Jeffrey Anthony joined NPL in 2019 and works as part of NPL’s Life Sciences & Health Partnerships Team. With a focus on the building collaborations across the Life science sector Jeffrey works with collaborators across industry, academic and public sector to identify the ways in which NPL’s metrology expertise and capability can help to support research and its translation to drive growth.
Jeffrey’s technical background is in microbiology, and he has worked in roles across quality assurance, and both product and business development. His experience includes the pharmaceutical sector, the development of genomic marker technologies in agritech and activities in cell biology. In his current role his time is dedicated to building partnerships across the UK and internationally across standards and metrology in Engineering Biology supporting companies in their quest to scale and commercialise at pace.
Anders joined Novo Holdings A/S in 2017.
Anders is Managing Partner and Head of the Planetary Health Investments team.
Prior to joining Novo Holdings, Anders was employed as VP in Xellia Pharmaceuticals heading up the Global Product Supply. Other previous employments include EVP, Global Product Supply at Leo Pharma A/S and VP Global Supply Chain at Novozymes A/S.
Anders holds a PhD in Biotechnology and a MSc in Chemical Engineering from Technical University of Denmark as well as a graduate diploma in Business Administration (International Business) from Copenhagen Business School.
Sofie is the Former minister of Higher Education and Research and former member of the Danish Parliament for more than 10 years. She is now an enthusiastic ambassador for biosolutions and for the industry which provides so many of the answers to how we can live sustainably in the future. Sofie is eager and impatient to get many more of the solutions to market in Europe.
Sofie is a Political Scientist by education and slso has a Masters degree in European Politics and Administration from College of Europe, Bruges.
George was elected to Parliament in 2010 after a 15 year career in the Cambridge cluster founding high-growth technology companies.
George has served in the last three Governments as UK Trade Envoy, the first UK Minister for Life Science, Chair of the Prime Minister’s Policy Board and Minister of State for Decarbonisation, Disconnection & Digitalisation at the Department for Transport. In 2022 he was appointed as Minister of State for Science, Technology, Research and Innovation at the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy. In 2023 George was appointed as Minister of State in the newly-created Department for Science, Innovation and Technology. He previously led the Prime Minister’s Task Force on Innovation, Growth and Regulatory Reform (TIGRR). As Founder of the 2020 Conservatives Group of MPs, author of Britain Beyond Brexit and Chair of the Conservative Policy Forum, Freeman is a leading Conservative voice for a New Generation of Conservative Reform, Regeneration and Renewal after the divisions of Brexit and the Covid recession.
Robert Harris is Head of Microbial Technologies, Biologicals Research at Syngenta Crop Protection. Based in the UK, his role is focused on building global microbial platforms and technologies that will deliver biological products for future global sustainable agriculture systems. Following an undergraduate degree in biochemistry from the University of Cardiff, and a PhD in biochemical engineering from University College London, Robert initially joined Syngenta as a fermentation scientist in 2001 and gained broad experience over 15 years in varying roles. This focused on developing microbes and bioprocesses for businesses in crop protection, biopharma, enzymes and biocontrols. In 2016 Robert moved to lead a group of scientists responsible for microbial discovery, synthetic biology, and bioprocess development supporting the biologicals business within Syngenta.
Dr Beatriz San Martin is a leading intellectual property partner at Arnold & Porter in London, advising life sciences and biotechnology companies on strategic issues across the product lifecycle. Her practice sits at the intersection of IP, trade secrets, data, compliance and dispute resolution, with industry experience spanning engineering biology, digital health and artificial intelligence. Beatriz regularly advises clients on complex issues affecting innovation and commercialisation, as well as supporting transactions, resolving disputes and enforcing IP rights. She works closely with in-house teams to deliver pragmatic, business-focused solutions aligned with scientific and commercial realities.
Oliver is an Investment Director at UKI2S. Specialising in life science investments he has managed the enlarged £33m engineering biology sub-fund since its inception in 2014. He has invested in a broad range of companies in sectors as diverse as therapeutic, agritech and clean biotech.
He sits on multiple boards and has overseen exits including the £85m sale of Quethera to Astellas. He is also a member of the Future Planet Capital ESG steering group.
Prior to joining UKI2S, Oliver worked at the venture fund Imperial Innovations as well as other roles in the industry. He has a background in strategy analysis and consultancy including roles in New York and has a masters from the University of Bristol and commenced a PhD in bioremediation at the University of Nottingham.
Claire has worked in the development of scientific networks and associations for over 20 years. Following a degree in agriculture and a PhD in crop science, she worked in scientific communications and as a biotechnology National Contact Point for Framework Programme Five. Her work took her to the fast growing Cambridge (UK) biotechnology cluster in 2000, where she was part of her first business association (now One Nucleus) from where, as part of a Europe-wide founding team, she launched the Council of European BioRegions (CEBR), a network of biotechnology clusters.
Her role as Network Manager for CEBR brought her to Brussels in 2009, where she also became Secretary General of the European Biotechnology Network, a network with the mission to build collaboration for exploitation of science. Through EBN she became involved in the Innovatove Medicines Initiative (IMI) within the ENABLE project, which developed novel Gram negative antibacterial candidates.
In 2016, Claire took on a global role as Director General of the Nanotechnology Industries Association (NIA), representing nanomaterials across sectors, with focus on the emerging regulatory frameworks worldwide and the positioning of nanomaterials in advanced products and processes.
In 2020, she joined EuropaBio as Director General, representing biotechnology across sectors and helping to shape the role that it plays in Europe’s delivery of a sustainable and healthy future.
Hendrik Waegeman obtained a master’s degree in Biochemical Engineering at Ghent University (2007) and holds a PhD in Applied Biological Sciences-Chemical Engineering (2011), also obtained at Ghent University. During his doctoral research he metabolically engineered Esherichia coli to improve recombinant protein production. During his post-doctoral research, Hendrik Waegeman was involved in a number of projects that focused on precision fermentation targeting specialty carbohydrates. He is also one of the founders of the biotech company Inbiose NV, founded in 2013, which develops fermentatively produced human milk oligoscaccharides. In 2012, he was guest lecturer at the University of Incheon, South-Korea where he lectured a course on Industrial Biotechnology.
Since 2012, he has a position at the Bio Base Europe Pilot Plant in Ghent, Belgium. Bio Base Europe Pilot Plant is globally one of the largest Pilot- and Demonstration Facility for Industrial Biotechnology. Since 2019 Hendrik is Head of Business Operations and responsible for the operational management of BBEPP.
Hendrik is also board director Biobased Industries Consortium (the private partner in BBI-JU and CBE-JU, Bio.be (the cluster of Belgian biotech companies), Smart Delta Resources (large energy and resource-intensive companies in the Flemish-Dutch Schelde-Delta region) and the European Biosolutions Coalition (representing VBO-FEB, the Organization for Belgian Enterprises).
Hendrik is a strong believer in the bioeconomy and industrial biotechnology.
Karolina has spent the past 15 years building a strong network across the UK life sciences ecosystem. She is an experienced life sciences investor and entrepreneur with over a decade in life sciences innovation, spanning drug discovery, technology transfer, venture building, and equity financing. She recently joined the BioInnovation Institute (BII) in London. Previously, she was an investor at the UK’s largest EIS fund, where she led multiple deals, sat on several company boards, served as a member of the Investment Committee, and supported numerous portfolio companies. Karolina also co-founded Accelerate@Babraham, Cambridge’s first life sciences accelerator. She began her career at MedImmune (AstraZeneca) and later in leading Cambridge biotech ventures, focusing on biologics in neuroscience and metabolic science. She holds a PhD from the University of Cambridge and an Executive MBA from HEC Paris.
