Profile: Gwyn Humphreys

Gwyn Humphreys has more than 30 years’ experience in biotechnology and early-stage tech firms. Suzan Uzel met him.
Gwyn HumphreysGwyn Humphreys
Gwyn Humphreys

IN Gwyn Humphreys’ words, relatively few people make the transition from academia to business successfully.

“There are plenty of opportunities missed I think,” he said. “Very few companies I think fail because they were set up over technology that wasn’t capable of being very successful, they don’t make it because people get in the way, egos or whatever.

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

“You have to have a team that’s totally single-minded but works 18 out of every 24 hours and has fun along the way and is a good team basically.”

Dr Humphreys, who is interim CEO of Wetherby-based skin research firm Evocutis and non-executive chairman of diagnostics specialist Avacta, also based in Wetherby, is speaking from experience. Apart from his long-term involvement in these two Leeds University spin-outs, Dr Humphreys is known for having co-founded Bradford Particle Design in the 1990s, where he was CEO.

The Bradford University spin-out company developed sophisticated technology to make highly defined particles, initially for use in inhaled drugs for asthma. It was sold in 2001 for $200m to Inhale Therapeutic Systems Inc in California, now Nektar Therapeutics.

By this point, BPD was working with most of the world’s largest pharmaceutical firms, had a turnover of £2.5m-£3m with “an extensive patent portfolio” and 40 staff. “We had managed to keep at that point about 85 per cent of the equity between the university and the three of us as founders,” said Dr Humphreys, who ran the UK end of the business until 2003. “Setting up a business is not rocket science but you just need to think it through and try and avoid those early mistakes.

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

“I firmly believe, like BPD, that if you get a world-leading academic with a good business development person alongside, then the academic, if he’s really good and world class, can open doors in companies very well and then you just need the common sense to do everything else.”

Since then, Dr Humphreys has been involved as an angel investor in several early-stage companies, mainly in Yorkshire, and also as non-executive director in several companies. Along the way he got involved in Syntopix, now Evocutis, and Avacta, both of which are now Aim-listed and are among the portfolio of intellectual property commercialisation company IP Group.

On the IP Group, Dr Humphreys said: “The philosophy is that the UK is really good at science, the other thing, that it certainly had, was a very good finance system through the City so why not put the two things together? It’s preferable in my book to venture capital.

“I think they (venture capitalists) drive technology companies into taking money very early and giving away most of the equity and all the rest of it and it’s not a nice scenario, which is why BPD I think was very successful, which we managed by avoiding venture capital from the beginning.”

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

He claims that accessing City funds directly via flotations rather than going through venture capitals is preferable as “everyone invests essentially on the same basis”.

But Dr Humphreys, whose career also includes a decade at the UK’s first biotechnology unit, Celltech, where for three years he ran its external research collaboration programme, stressed that the funding climate is “enormously harder” than it was when he was involved in BPD.

He said that the UK “needs a more entrepreneurial finance community”, adding that there’s no reason why the UK shouldn’t be able to replicate successes such as Google that were born out of early-stage technology. “They (in the US) are prepared to put in significant amounts of money early and take real gambles.”

Dr Humphreys was also involved in the early stages of Connect Yorkshire, which helps growth businesses in the region get the debt or equity funding and expertise they need, and was chairman of Avacta and Syntopix when they floated in 2006.

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

Evocutis changed its name from Syntopix in 2011 after buying Leeds Skin for £900,000. Today, the firm’s main focus is developing its LabSkin product, which emulates living skin tissue and can be used in research and product testing.

Towards the end of last year, Evocutis announced it was looking at various strategic options, which could include selling the business. Dr Humphreys, who took on the interim CEO role after the departure of previous CEO Dr Stephen Jones last year, said: “Along the way essentially it became clear that we needed a big brother if you like, a strategic partner, to further develop the company.

“It could lead to a full acquisition but we are open-minded as to what kind of relationship we could end up with.” He said the company has attracted “significant interest”.

Meanwhile, changes in the world of cosmetic testing are opening up new opportunities for Evocutis. A sweeping ban on the sale of cosmetics that have been tested on animals came into force throughout the European Union (EU) yesterday. Animal experiments carried out to test cosmetics or their ingredients have been outlawed in the EU since 2009. But companies have previously been free to sell products with a history of animal testing conducted outside Europe.

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

Dr Humphreys said Evocutis has seen “an increasing amount of interest” from companies worldwide seeking alternatives to testing on animals. “Animal testing is an essential part of pharmaceutical development and it has to be to some extent but it’s always been more contentious in terms of cosmetic testing.”

Dr Humphreys declined to comment on when Evocutis might become profit-making, but said that LabSkin is “potentially very, very powerful”. “You can put the cosmetics on repeatedly, you can look at changes in the molecular biology of the tissue so it can help to enhance your claims for your product.” The company’s revenues from commercial deals doubled year-on-year to £460,000 in its last financial year.

Avacta, also still loss-making but with £3.13m revenues recorded in its last financial year, has evolved substantially since its inception, said Dr Humphreys, adding that the potential growth based on its acquired affimer technology is “very, very substantial”.

It acquired the IP and inventor Paul Ko Ferrigno of Aptuscan in 2011, a technology company also spun out of Leeds University, which has developed unique binding agents for the diagnosis and treatment of disease.

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

The proteins it has developed act like antibodies, but they are not prone to the weaknesses and damage that beset antibodies. Avacta CEO Alastair Smith is a great example of an academic-turned-businessman, said Dr Humphreys, adding that making the transition has a lot to do with “common sense and judgment”.

Gwyn Humphreys Factfile

Title: Interim CEO of Evocutis. Former non-exec director and chairman.

Date of birth: April 3, 1946.

Born: Llandudno in North Wales.

Lives: Elland, West Yorkshire, and Woolacombe, North Devon.

Education: University College London – biochemistry to PhD.

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

First job: Heath Protection Agency – research on antibiotic resistance of bacteria.

Car driven: Jaguar XKR and Land Rover Freelander.

Favourite film: Top Gun.

Last book read: Last Tango in Aberystwyth by Malcolm Pryce.

Favourite holiday spot: Namibia and Botswana.

Most proud of: Growth and success of Bradford Particle Design.