Biotechnology and
Environment YES
Young Entrepreneurs Schemes
Explained
Which Competition?
Environment YES is for researchers working in natural environmental
sciences the science needed to provide solutions to the global environmental
challenges that the world is facing today and will face in the future
Climate system, Biodiversity, Sustainable use of natural resources,
Earth system science Natural hazards, Environment, Pollution and human
health
Biotechnology YES is for researchers working in Bioscience
The BBSRC remit is wide and covers basic science in Plants, Microbe and
Animals including Humans, Technologies that underpin practical solutions to
major challenges such as climate change, food security, healthier ageing, and
the control of infectious diseases would all fit well
Information
http://www.ncl.ac.uk/fms/postgrad/skills/enterprise.htm
http://www.ncl.ac.uk/careers/riseup
http://www.biotechnologyyes.co.uk/
http://www.nerc.ac.uk/funding/available/postgrad/advanced/yes
Aim:to prepare an oral business plan presentation for a “hypothetical"
company.
You can do all the work there – but it’s unlikely you will win
Support sessions here (provisionally end Sept – early Oct)
Competition starts with regional heats over 3 days (2 nights
residential)
Win the regional heat (2 places) and progress to national finals
How much does it cost?
To you it is FREE*
a deposit is required but this can be covered by the
Graduate School NB the deposit will be recovered if you
do not attend
* EPSRC Funded Students have to be paid for
Eligibility
• All research students & research staff
• Researching Bioscience or Environmental
Science
• Masters students one per team must be
here in December 2016
YES Dates
May 27th
Application Deadline
August 3rd
Briefing Session in Nottingham
September
October
October
October
November
November
Food, Nutrition & Wellbeing (Unilever, Colworth)
Environment / Chemistry YES (Nottingham)
Biomedical YES (GSK Stevenage)
Biotechnology YES (Manchester)
Biosciecne YES (Edinburgh)
Plant, Microbe / Environment (Syngeta, Reading)
December 5th
Finals in London
How much will you have to do?
• Residential Workshop/Competition over three days
– Day 1
• talks in morning (by patent attorneys, entrepreneurs,
business plan consultants etc.)
• One-to-one advice with a chosen specialist and time to work
on business plan
– Day 2
• Again, talks in the morning by various specialists in the field
• One-to-one advice and time for individual work
• Final preparations of power point presentation
– Day 3
• Presentations by each group to an investment panel
(split into streams and one winner from each stream goes
through to national final)
• You should turn up with:– The idea
– Who you intend to sell to
– Some sense of production costs
– Awareness of competitors
– What you intend to sell (product, licence)
– Some consideration of Intellectual Property
issues
Division of Labour
If possible teams should consist of people equally
committed to the competition
If not, go into the team with your eyes open about
what is expected of each member
What about the Idea
Your idea should be based on realistic science, but currently
hypothetical, winning ideas tend to be good with an intrinsic flaw
2015 Head Lice Treatment
2011 Using yeast to produce high value fragrance components
2010 Nitrogen fixing bacteria fertilizer pellets
2008 Vegetarian Omega-3 oil from food industry waste
2006 GM Plants that reduce a slug’s appetite
2002 winning team assumed a micro-organism has been identified
with novel enzymatic activity.
Newcastle ideas, peanut allergy detector, appetite suppressing
chewing gum, a preventative head lice treatment, a meat spoilage
detection kit, multiple diseases all in one assay
Your idea must be believable; you should be able to account for the
advances in science needed to develop your imaginary technology.
The Application
• Simple really
http://www.nerc.ac.uk/using/schemes/yes/
http://www.biotechnologyyes.co.uk/
One person takes the lead Fills in the application and send it off.
Deposit
Medical Sciences Graduate School will cover deposits for teams with FMS
Research students in, if you don’t attend we will need paid or FINANCE HOLD
For others If you send a cheque it will only be cashed if you don’t turn up.
• Previous Participants
– Matt Wilcox – Research Associate (Newcastle)
– Frida Ponthan – Contract Research, Epistem Ltd.
(Manchester)
– Emma Kirkpatrick - Clinical Trials Co-ordinator
(Southampton)
– Paul Keane – Regulatory Scientist at Roche
(Hertfordshire)
– Richard Hodgett - Lecturer in Business Analytics and
Decision Science (Leeds)
– Mike Batey - Senior Business Development Manager
at Waters (Manchester)
• Summary
– It’s not easy but doesn’t have to take up too
much time and you get a great sense of
achievement
– You learn a lot of valuable skills that you don’t
get elsewhere.
– It’s completely free
– If you’re not sure you want to stay in
Academia it helps see what else is out there!