Winner: 2023 Chemistry World Entrepreneur of the Year
Dr Harry Destecroix
Science Creates
For co-founding Ziylo and Carbometrics, and building the Science Creates ecosystem which provides facilities and funding for multiple chemistry-based start-ups.
Dr Harry Destecroix co-founded Ziylo, a University of Bristol spin-out company, to develop unique glucose-binding molecules for diabetes management. Ziylo was sold to Novo Nordisk in one of the largest spin-out acquisitions in recent years, worth a potential $800 million. As part of the sale, Harry co-founded a new company, Carbometrics, to continue the work done by Ziylo. He also founded, Science Creates, a thriving deep-tech ecosystem to help scientists and engineers transform their discoveries into life-changing inventions: to enhance healthcare, quality of life, and the environment.
Biography
Harry is the founder of the Science Creates ecosystem and managing partner of Science Creates Ventures. He is a scientist, entrepreneur and investor, and the co-founder of Ziylo, the hugely successful University of Bristol spin-out company. Harry is passionate about building great companies and providing the optimum ecosystem to facilitate their growth and development. He has a PhD in chemistry from the University of Bristol.
Q&A
Tell us about somebody who has inspired or mentored you in your career.
Over the years I have had so many great mentors but where it all started, and the person who made it all possible, was Professor Tony Davis.
We had hours and hours of conversations about science and glucose receptors and how to utilise them in commercial applications which we see today in Ziylo and Carbometrics.
To have someone as distinguished and intelligent as Tony backing you, as a dyslexic kid, mentoring me and pushing me through my PhD continued to fuel what had started in my childhood as just a fascination in science.
Mostly though, he saw potential in me and encouraged me to be ambitious. Psychologically, this helped me internally generate the confidence to pursue everything else I have done.
Tony allowed me to go off in my own creative direction and he never judged me for my mistakes 鈥� he only encouraged me. When things sometimes did work out, he was the first to take on board the new information. He truly is an exceptional scientist with the ability to constantly update and challenge his own thinking of how something works. What motivates you? Since a very young age, I have been fascinated with the world around me and how it works. The pursuit of knowledge and trying to understand everything is a never-ending task and something I find a lot of joy in.
Through this understanding, humans have the innate capability to improve the environment around us through the development of new tools and technologies. There are so many new technologies yet to be discovered.
I was fortunate that part of my research during my PhD was built off decades of work by Professor Tony Davis. In understanding how to build artificial sugar receptors and how that could be translated into new technologies that could potentially improve healthcare made me acutely aware of how hard that process really is, and how many discoveries are sat on the shelves of universities gathering dust where they could be, with the right expertise, turned into inventions to improve society.
Finally, when we take a step back and look at the current world we live in, there is so much that is still yet to be discovered. Important materials and technologies to help stop and ultimately reverse climate change and room to improve healthcare by drastically improving the diagnosis and treatment of patients. What advice would you give to a young person considering a career in chemistry? In the real world, nature has no boundaries and chemistry underpins so many other subjects. I believe it's a fantastic subject that helps to explain how the world around us works.
My advice would be that as you go on your journey to understanding chemistry, you'll discover how it's intersected with so much else. It's at these intersections of subjects and technologies where there is huge potential for innovation to happen and discoveries to be made. What has been a highlight for you (either personally or in your career)? There have been so many! Looking back on it and how I now look to the future, the highlights are actually some of the most difficult parts of the journey, when everything is stacked up against you and it seems you have to overcome the impossible. It's those moments where you get pushed to deliver in the face of uncertainty that I look back on as some of our team's best.
So much happens in science when things don't happen as you expected. This leads to new knowledge and understanding which often leads to new results.
The Ziylo technology is a great example. The first receptor design had many problems, and it was the second iteration and a complete redesign where the major breakthrough of the core technology came from. What has been a challenge for you (either personally or in your career)? My biggest challenge has been navigating the world with ADHD and dyslexia, which has felt like a double-edged sword! In certain instances, I find it exhausting to maintain concentration on monotonous tasks that are not interesting to me (ADHD), while struggling to communicate through writing and taking more time to absorb information through reading (dyslexia).
Although, in some instances, both are like a superpower. ADHD means I have boundless energy and am able to switch from task to task to task and dyslexia enables me to visualise how seemingly unrelated things are interconnected.
Fortunately for me, through sheer determination, I've been able to work out ways to structure my own routine and use software to navigate my own path to have largely overcome much of the initial downsides which I experienced in my early years.
More importantly, it's taught me that it's ok to work within a team where we all have different strengths and weaknesses and I associate all of my success to the teams in the companies I have co-founded.