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Welcome to Oxford+, the podcast series that explores the myths and truths of the Oxford investing landscape hosted by Susannah de Jager. Since moving to Oxford, Susannah has collaborated with experts, entrepreneurs, and government to shape the conversation around domestic scale-up capital. Oxford+ aims to inform, inspire, and connect. We'll talk to Founders, investors, academics, politicians, and facilitators and explore how Oxford is open for business.
Welcome to Oxford +, the podcast series
that takes you deep into the myths and
truths of the Oxford investing landscape.
I'm your host, Susannah de
Jager and I've spent over 15
years in UK asset management.
My guest today is Irene Tracey.
Irene became the Vice Chancellor
of Oxford University in January
2023, but her connection with the
university goes back to her own
undergraduate degree in biochemistry.
After leaving Oxford, Irene focused on
Magnetic Resonance Imaging at Harvard
Medical School, before returning to
Oxford in 1997 as a founding member of
the Oxford Centre for Functional Magnetic
Resonance Imaging of the Brain, later
serving as its director from 2005 to 2015.
Irene has held many senior leadership
roles within the University, as well as
serving on many national and international
committees in her research area.
Of particular interest to the
discussion about the investment
ecosystem in and around Oxford is her
co authorship of the University Spin
Out Review alongside Andrew Williamson
of Cambridge Innovation Capital.
Irene, thank you very much for joining
today and I have a special thank you
for you because one of the taglines
of Oxford Plus is here about busting
myths and your spin out review, as you
co authored with Andrew Willinson, is a
massive one for busting myths and some
of them that you've busted and some
of them that you kind of corroborated.
So if I were to give a laundry list
for those that might not have read,
but should for what it's worth.
The ones we may be busted, or you busted,
University IP stakes and the percentages
taken versus perhaps our US counterparts,
every US uni is better and actually it
transpires perhaps just two are marginally
ahead and universities cashing in.
But focusing on some of the ones that
we suspected are the case, the golden
triangle getting a disproportionate amount
of funding, more scale up capital needed,
more government support at both the early
and late stages, potentially with the
middle being pretty good and academics
aren't necessarily the most commercial.
Now, not taking it in any particular
order, because I have so many questions
for you, which one of those are you most
focused on at the moment for Oxford?
Well, first of all, thank you for
reading the report and I do encourage
the listeners to read it and it was a
really interesting journey to be on,
actually, throughout the year and it was
terrific to work with Andrew and we were
very grateful to all the stakeholders.
I mean, I think I joked that there
was nobody left in Britain to talk to.
We had such engagement and we
tried to do that to make sure that
we really did listen to all the
different stakeholders at every stage.
Just a caveat maybe before I answer
specifically where I'm focused.
The report was constrained in terms
of what the government wanted from it.
It was very much for us to focus on that
first phase, so within the university
sector, as you are developing your
ideas, you know, in your potential
research discoveries that are IPable,
I say that as a scientist myself with
it was the journey from that sort of
immediate transfer out there, that
first phase of spin out and even just
reminding, you know, the government
that not all people spin out companies.
There's a lot of licensing, in fact a lot
of it is licensing and what that means
and why one makes the choice between
spinning out a company or licensing to
an already made company and not so much
to focus on the sort of scaling up bit of
it, or indeed the sort of more series B
where the companies then grow even bigger.
But we were very keen that we'd speak
to that in the report because we felt
that there was a pipeline that needed
to be discussed and this was a one off
opportunity to say, okay, let's bust
some myths because there was a lot of
twittersphere and commentary that was
incorrect and factually just wrong.
So let's use this as a vehicle to
bust some myths to really celebrate
actually how well the university sector
has done in this space, considering
actually it's very constrained at the
moment and struggling financially.
But despite that, how well they've done
to actually make this even happen and
what a fantastic achievement that is
and to put in the appendix some of the
success stories that you could point
to, but then point to some of the things
that we felt would make Britain more
competitive, more interesting, have a
particular USP, so not just to, again
have the rhetoric, which you know, I
teased Jeremy Hunt, the Chancellor, around
about just doing a Silicon Valley Me Too.
It's like, that's so unambitious,
britain can be much bigger and
better than that and we don't want
to just be a Silicon Valley Me Too.
Yes, we're great at the life sciences
and the physical sciences and the
deep tech sciences, but we're awesome
at creative arts and we're awesome
at the humanities and there's a huge
opportunity in entrepreneurship and
innovation because of all our amazing
ability around the creative arts.
So let's speak a little bit to that.
Let's speak about some of the
issues around women founders.
Let's speak about the bits that aren't in
our control but are in the government's
control, which is why is it we lose a
lot of companies at that sort of more
secondary stage because of capital
investment, planning, restrictions,
access to a skilled workforce, we
can come on to all these issues.
So to go back to your point about, you
know, maybe you made a comment about a
disproportionate number and that's an
interesting loaded word, it's that there's
just a huge volume, and we've been at
this in that golden triangle a lot longer.
It's as simple as that.
So there's just a lot more to invest
in, but there's just not enough capital.
So it's not disproportionate.
It's that there's not enough capital to
invest in other places and there's just
a disproportionate amount of opportunity
in this region because we've just been
doing the innovation piece longer.
So part of the report was also to say,
learn from how we've learned the journey
for the new places around the country,
the universities that want to be a
part of this and want to do innovation,
what is it that we've learned that
you should learn now and go and start
here, not where we were 20 years ago?
How can we help you?
How can we encourage the government
to think about more innovative ways,
forgiving the pun, of facilitating
some of those university places to
be a part of this because there is
no shortage in this country in our
brilliant university sector, fantastic
ideas, amazing opportunity to generate
more IP and there's a thirst and
an appetite for entrepreneurship.
So, long answer but you know I'm
very focused obviously in my role
as running the university here is to
continue to inculcate an excitement
around the opportunities that
innovation and licensing and spin
out bring because I recognise in
our students, whether undergraduate,
graduate and our young early career
researchers, they want in parallel,
many of them do this type of thing.
Not everybody, some people don't want
anything to do with that and that's
absolutely fine too, but as a modern
day institution, we're really good at
this, this is a fantastic way we can
make impact, further impact beyond
our discovery research and contribute
to the betterment of society, which
is what a university is about.
We are pretty good at it and we've learned
a lot in the past 20 years, there is
more we could do and there are ways that
we can definitely improve and do that
better and that's at every level of the
institution, so again, training, awareness
at the undergraduate, graduate level,
creating opportunities, getting people to
buddy up and meet with entrepreneurs and
be inspired by those investigators in my
university that are serial entrepreneurs
and have four or five companies spun
out, to be inspired by them and to get
opportunities to work with them and then
to continue to facilitate ways that we can
think about how, when we are developing
people's careers, that we make it just
easier for them to, in addition, if they
want to, be an entrepreneur and to spend
some time spinning out and to have what
has been historically quite a rigid tenure
track process where sort of you're in
the job and that's it and if you go, you
go, to have a slight more flexibility, I
call it porosity, to sort of, for us to
think about what does a modern academic
career look like and it should be more
porous, it should facilitate people who
want to take some time out or they want
to be part time in maybe the private
sector that might be their private
sector that they've spun out or somebody
else's and then in the public sector
which is being part of a university.
What is it that I can do to again
encourage that way of thinking and
to develop the mechanisms by which we
facilitate that more readily and of
course then there's the sort of lowering,
hopefully, more capital investment in,
because for every company we spin out,
there's several we can't, because we just
don't have enough capital, how do we then
facilitate in our ecosystem, and I'm sure
we'll come on to this, new ways that we
can also hold on to that incredible talent
pool and all those companies, because
that will drive regional economic benefit
for the region and I'm born and bred in
the city, so you know, it really matters
to me that we, as a university, which of
course we do as a big anchor institution,
the major employer, and we pump billions
into the economy, but there's more we can
also do and how can we do that through
the innovation spin out opportunities?
Yeah and I think that's a really important
point you raise and one I was discussing
yesterday at Harwell, talking about, you
know, Blackbird Leys are right there,
you know, what can we do more to create
opportunities, not just for the elite
that they primarily would appear to serve.
Coming back to something you said
about, you know kind of learning for
other universities and being able
to do things there, I had a recent
guest, Dave Norwood, who was saying
that actually the levelling up agenda
being layered onto the innovation
ecosystem belies some of the realities
of clustering and clearly, universities
all have hopefully brilliant academics
and the ability to spin companies out.
But those companies thriving locally,
is not necessarily always going to be
easy and that clusters have a lot of
things that you have alluded to that they
need to survive, not least talent and
mobility of talent and density of talent,
housing, supply, financing options, etc.
Oxford has many of those here and is
expanding and the science parks, but
we would all like that to be the case.
Do you genuinely believe that it's going
to be possible that every university
town can have its own cluster?
It's a really important point and
there's a lot in there to unpack.
So yes, whilst Oxford will look good
on the UK landscape in terms of density
of people in the ecosystem, it is a
far cry from my competitors which are
sitting in Kendall Square in Boston
and Stanford and San Francisco and
those, I remind people, even though we
beat them in every league table, which
we should be very proud of, it's like
winning the World Cup year after year.
We do it, we're a public university,
publicly funded, they sit on private
investments, they are private universities
with sixty billion of endowments and yet
we do really well and they've of course
in the innovation space been at it a lot
longer which is why they've got trillion
dollar companies sitting on them but what
they do have which is sort of again a
place that we need to be competing with
is just such a volume in that ecosystem.
They just walk across a corridor
and there's people that they could
bring into their companies the CEOs
who are experts that academics need
you know capital investment you know
all that is just there at scale, at
a level that's just jaw dropping.
Now we will get there in Britain,
undoubtedly and you know, places
like Oxford and others are
sort of on the journey there,
but we're not anywhere close.
People should just, the listeners
should be just reminded of some of
the challenges that we even have.
Now, to go back to your question around
the clustering, it's key that when you're
creating these innovation systems, you
do have the ambition and scale to want to
have that mix because you need to signpost
people again to the capital investors,
to the IP lawyers, to the people that
are going to be your great CEOs, to ease
of planning and building at scale, to
a great workforce, as you say, in areas
that you've got school kids coming out
and want interesting new different jobs
or people want to reskill into different
jobs and you can create that opportunity.
We need skilled people to come and work in
these companies and that's something again
that part of what we need to think about
also, it's not quite in your question
but something to again reflect on, is how
much we need to think about what more we
need to do within the school system as
part of the training or apprenticeships
to help facilitate that and actually get
involved in the training of the skilled
workforce in Britain, that is one of the
reasons as we point in the report a lot
of companies go when they want to really
scale up because they just feel they
haven't got the skilled enough workforce
here or the capital investment or the ease
of planning to go and scale up a company
and we lose them, right when they're
ready to contribute massively economically
and we just let them go and it's tragic
and we just got to stop that happening
having invested in them with publicly
funded money in our public institutions.
So one of the things you note in the
report we did is say very clearly, to
run the volume of companies say Oxford
spin out 25-30 a year, to run a tech
transfer office that's doing the bit,
just for the listener who's not aware
of how it works, you've got me as a
researcher working, I have an idea, we
patent it, we want to then potentially
license it or spin it, you have an office
inside the university that advises you.
They're going to get you the barrister
who's going to then protect it with
a patent in different territories,
they'll point you to different people
who might want to invest or to different
people who'll be skilled enough to help
run your company or whether you need
to be advised to go with a licensing
route to sell it to, say one of the big
pharma companies instead, rather than
always spinning out your own company.
But to make that tech transfer office be
really good and really skilled with great
quality people, as we have in Oxford,
such a fantastic tech transfer office
with Oxford University Innovation, you've
got a big volume that you've got to be
generating to make that wash its face
and you're not going to be able to do
that in every university, particularly
small universities, they just won't
have the volume and neither should they.
So what we pointed to was to say in
regions and maybe you would start
where the government's already decided
to create investment zones, you would
create a one stop shop, which not that
you're creating a cluster within the
university's cluster around that one
stop shop so that you can have a really
quality one stop shop where you've got
all that advice and that signposting.
Each university isn't then going to the
cost and the effort of trying to invent
it all and have it all in house, but
you've got a quality place that you can
go to in your region that can help you
get going on that journey with really
good advice and that's again what I was
saying to the start, you know, with some
of the things it's not under our control,
but that's where the government need to
now do the work and decide where they're
going to put these, you know, one stop
shops and these clusters so that you can
start to within a region where you've
got three or four universities in a
geographical area, they can get going,
they can have a really good quality,
you know, set of advice, they don't have
to set it all up in house, particularly
when, the financial constraints of
universities is very tested and then
they can start to think about how does
that shape then other aspects of growth
in that region in the context of those
companies being successful and wanting
to stay and putting in more investment.
Now where places like Oxford and London
Universities and Cambridge are helping
in the context beyond just advice
and this learn from us and this is how
we've done it, it's some very specific
things that also speak to the leveling
up and that is to say we can't, you
know, I can't place all the companies
that we generate, but there are other
universities that are trying to build
innovation space because they've got
spare land, they've got areas that they'd
like to use, but they can't fill them.
Well, what a happy marriage that is,
so we signed a deal with for instance,
Birmingham University, where we're placing
companies there and again, we're looking
at other places where we can move talent,
move money, move opportunities and place
them in different parts around the country
and that's a real win-win and we're doing
that, not just in this innovation spinner.
We're actually doing lots of things in our
basic research and collaborations anyway.
A lot of the research that we do,
particularly in the medical sciences,
is in very much collaborative
context and is setting up ways that
you exchange talent, you know, and
the talent pool can be distributed.
So these are the more, as I
often say to government, you
don't asset strip to level up.
You know, you've got great
assets that are phenomenal.
You know, if they're
strong, everybody's strong.
If they're weak, well, it's all done.
But we do have to address the fact that
there's not a spread, but you need to
make the pie bigger and you need my to...
yeah, it's just obvious,
it's not rocket science.
So, you know, we're strong.
We will do and grow stronger, but
we will also spread that beyond our
geographical boundaries as we are
and as actually we have done, it's
just often people don't know that.
No, that's really wonderful, thank you
for explaining that, that's very clear.
So within our boundaries, one of
the things that again was mentioned
in the report was sort of liaising
between business schools for that
more entrepreneurial, commercial
talent and often the people going
into those forums are already more
experienced in the commercial world
and twinning up with the academics.
It's not something one has a
sense is happening optimally
in Oxford as it stands.
I think somebody explained to me once
that the history of the Saïd Business
School was that the university didn't
originally want it and that there's some
sort of weird hangover from that but
clearly there's so much mutual benefit
from this amazing business school and this
world leading university being combined.
Is that something you're focused on
here and how do you see that evolving?
Yeah, it's such a good point and again,
I'm just going to bust that myth.
I've been in Oxford my whole
career for 35 years and I've never
heard that and I'm on the inside.
Oh, I love that!
That's myth number one.
Apologies to the listeners!
It is, well, I think it is fair to say
that, you know, the business school in
its development and growth from ground
roots is very focused on just developing
a business school that could quite quickly
get up, you know, to a successful level
and naturally, you might have some people
feel that it's not integrated enough.
But that's an evolution of how any new
thing is going to develop, it's got to
be brilliant itself and focus on what
it's doing and then as it matures, it
starts to make that connectivity both
internally and then more externally
and that's just an evolution thing and
that's absolutely the phase it's in.
Sumitra Dutta, who's the new Dean,
he's coming in and inheriting a
business school that's now, you
know, up the league tables, doing
well, attracting more students than
we can take, et cetera, et cetera.
So in this evolution, it's very much
about, right, how can I benefit even
more from being in the university
and all the amazing talent?
How can we reciprocate and put things in?
So that's just a sort of explanation
about how things really work when
you're building new enterprises
and again, there's always lots of
commentary and myths in Oxford,
which, you know, I'm often staggered
at and I've been there for 35 years!
I was given a very detailed
version of that, we'll discuss
it offline, that's hilarious!
There are always anecdotes of
things, but you know, the anecdote
of the anecdote as opposed to the
generic sort of broad understanding.
But Sumitra is brilliant as the new
Dean and is absolutely, you know,
he's running a leadership program
for all our, you know, heads of
department, there's all sorts of stuff
he's doing, so it's very integrated.
But the point you're making,
having sort of just corrected
that, is that it's not just Oxford.
There was a really surprising lack of
engagement across the country of business
schools, tying in with the innovation
piece and that was a real surprise to us
when, you know, we identified that one of
the challenges was, as you spin out, the
quality of the CEOs you can get access
to, the ability to grow that company
and meanwhile, you've all these business
schools around the country and the two
weren't meeting or talking, so that's why
we flagged it as an issue more generally
and certainly, obviously I'm talking
to our business school and Sumitra and
there's huge appetite and they're running
innovation schemes, entrepreneurship
schemes, running summer programs, they're
all part of some of the programs that
we run anyway and have been running.
So they have been quite integrated.
But what we need, again, it's holding
on, I refer to it as the challenge and
the trick we've got is how do we hold
on to that talent pool once they've
graduated and left, because you want
them to stay and of course, these are
very attractive students who've got lots
of amazing opportunities and offers.
Oxfordshire is beautiful, I love it, I'm
borne and bred in it, but there's not that
many different types of jobs, to do here
and that's part of the growth opportunity
and then you can hold on to more of your
talent pool because there's interesting
things for them to want to stay and
do and that's where the two will meet.
So I think it's, again, it's all
part of, you're always on a journey,
always evolving, you know, naturally
quite a lot of the people coming to
our business schools will be heading
into London or they'll be heading
into sort of bigger cities where
there's just bigger businesses.
So one of the challenges you've got
and I've got is making Oxfordshire an
opportunity innovation ecosystem, you
know, with a stunning, beautiful city
in the middle of it, juxtaposed to the
greatest city in the world of London.
Cambridge is another great city close by,
all the rest is in Britain and a place
where not just for our own people coming
through our school system, but also people
that come in as students, we hold on to
amazing talent and we build and drive
economic growth and all the benefits
that come with that in this region.
So we address some of the challenges
of worst life longevity in the country,
you know, within our own city, some
of the schools that are not performing
as well as, you know, we would like
them to be considering their city next
to a great world leading institution.
These are all the things that, you know,
we hope that we can be a part of fixing
by creating that broader ecosystem and
I often go out, you know, to my alumni
who sit out on the West Coast and
they're part of the Silicon Valley lot
or Boston or out in Asia and they will
say, and I will agree, and it's like,
where else in the world is there such a
phenomenal combination of things that's
so amazing and capable of developing
something that is truly world beating.
When you think you've got a world great
city, you've got two historic 1, 000
year old universities that have beaten
everybody else in the world, you've got
extraordinary creative arts on the M4
corridor, you've got some of the greatest
national labs that are knocking socks
off what's going on in Europe, you've
got beautiful cities and countryside.
There is nowhere else in the world
that's got that constellation anywhere,
tell me and nobody can and these are
people sitting on the West Coast and
the East Coast of America and in Asia.
We've got them licked.
So let's do it, let's be ambitious, let's
think about what we create in this region
and we can absolutely do this and it will
be phenomenal and that's how you will
build Britain back strong and economically
and that's the sort of opportunities
I see and try to sort of instill the
report and what I'm saying very publicly,
you know, under my stewardship, which
is, you know, obviously a short period.
I will do my best to set this in train.
It'll take longer than my stewardship,
but at least I'll set it off and that's
the ambition and aspiration I have for
the region, but it's also for the country.
You make a really interesting point
about the broader ecosystem, jobs that
are outside of the current domain.
Funny enough, when I moved to Oxford,
my background is financial services
and I was struck by how few investment
companies there were here and it's
something that you bring up in the
report, is about diversity of capital
and Cambridge does have more of it.
I remember thinking, gosh, I've picked
the wrong city for my background!
I don't feel that way now, but I really,
I thought gosh, I thought there would
be more and there isn't and you do point
very explicitly towards universities, as
you say, learning from the experience of
those that have gone before and very much
making sure that they can appeal to as
wide a range of investors as possible.
How do you see Oxford evolving
and what do you think in five and
ten years it needs to look like?
Because it is still relatively
constrained compared to Cambridge.
Oh, yeah, it absolutely is.
I mean, we always laugh because
Cambridge obviously is brilliant
and it's doing very well.
But on many metrics, we have them beaten.
We've had them beaten for ages, but
there's a, we somehow don't sort of
communicate that and if I can say
that their ability to build at scale,
different areas has just been a lot easier
and that's really a major difference.
But you're right, I mean, you know,
going back to sort of, why did
we suddenly take off in Oxford?
And it goes back to the sort of capital
and then how we must develop the capital
and I know that you've interviewed Ed
Bussey, who's the new terrific, you
know, head of Oxford Science Enterprises.
But, you know, when I was a young,
early career scientist, you know, we
patented things and then you put them
in the drawer, did nothing with it.
Occasionally, a bold, brave scientist
would sort of pack up the job and
have a go and get some venture
capital money somehow and some of
them were brilliantly successful and
did really well, but a lot just chose
not to do that because it's just too
high risk and a lot didn't succeed.
But the moment we created a fund and it
wasn't a big fund at the start, and that
was the sort of subsequent, it's been
renamed many times, but now it's OSE.
You just look at the graph, the moment
we created the capital pot, bang,
we went off and then the curve just
rocketed to, you know, 300 companies
now in that past decade, right?
And it's absolutely causal.
So all it needed to light the fire
was a dollop of money and then we were
there, we were doing our bit, generating
IP, had the ideas, ready to go.
We just didn't have the means to actually
do anything with it and so do not
underestimate the importance of capital.
Obviously, we've got to see a
more model, but we just need more
money in the system and of course,
venture capital is one way to do it.
But as we say, the report
is not the only way.
You've got some, a lot of students and
early career researchers want to do
different types of spin outs, they want
to be more social enterprise, they want to
be a bit more of an NGO maybe model, they
want to have different types of investors
that may be more angel investors,
there might be some people who will do
it through a philanthropic donation.
There's a whole range and I think again
as ever in life, you want diversity,
you want a menu of different ways of
having capital come in and support you
dependent on what it is you're aiming to
do with your particular idea and so you
know, where do I see things in five to,
I would love to have billions of pounds
in my ecosystem here and a range of
different ways that people would want to
invest and we have opportunities to think
about how would we like to be invested
in, because not everybody wants to go
down the VC model, but that's a sort
of common model at the moment and what
we're trying to do is also remind the
government, it doesn't have to just be VC.
Here's a set of examples of how people did
it very differently and there's pros and
cons with that different way of investing.
But we don't have enough, the short
answer is for the volume of opportunity
that's coming through, we do not have
enough capital by a wide margin and
we've just got to keep growing it.
So part of it is to, you know, excite and
interest people to come into our ecosystem
because it's a phenomenal place to be and
work, you will not be short of opportunity
and it's exciting opportunities.
These are really interesting projects
that are not just going to make money,
they're going to do great things in the
world because everything we're doing by
definition in an academic environment
is stuff that's good for people and the
society and the world and the planet.
So whether it's our amazing new work
developing extraordinary new generation
batteries and the capabilities to store
efficiently the energy there, whether
it's amazing new chemistry materials
on solar panels to be more efficient
in the cloudy weathers of Britain, you
know, obviously drugs and vaccines are
a given obviously with the COVID one
and then with malaria one, you know,
we save lives and we make the world a
greener place and this is what we do.
So it's not just that you'll also make
a lot of money, you'll be doing good
for the world and my sense is that,
you know, I look at my children's
generation, they want something different
and we've gone through a phase where
it's all just about the money and
that's very much a hard driven model
that has borne and bred the brilliance
that's happened on Silicon Valley and
the East Coast, but I think, again,
think about what Britain wants, think
about sort of what our value system is.
Sure, you need to make money and
there's no shame in making money and
that's great, that fuels everything.
But you can do it and do good too and I
think, you know, we can build an ecosystem
that will again, embrace more the creative
arts in addition, and our brilliance in
that in Britain, it will also embrace
women as founders and investors and the
capabilities there that we're missing
out on, it feels to me a little bit like
where we were in academia 25 years ago,
you're just missing talent because of,
again, the usual old biases that exist
and then you're investing in things
that will absolutely make you money if
that's the direction you want to go.
But you'll also be doing extraordinary
contributions to the world and that's
got to be good and I feel that the
next generation, that's what they
want and what they're looking for.
So my hope is I can create and help
create and be a part of creating
an ecosystem that delivers on that.
I hope so too.
You talk about companies growing here and
values based and I couldn't agree more.
Funny enough, I was saying I was
from a financial services background.
I'm now doing two days a week
in a cancer vaccine company.
So I am one of those people
and it is much more fulfilling.
Nothing against financial
services for what it's worth.
You talk about those companies and it's
not all for money and you talked about
the restraints of the reporters you asked,
but the scale up capital part of the
equation is meaning that sometimes our
best companies, sadly, if they are really
successful, almost more so are likely
to end up being bought, listed and not
always, but sometimes subsequently moving
some or all of their headquarters or
their operations elsewhere, often America.
So there is this sort of quandary of
a missing segment here in the UK and I
wanted to know what your interactions
with people like Jeremy Hunt and obviously
on the Mansion House Compact and the
changes that might bring to that end of
the ecosystem, what your view is on that?
Yeah, no, it's a great, question and
you know, we touched a little bit on
this in the report, even though that
was not the remit of the report, but
we wanted to make some commentary about
the downstream issues, because we see
them and we see them at both a sort
of ethical, moral level, if you like,
because we feel, well, hold on a minute,
you know, it's the taxpayers money,
these are publicly funded universities,
we've developed all this, we've then
supported them to grow and be successful
and then just when they're ready to
really go big and really help drive
things back, we just let them walk off
into the sunset and there's no penalties.
So we did discuss a little bit, you
know, this wouldn't happen in America.
If you left America, there'd be a
tax penalty, there'd be some penalty.
So again, these are things we've got
to really think about in this country.
Let's be bolder about the fact that, hold
on a minute, we've got to hold on to you.
So we've got to incentivise people
to stay, that's the first thing.
We've got to make it easier and
better and more attractive to stay.
We've also got to maybe think
about, you know, like they do in
America, maybe there's a penalty
if you do decide to go and...
Do you not worry that might
disincentivise the most commercial people?
It might do, but it happens in the States
and it doesn't seem to and they stay.
So again, I think we need to at
least analyse what happens there,
what happens here, where are their
differences and let's not be unwilling
and let's have a bit of humility to
at least analyse what goes on there.
Is that a causal factor for what
drives there, and what would be
the penalties of not doing that?
I'm not saying that's my recommendation,
I'm just saying it's interesting
to observe that we, there is no,
you know, problems with that.
Now having said all that, of
course I can absolutely see why
people will do it because they
want access to a skilled workforce,
they want easier planning, right?
They've got access to a huge market
that they can sell in and they've
got access to capital and so, almost,
you're forced to go and that was
sort of why we did put in the report.
These are the things that
aren't in my control.
I'm doing my bit.
We are generating ideas and we're
generating the talent and the skills,
the next bit now is over to you and
you've got to start to think about
how do you incentivise people to stay.
Incentivisation is always better
than penalties, so I'm not saying I'm
recommending you tax or whatever, you
know, a carrot is better, but you know,
it is interesting that there are...
other countries do it differently, right?
So, let's do that.
Now, it's interesting, as you know,
Julia Hoggart, we quoted from the
London Stock Exchange and obviously
I've had many conversations with her,
and they've been doing some analyses
of companies that did go off on lists
on NASDAQ versus, you know, ones that
list here and just, actually, what
is the five year journey, and what
are the pros and cons of doing that?
It might be a short term
gain, but a long term...
not so much.
So I think there's again, as ever,
there's maybe some perceptual
interesting things to unpack there
and we have to see where that lands.
But there's no doubt there is
recognition that we have to make the
listing more attractive to stay here.
So those are things that need to be sorted
and I keep referring to sort of planning,
but I wouldn't underestimate and this has
been a touchstone now for many different
aspects of our society at the moment.
We're all talking about it
and the different parties are
recognising that this is a problem.
We are, we're suffocating ourselves
because we've got a very anti growth
of a sort of philosophy, which I
totally get because sometimes we've
made a real hash of the way we've
done buildings and plannings and
developments, but we do have to breathe
and grow as well and that can be good.
It needn't always be bad and so there's
a cultural thing that needs to be worked
on because that's also a big factor
why people will go is they just feel
they can't, it's just too painful and
too long and too slow to be able to
develop the physical facilities that you
need to grow the company at the scale.
So, and of course, you
know, we have had Brexit.
I don't want to get into the politics of
that, we are where we are, let's move on.
But again, you've got to think about
the market you're selling to and when
that's now a different ease of selling
to a large European market, America
is, you know, it's a big market to sell
in, and we're not a big country, right?
So, again, those are factors
that we have to own the decisions
we have taken in this country.
But if we want to, again, hold on to
these companies that we're developing,
we've got to think about all these
different issues that are the factors
that people will tell you are why
they upped and upsticks and left.
And again, to the point around domestic
market, one of the criticisms that
I've heard levied in the UK is the
NHS should be the first purchaser,
the government should be the first
purchaser, helping with proof of
concept for our start up companies and
so often those procurement exercises
are just like wading through treacle.
So I completely agree with that.
I think there's a lot to be evolved
there and Julia Hoggart is excellent.
She's super, absolutely super person.
Actually I spoke to her, I mean this
is down in the weeds but even things
like MIFID2 which is very boring
piece of financial regulation have...
they are now going to be reversed.
It was gold plated probably by
us as part of EU regulation.
We do now have an opportunity to roll
that back and help with the depth of the
research market, which again is impacting
people's confidence in listening here.
She absolutely gets it and she
gets the pipeline and innovation.
No, she really does and she, you know,
as I say we've discussed, you know,
several times this issue and I'm very
confident in her absolute desire to get
this right and to do the changes that's
necessary, you know, we're all part of
this pipeline and we've all got to do
our bit well and so yeah, over to them.
And so we're talking about Julia, I'm
talking to you, I'm here hosting this
and yet it was identified and you've
mentioned it a few times that women,
partly to do with structural difficulties
of the inference is childcare outside of
working hours, fewer women necessarily
stepping into the ring at all, but the
report also alluded to TTOs needing more
convincing and I was wondering A, if you
could illuminate a little bit more on what
came out around that and B, what maybe
you're doing to help educate, because it
does seem to me, through work I've done,
the conversations I have, the industries
that I've been in, that women's leadership
qualities, unless they fit a more
masculine mold, are sometimes overlooked
and we need to do a big educational shift.
Yeah, absolutely and I was...
this was something new to me.
So in doing the report, I had
obviously access to other types of
reviews and reports that were done.
Actually one interesting was
ongoing at the time coming
out of our business school.
So a person doing their PhD
on the gender gap and Thomas
Hellerman's done other reports.
So I was privy then for the first
time to just the data and the
stats and my jaw was on the floor.
I did not realise it was this bad and it
did, as I say, the best I could use is
that it felt like, wow, this is where we
were in the academic sector 25 years ago.
That's, you know, we're just glass
ceiling, no women getting through,
etc., and what a waste of talent,
you know, that you're not using.
So then, you know, in the brief period
I was doing the report, sort of my
diagnosis that's always data informed
and evidence based was, of course there's
the usual pressures that on top of
already trying to just keep going as a
successful academic, whilst simultaneously
having a career, you know, other
responsibilities around care, that's just
one extra thing that just has to wait.
You know, there's a reason I'm only now
actually probably discussing spinning
out a company in my own right, because it
just was not possible to add that onto...
And that's typical for
women, that it will be later.
A bit later, exactly right,
because there just was no way
I had bandwidth to do that.
There's also some evidence that would
suggest and this is not just in Britain,
this is sort of global data, that women
are more prone to want to spin out
companies of a more social enterprise
type nature, they're not going to be
so commercially profitable and that's
just less attractive to investors,
particularly the VC model of investment,
unless there's women investors and
then they tend to want to do that.
So there's some very interesting things
there and then there's all the usual,
like if a woman's the founder then it's
less invested, if she's just on the
panel but not the investor, they'll
get more, all that sort of stuff going
on, which is all usual implicit biases.
But there's a little bit that could
probably be explained just on some
facts that women tend to want to
produce companies of a different nature.
There's the timing thing, but then
there is just the implicit biases.
Now that requires just education and
facts and good examples of women.
So things that we've been doing actually
for the past five years is running a
program called IDEA, Improving Diversity
in Entrepreneurship and we've had lead
champions of some of our women founders
who've been terrifically successful, who
were sort of early and then quite seasoned
researchers, and then them running
workshops, running panel discussions,
exciting and inspiring the next generation
of women, so that they can see, because
visibility, I've learned that as a
woman myself in a leadership roles, is
that you underestimate as a woman, you
know, it took me till quite late in my
career to realise it matters, Just the
visibility of me being a woman in that
role, actually, was all I needed to do.
It just made such a difference to a
sense of empowerment that, you know,
you could do it and it was possible to,
you know, be head of a department and
have a family and you know, run a lab
that was doing well and all those things
and you do underestimate as a woman.
So we've been working hard to recognise
that we need to improve the representation
in this space to use the champions as
great role models, great visible role
models and then to be really active
about supporting and encouraging and
then, you know, as I say in the report
by flagging it there, you know, it
was very deliberate for me to want
to put that in, you know and Andrew.
So it's there and it's in black and
white and then just next time there's a
decision at a maybe a board meeting for
VC and their sort of thing they might
just remember oh yeah maybe I am being
biased here and maybe I should invest in
her as opposed to somebody else or give
them a bit more because it's not just
investing in the binary decision it's
also how much so again significantly less
money being given so it's, as ever there's
never one unitary reason there's always
a set of that you need to understand and
diagnose and then you need to start to
think about how do you start to address
them and again, we're trying to do our bit
in that way as an example and then we'll
see what the rest of the community does.
Well, the government through the
British Business Bank have now got the
Women's Task Force, which is absolutely
pointed at this subject matter and I'm
very passionate about also, so it does
sound like they're picking up that
mantle and in really positive ways.
So that's really exciting.
It is exciting because you're
just losing, you're losing
money, you're just losing talent.
You know, I see if you sort of digress,
but you know, many of the colleges, you
know, were celebrating over the past few
years, 40 years of women being admitted.
Okay, I was at Merton College was my
undergraduate and graduate college, I was
very fortunate to be its warden, its head
for a few years before I took on the vice
chancellor role and we too celebrated
our 40 years of women, I was the fifth
year women were there and what struck me,
and this is, You know, sounds like I'm
going way off piste here, but there's a
point here, is that when we started to
celebrate, you know, just a sample of our
women over those four decades from each
of the decades, it was just extraordinary,
the things that they'd gone on and become
and done and you couldn't help but look
at it and just say, wow, look what they've
achieved in just 40 years of having an
opportunity of that transformation that
education brings and what we've missed
by not having that happening more early,
you're just missing, you're just wasting
talent and that's a great tragedy,
so you know, it's a good investment.
Absolutely.
I have one final question, I wanted
to speak to, you alluded to the kind
of the endowments in America, you
didn't allude, you explicitly spoke
about them and in the report it
talks about them and the difference.
In Oxford, it's further potentially
exacerbated by the college system
and the alum networks being
held within individual colleges.
Is that something that, I appreciate
it's pretty difficult to get people to
open up those lists, but in conversations
I've had, it seems to me that giving to
your college and potentially giving to
innovation, to science and technology,
to departments, they're quite separate.
Is it something that you have
plans to try and open up more or
is it just completely intractable?
No, it's another myth actually and
I can say that, you know, hand on
heart, I've run a college, I've run
a department, I've on both sides.
Well, I'm pleased.
There's a lot of, you know, I'm
an alum, so I get approached.
There's a lot more talk and
rhetoric around, oh, it's a big
competition between the two.
It really isn't because the reality
is people give to the colleges because
it's your family, it's your home and the
college's needs are quite different and
circumscribed and at the end of the day,
everything the colleges are doing is core
university, it's core business, right?
We're all doing the best teaching that
we can to the most outstanding students
that we can find and we're trying to
do the most impactful research with
the best academics after delivering it.
That's it, that's our core business to
make the world a better place, right?
That's what we do and that's happening
everywhere and so I don't care where
the money goes because it's all
supporting core business and the
truth is alumni database is one, it's
one big shared database anyway and
it has been for years and years, so
everybody buys into one big database,
it's not like they're secret lists.
That is literally not what one hears.
You know, people shouldn't
listen to what they read in the
press or sort of the hearsay.
So the truth is, for years and years,
we have a large big database where
everybody signs up because it's more
efficient to communicate by email to
everybody in one big bit and colleges
can then have, they access it and run
theirs if they're doing bespoke stuff,
or if we need to communicate to everybody
in one fell swoop, we can and everybody
sort of signs up to that model, right?
The alumni that tend to give will give
to the colleges for, you know, because
it's your home and your family and then
when you want to give to the university,
it's for something quite different and
separate that the college can't do.
So often it's for a major project or
a new big initiative around a large
building and the honest answer is most
of the big gifts don't come from alum.
So if you look at our last campaign
that we ran and we're going to launch
one at the end of this year, we do one
every sort of 15-20 years, most of the
money that came for the large gifts for
the university projects, the largest
percentage of it is from non alum.
So it's people who are extraordinarily
generous and very wealthy, and they
want to buy into excellence and
sustain excellence and they want to
buy into what is going to make great
impact and you know, that's the way.
So there's no competition, you know,
rarely you might get something where
maybe somebody's just at the moment
of wanting to get a person to support
a, you know, leaking roof or something
in your, you know, 13th century grade
one listed building and then maybe the
university's indirectly been talking
about something else, but it gets
resolved because you don't talk to an
alum about a gift unless you've cleared
it with the college and the college is
99 percent of the time will say that's
absolutely fine, go ahead and have a chat.
I never said no once if I was
approached for one of my alums to
have a conversation about something.
So it works far more, well one, it
just is very harmonious because there's
actually not much competition, we have
complete line of sight on all sides.
At the end of the day, everything
that comes in is very welcome because
it's all support and core business and
most of the big university projects
anyway are supported by none of them.
That's super interesting and of
course, you know, corroborated by
what's about to happen with the
really exciting Ellison Institute.
Yeah, exactly.
I mean, Ellison is, you know, got
this amazing standalone institute.
Obviously, our wonderful professor of
medicine, John is retired from that
post and will be the first president,
we're doing already amazing, exciting
collaborative projects with them.
It's going to be a phenomenal component
of this ecosystem, absolutely amazing.
Schwarzman supported the new
big center for the humanities.
So that's a bold statement about the
importance of supporting the humanities
at a time when, you know, they're under
pressure and struggling in universities.
We're going out there and saying, not
on our watch, we will look after these
subject areas because it tells you why
you are you and why society is society.
It tells us about ourselves and
that's such an important thing to do.
So we're making a bold statement
there, generously supported by
again, a person that wants to
buy into and support excellence
in an area that they care about.
So yeah, so you know, there's
always these anecdotes.
So I'm very pleased to be able to rectify
that, now there's one big database
and we all work quite well together.
And I think that's a great note to
finish on is just that point of buying
into excellence, which I think is
what it's all about and I'm going
to say thank you so much Irene,
it's been an absolute pleasure.
Thanks for listening to this
episode of Oxford + presented by
me, Susannah de Jager if you want
to stay up to date with all things
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