Chief Scientific Officer
Steve has over 16 years experience within industrial R&D and holds an IOTA NanoSolutions Industrial Senior Research Fellowship. He is a professor at the University of Liverpool Chemistry Department, where he also holds a Royal Society Industry Fellowship. Steve is a cofounder of IOTA NanoSolutions Limited, having led the development of the technology within Unilever, Port Sunlight Laboratories before joining the University in 2007. Steve held senior research and management positions within Unilever for 9 years, initially as a member of the Physical Sciences Group Leadership Team and Unit Leader for the Molecular Sciences Unit, moving to become the Science Area Leader for Functional Ingredients in 2001. Latterly, Steve held the position of Discovery Platform Director for Molecular and Nanotechnologies for the HPC division of Unilever. Steve has also worked for Courtaulds Strategic and Corporate Research and for the Cookson Technology Centre. Steve gained his first degree in Chemistry with Materials Science and a D.Phil in Controlled Block Copolymer Synthesis from the University of Sussex. He was also the first recipient of the RSC/MacroGroup Young Researcher of the Year Medal for his branched polymer research in 1998. Steve is the co-inventor of over 50 patent filings and co-author of over 55 scientific publications.
John has been the Managing Director of Unilever Ventures since its commencement in 2002. Prior to this he worked at Unilever for 13 years in a number of manufacturing and R&D roles in the UK and Europe. He then switched functions into consumer marketing, becoming Marketing Director on the board of Unilever's UK food business and the European Culinary Category, running brands including PG Tips, Calve, Colmans and Oxo. In 2001 he joined a team tasked to define & set up Unilever's corporate venturing program. John graduated from Oxford University in 1981 with a degree in Engineering Science.
Anna is an Investment Director with Unilever Ventures. Prior to joining Unilever Ventures in 2003, Anna worked in venture capital, equity capital markets and M&A out of London since 1995, engaging with growth companies across industries seeking to raise equity financing privately or from the public markets. Anna is Swedish; she lived in France for 12 years and holds a degree from the French graduate school of management ESSEC.
Andy is a scientific consultant to IOTA NanoSolutions Limited, and is also a cofounder. The IOTA NanoSolutions technology was initiated by Andy and Dr. Haifei Zhang at the University of Liverpool (EPSRC Grant GR/N3999/01). Andy is Professor of Chemistry in the Department of Chemistry at the University of Liverpool and is the Director of the Centre for Materials Discovery (www.materialsdiscovery.com). Andy gained his D.Phil at the University of Nottingham in 1994 with Prof. Martyn Poliakoff. He held an 1851 Fellowship and a Royal Society NATO Fellowship at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, USA, before a Ramsay Memorial Fellowship at the Melville Laboratory for Polymer Synthesis at the University of Cambridge. He also held a Royal Society University Research Fellow in the University of Liverpool and was appointed to a Personal Chair in 2004. In addition to the Macro Group UK Young Researchers’ medal Andy has been the recipient of a Gertrude Cropper Award (1994) and the McBain Medal. He is the co-author of nearly 70 peer-reviewed journal publications and co-inventor of >11 patent filings.