20 October 2009 | World Forum | The Hague


Arnold

Dr Jack D. Newman, is a Life Sciences success story. He is an accomplished orator and will be talking about his experiences in setting up his company, Amyris Biotechnologies, and the challenges and opportunities he sees in this changing market. Jack Newman co-founded Amyris Biotechnologies with over a decade of experience researching bacterial physiology and genetics. In addition to publishing in leading molecular biology and biotechnology journals, he also co-authored the groundbreaking work underlying the technology of microbial terpene production.

Amyris Biotechnologies, which now employs over 150 staff, made its name in producing anti-malaria treatments based on semi-synthetic artemisinin.
It has broadened its horizons recently and expanded to produce products that address the global energy and climate crises by applying a unique science platform in creating renewable fuels and chemicals.

Jack D. Newman


International life sciences entrepreneur,
Co-Founder and Senior Vice President of Research Amyris Biotechnologies, USA

There are two fundamental drivers at the heart of entrepreneurism: creativity and impact. A new technology company attracts entrepreneurs not only with the cleverness of the technology but also through the magnitude of the problem to be solved.
Amyris was spun out of UC Berkeley using Synthetic Biology as a technology platform. Synthetic Biology has inspired the engineering of “blinking bacteria,” “microbial photography” and “banana-mint scented
E. coli.” There is no shortage of creativity in the Synthetic Biology community. The early discussions founding Amyris centered on how to use this creative potential to maximize impact.

The marketplace points you to impactful business models by identifying people’s needs. We looked at anti-cancer treatments, specialty chemicals, and biofuels as product opportunities, as well as service models such as “tools” companies. Impact is often quantified in the market place by the valuation of the company. But as a new company seeks to inspire
a vision that brings out the entrepreneurial spirit, impact and creativity may not be immediately measured by valuation. Remembering the fundamentals of entrepreneurism will lead to valuation.

The need for a stable supply of a molecule called Artemisinin (a cure for malaria) at a sustainable price became the highest-impact project we could imagine: over 1 million children die needlessly each year because of Artemisinin supply problems and price instability. Amyris was launched with capital to develop a Synthetic Biology platform to produce anti-malarials. A $42M grant from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation funded a non-profit collaboration between the Institute for OneWorld Health, UC Berkeley and Amyris. Amyris in-licensed the intellectual property invented by its founders while at Berkeley. For our “philanthropic investor”, the return on investment would be lives saved. For Amyris, we would build a company based on success in the Artemisinin project and find revenue using the technology platform for other purposes. Entrepreneurism favors impact and embraces taking intelligent risks: even if we could not find a profitable application for the technology after the Artemisinin project, the impact factor made the project worth doing. In 2008 Amyris partnered with Sanofi-Aventis to scale up, commercialize and distribute Artemisinin combinational therapies.

To date Amyris has raised over $100M in venture capital and now operates in three cities and two continents applying synthetic biology to creating renewable fuels. This talk will highlight the roles that creativity and impact play in driving entrepreneurism
at Amyris.