Dr Kathryn Fraser and Dr Andrew Mearns Spragg

Met up at a Marine Biotech Conference in 1996 and knew they were kindred science spirits.

Apart from being a medical doctor, you get to have the title Dr. because after you have a degree in science, you then spend more time getting a masters, then you work for a few years on a project of your own choosing for your PhD, which is short for Doctor of Philosophy. Your project should contribute something new to science.

Kathryn and Andrew both got their PhDs from Heriot - Watt University, and both studied Marine Biotechnology, Kathryn to see how marine microbes help to breakdown man made structures around the coast, and Andrew in working on how marine microbes might stop the growth of MRSA bugs.

So you can see where the idea for Aquapharm came from!

Andrew is in charge of the investment and science at Aquapharm, and when you work in a science company that work is called Research and Development, or R & D for short.

Kathryn is in charge of business operations, which has meant she's had to learn a whole heap of new stuff very very quickly! Employment law, finance and company accounting, and marketing (that's telling people about the company) are just some of her new skills. Luckily she had already decided that running a biotech company was EXACTLY what she wanted to do, rather than being in the lab working with the microbes, so together Andrew and her are the perfect team for Aquapharm.

For both of them science runs in the family. Andrew’s Mum was in radiography (that's sending waves through the body to detect or cure illnesses), and Kathryn's Dad set up one of the first Biotechnology companies in the UK.

They are both keen that Aquapharm is a UK company, even though they both think they'd have found it easier to get finance if they had set up in America, just because American investors understand the risks of a biotech company better. Staying in the UK means they can support UK science with their work, their ideas stay in the UK and they can repay the country for their science education.

Kathryn describes how it feels to be able to 'think in science'.

"When you've had a science education up to PhD level, you can look at the natural world and try and work out what's happening and why, because you can imagine the tiny worlds of chemical, physical and biological processes going on inside what you're looking at – it's really amazing!"

Kathryn's science knowledge up to a really high level has made it much easier for her to talk with investors and banks and customers and the top scientists who advise the company, about Aquapharm and what they want to achieve.

Andrew stressed the importance of 'networking'. This is business speak for 'getting to know people who might be useful or helpful to you'.

"We both spent the first year of Aquapharm doing nothing but attending biotech and marine conferences, and funding and grants meetings just talking and talking to the science and business community. This turned out to stand us in really good stead, and we made some great connections."

Both Andrew and Kathryn were inspired to become scientists at school when the teachers did 'mad stuff!' in the school labs. Andrew grew up in the country side and spent his childhood exploring the natural world around him. This was a great inspiration too.

"I used to trawl the local river for bugs with my Mum’s kitchen sieve, and look after sticklebacks in a big jar. I was surprised when I did my degree to find myself doing more or less the same things.
I’d done all that when I was seven!"

When they first thought about setting up Aquapharm they were working in a lab the size of a cupboard, with almost no facilities and no money – this sounds really bad, but it made them very resourceful people, able to cope with anything and come up with solutions to problems cheaply – important for running a business.

When you have your own company you can’t just go with the flow, you have to think ahead about where you want to be and where you want the company to be. Kathryn has a clear idea of this for Aquapharm, here’s what she said, but you’ll need to know what some of the business speak means before you read it!

*Sustainable = pays for itself

*Floated on the stock exchange = this is when people can invest in your company by buying ‘shares’ (or stock which is the more old fashioned term for this) in that company, which means if their money helps the company be more successful, the price of their shares in the company goes up, and they can choose to sell their shares for profit, or hold on to them to see if they go up more. Shares can go down too though, so buying shares can be risky. You, as the company’s owner, get your investment and hard work paid back when you ‘float’ – i.e. you can become quite rich suddenly, but you stop owning all of the company yourself, and stop getting all of the profits from then on.

*Bought out = This is when another company – usually a bigger company – is so interested in what you do they want to own it for themselves, so you tell them how much your company is worth to you and in terms of future profits and past investments, and they buy it from you. This is another way to suddenly become quite rich!

Right – over to you Kathryn!

"In five years time I’d like to have reached a point where we have sustainable sales, good profits, and we’re known as a company that supports the environment. I’d like us to be adding to the local economy, and also to be a company that cares for its workers and about people in the local community. I want it to be known as a biotech company with new ideas, a good place to work. In ten years we might have floated on the stock exchange or been bought out by a bigger company – either way we hope to have made lots of money out of Aquapharm!"




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