracts a
part-time salary (about 拢160 a week). Although he has no teaching duties,
he is still finding it increasingly difficult to balance writing and university
life. 鈥淛ust because you have `professor鈥� in front of your name, people think it
is your job to enlighten them free of charge,鈥� he says. 鈥淚 am still expected to
referee papers, write references, open exhibitions, support good causes, give
after-dinner speeches, attend functions, lobby politicians and meet visiting
诲颈驳苍颈迟补谤颈别蝉.鈥�
In the blood
鈥淎t least I was wise enough to take out a patent,鈥� recalls Dennis Chapman.
His discovery in 1979 of a material that allowed blood to flow without clotting
led him to set up Biocompatibles, a company now worth 拢230 million.
Chapman was a professor of biophysical chemistry at the Royal Free Hospital
School of Medicine, London, researching biological membranes, when he became
fixated on a peculiar characteristic of blood: when it comes into contact with
materials foreign to the body, it clots. He was convinced that there must be a
material that wouldn鈥檛 have this effect. 鈥淏ut it seemed everything had been
tried鈥�, he says.
Chapman found his answer in the human body itself. 鈥淭he outer lipid proteins
of red blood cells didn鈥檛 cause blood clotting,鈥� he says. And that outer surface
was dominated by a compound called phosphorylcholine. 鈥淪o I developed
phospholipid polymers that could mimic those proteins.鈥�
鈥淚 started to wonder about all the things I could do with them,鈥� he says.
Although he patented the idea that year, it was not until after a colleague gave
a lecture to academics at a biomaterials conference about his slippery polymers
five years later that Chapman was approached by two venture capital groups.
鈥淭hat was just luck,鈥� he says. But it took two more years to negotiate a
favourable deal. In 1986, Chapman set up Biocompatibles in the science park of
London鈥檚 Brunel University. 鈥淭he company developed new patents of their own
based on my basic idea,鈥� says Chapman, who is now 69. His polymers are used
these days to coat medical instruments, such as guidewires for angioplasty
operations. Coated cardiovascular stents are currently being tested.
The substance is also the secret behind a new kind of contact lens that is
highly permeable to oxygen, resists protein deposits and doesn鈥檛 dry
out鈥攁nd with 拢3.1 million in sales last year, is highly profitable
as well. Biocompatibles went public last year and Chapman admits modestly that
he holds a 鈥渞easonable鈥� block of shares in the multimillion pound company. He is
retiring from the Royal Free this month to make time for lecturing in Australia,
China and Turkey.
The main chance
Tony Churchill made his fortune from chickens. Back in the Sixties, the
British poultry industry was losing 拢12 million a year to Marek鈥檚 disease,
which causes malignant tumours in chickens. Churchill found that the disease was
caused by a herpes-type virus, and then devised a vaccine. At the time, he was
working for the Agricultural Research Council, so while he was named as the
inventor on the patent, he had no rights to royalties or licensing fees.
That didn鈥檛 deter him. In 1969, he left his colleagues behind and set up
Poultry Biologicals, to commercialise the discovery. 鈥淭here was evidence that
someone was going to make a lot of money out of it, and I thought it might as
well be me,鈥� he says.
At that time, veterinary surgeons were allowed to supply an unlicensed
product to animals directly under their care. Desperate chicken farmers
clamoured to make him their vet. 鈥淰irtually the whole UK poultry industry became
our client,鈥� he says. Turnover in the first 12 months alone was 拢800 000.
鈥淧eople would come from different parts of the world with suitcases to take the
product away.鈥�
Within two years, he and his partner sold the company to a Dutch-owned
company called Intervet. Churchill stayed on to develop vaccines for pets, but
left in 1984. 鈥淚 decided I wanted to be my own boss again,鈥� he says. Today, at
64, he is worth about 拢5 million. He owns Churchill Applied Biotechnology,
which carries out safety testing, as well as a conference centre in
Cambridgeshire.
To be successful, you have to be single-minded but flexible, he says. For two
years, his small company stayed ahead of the big pharmaceuticals largely, he
believes, because they weren鈥檛 afraid of doing things differently. 鈥淚 could see
the big pharmaceuticals companies sitting in committees and humming and hawing.
We made our board decisions while passing in the corridors.鈥�
Night moves
鈥淲e were lucky鈥攂ut as the saying goes, the more we practise, the
luckier we get,鈥� says Paul Preece, head of the chemical engineering department
at the University of Wales at Swansea. He鈥檚 not talking about his academic
career but about his 鈥渘ight job鈥� as head of a successful software company.
Procede, of which Preece owns two-thirds, creates computer software for
modelling complex chemical processes. Most of Procede鈥檚 clients are industrial
companies, such as BP, Mobil and Esso. But almost every university in Britain
has his software too, he says.
In the early 1980s, while at the University of Leeds, Preece recognised the
value of computer graphics to explain complex processes to his students. 鈥淪o
some graduate students and I played around in our spare time and began to put
the chemical plant on the screen,鈥� he says. They ended up with something 鈥渁 bit
like Lego鈥攂ut with pipes鈥�. Preece鈥檚 lessons were transformed. 鈥淏efore we
developed our system, we spent eight weeks of my 10-week course just learning
how to use the wretched computer program.鈥� The simple graphics program took only
two weeks to learn, so eight weeks were left for design.
In 1985, almost immediately after Preece had published details of his
software, companies began beating a path to his door. 鈥淭heir permanent staff
were experiencing the same problems as my students,鈥� he says. Preece鈥檚 team
customises the program as well as acting as consultants for specific projects.
Preece, who is 48, reckons he is now a millionaire. 鈥淲e had a niche product, so
to a certain extent the market came to us,鈥� he says. 鈥淏ut we also worked bloody
丑补谤诲.鈥�
The Midas touch
Mark Creasy wishes he鈥檇 studied geology, but in his youth someone advised him
that the real jobs were all in geological engineering. 鈥淭hose skills haven鈥檛
been at all helpful,鈥� he confesses, in explaining how he鈥檚 become the most
financially successful prospector in almost 150 years of gold mining in
Australia.
He studied at the Royal School of Mines in London, then left Britain for
Australia when he was still asonly 23. He had a job as a mining engineer for 18
months before striking out as a prospector鈥攆irst for opals, then emeralds,
then gold.
Creasy struck it big in 1994, when he sold his stake in the Yandal belt in
Western Australia to a mining magnate for over 拢80 million. In the
industry, they call him the prospector of the century. But he had been at it for
more than a quarter of a century, and he spent most of those years 鈥渢otally
辫别苍苍颈濒别蝉蝉鈥�.
While prospecting, he still drives a 1968 four-wheel-drive, puts in a
punishing 70-hour week and lives on rice and tinned fish. His onlyindulgence, he
says, is 鈥渉eavy drinking鈥�.
Part of the key to his success, he says, is that he鈥檚 a voracious reader.
He鈥檚 read 鈥渆very single book on West Australian geology鈥� and pores over dozens
of geology and minerology journals every month, which he has packed up in a
cardboard box and mailed to him in the wilds. 鈥淭hose give me a clear idea of
where to look and how to look,鈥� says Creasy.
What kept him going all those years? 鈥淚 had an enormous great stick beating
my behind and an enormous carrot in front of me,鈥� he says. 鈥淎nd I had
诲别迟别谤尘颈苍补迟颈辞苍.鈥�
A sense of opportunity
What makes a successful entrepreneur? 鈥淧ersistence, imagination and the
recognition of possibilities,鈥� says Des Smith, who has been head of physics at
Heriot-Watt University in Edinburgh since 1970. Twenty-five years ago, Smith
started the company Edinburgh Instruments, which today has a turnover of
拢4 million a year. He is its chairman and biggest shareholder.
Smith arrived at the university just as it was pioneering the science park
concept鈥擡dinburgh Instruments was the first spin-off company to set up
shop. 鈥淭he principal had just come back from MIT,鈥� he recalls. 鈥淚n the first
week he told me to build a physics department. In the second, he asked me to get
on with setting up a business.鈥�
Smith and his half-dozen employees developed cutting edge
technology鈥攍ike the 鈥渟pin-flip Raman laser鈥�, one of the first lasers
tunable to a specific wavelength, and meterological instruments for satellites.
But when business was slow, they were not above servicing juke boxes and working
on quality control for the sausage industry.
These days, Edinburgh Instruments produces everything from infrared gas
lasers to spectrometers, and it exports 85 per cent of them. In the early 1990s,
the company gave birth to Edinburgh Sensors, which makes sensors to sniff out
noxious gases. Smith, who鈥檚 worth well over a million, is due to retire from
academic life this month. But he鈥檚 far from the end of his career. He is
considering launching a third company to work on developing a new generation of
infra-red light sources.
Genius in a hurry
An outraged maths professor in the US once admonished Stephen Wolfram, thus:
鈥淵ou can鈥檛 sell mathematics!鈥� He was wrong. It was 1988 and Wolfram had just
launched Mathematica, the first technical program to have an integrated symbolic
language鈥攏ow used by millions of students, scientists and engineers.
Today, aged 37, Wolfram is worth more than 拢100 million.
Born in London, Wolfram spent a year at the University of Oxford but got
bored. So at 17 he decided to skip his under-graduate degree altogether in
favour of a PhD in theoretical physics at Caltech. 鈥淧eople would say I鈥檓 fairly
smart,鈥� he says earnestly. Indeed. He published his first paper at 15 and held
academic posts at Caltech, Princeton University and the University of Illinois
in his early twenties. While studying how computer systems work and designing
his own, Wolfram saw how much time was lost in assembling software. 鈥淭here were
all these specialised packages, but no underlying language that was general
enough for everyone.鈥� So he invented one.
Today Mathematica has become an industry of its own, with books, Internet
discussion groups and the 230-strong Wolfram Research Institute in Champaign,
Illinois with Wolfram at the hub. He calls himself an 鈥渆-mail CEO鈥� and says he鈥檚
more efficient than most in his position because he avoids meetings. 鈥淚 respond
quickly to e-mail, though,鈥� he says.
While he says he set up the company 鈥渟omewhat reluctantly鈥�, he now thinks
most of the important research in the field is done by industry. 鈥淯niversities
are pretty secondary entities.鈥� But he鈥檚 glad his company is not publicly owned.
鈥淚 don鈥檛 have a bunch of investors telling me what I should do.鈥�