Episode 47 - The Ten Carbon Chemistry Conundrum with Tony Peacock

In this episode we had a chance to discuss the pre-emptive wind up of Ten Carbon Chemistry with Dr Tony Peacock. Earlier this year, Tony candidly posted on LinkedIn some of the story behind the journey and the recent decision to wind up the company, returning the IP to Wintermute Biomedical and I was very keen to explore the story behind this decision.

Tony has been involved in tech transfer in many roles, most notably Managing Director of the Pig R&D Corporation (a forerunner of Australian Pork Limited), Chief Executive of Cooperative Research Australia, Chairman of Wintermute Biomedical, as well as a consultant to CRC bids and angel investor. We started by exploring our perspectives on what technology transfer is and discussed that perhaps the name suggests a simple handover where, in fact, tech transfer is a complex and ongoing set of interactions and iterations to enable success.

We started exploring the rationale to the formation of this new venture. The venture was designed to enable Wintermute to continue its strong focus on biomedical applications while exploring opportunities in agricultural and industrial chemical markets. The formation of the new venture enabled market development and the positioning of the novel chemistry with different partners working who had different technical, market and regulatory needs.

The timing of the venture was particularly interesting, (Launching in the time of COVID), which distorted demand for cleaning and hygiene solutions. We discussed how market structure and big brands can create opportunity and challenges in entering consumer facing market segments. The inherent risk to well known brands to adopt formulation change became a challenge. Regulations set around older chemistries presented challenges with a new mode of action. Agriculture applications emerged where the technology received interest as a fungicide resistance solution.

Tony introduced the 2:2:1/2 rule – that biotech takes twice as long as expected, with twice the resources envisaged and half the revenue generated! We particularly focussed on the timing issue, with various delays in trials and paths to market impeding the return on investment. The importance of market pull, or the role of the desperate customer as Paul Bryan mentioned in an earlier podcast, was also explored where Tony described the initial enthusiasm amongst glass recyclers for the product and getting and holding the attention from (potential) customers.

We then explored the governance and management that oversaw the decision to wind up the company. Tony reflected on the importance of governance and the need to think beyond risk management, an area we discussed with Anne-Maree Perret in an earlier governance podcast. We discussed the importance of clear financials, the role of the founder and having a focused management team to bring the venture into maturity. In reflecting on the journey, Tony reinforced the need for due diligence and wearing a black hat in assessing opportunities and recognise that new ventures take time and energy.