Incubator space for the Life Sciences sector opens with Kinetic Labs
Kinetic Labs; Ireland’s first private laboratory facility incubator space for the life sciences sector has opened its doors in Waterford City.
Kinetic Labs is a facility offering state-of-the-art single and shared wet lab space, office facilities, meeting rooms and a café and is now available on a rental basis to start-ups and science-based companies offering all of the lab facilities needed to develop their products and processes.
The innovative new business has been created through a combination of a REDF grant from Enterprise Ireland with additional funding from WorkLAB and Waterford City & County Council the first wet lab incubation facilities for science-based companies to be created in the Southeast.
On of the Directors of the project is well –known pharmaceutical entrepreneur Patsy Carney. Having built Eirgen Pharma from scratch to a global multinational Patsy understands the needs of both start-ups and multinationals having worked at both ends of the scale in the fine chemicals and pharmaceutical industries. Patsy discusses the new venture in the most recent ‘The Science of Business’ podcast with fellow scientific entrepreneur Louise Grubb and founder of Q1 Scientific.
During the podcast interview, which is now available on all podcast platforms Patsy says, “We know that Kinetic Labs will play a critical role in building on the capability and entrepreneurship potential of existing indigenous and multinational life science companies here in the Southeast.
We are a region with a core cluster of life-sciences and medical device companies and we have a critical mass of talent in this sector, and I know that for start-ups finding affordable and flexible lab space can be a big challenge. Kinetic Labs offers the ideal space for those working in the industry who might be considering their own entrepreneurial journey along with spinouts from third-level universities and institutes plus the life-sciences sector, sciences, medical device, pharma, bio-pharma and even the higher-end functional food sector. There is even great opportunity for the specialist equipment suppliers to use the space to demo products to potential customers.”
Patsy says that it is his vision to develop a science innovation hub through Kinetic Labs. Through the interview, Patsy also shares how his early interest in science was ignited at secondary school. He details his extensive career journey and the variety of opportunities that he made happen including his decision to take an MBA with his work colleague Tom Brennan and how they then developed the business plan for what would become one of the country’s more successful indigenous pharmaceutical companies.
Just some of the extensive advice in the podcast interview that Patsy shares for start-ups is ‘to be prepared for risk’, “Any startup is a risk and you have to be prepared for that – however, to grow levels of entrepreneurship in Ireland there is a need for more government supports and more of a cushion for entrepreneurs. Be that in the form of tax breaks or entrepreneurship relief to help reduce this risk and create an eco-system in order to nurture entrepreneurship with the likes of Kinetic Labs, those elements are essential in order to make this happen.”
The Science of Business podcast series is hosted by the multi-award-winning serial entrepreneur and founder of Q1 Scientific and Trivium Vet Louise Grubb. The series features interviews with some of the key people behind Ireland’s global success in pharma, life sciences, health and biomedical sectors. Louise brings her twenty years of experience within the sector to the table and her own knowledge of what is required to establish a pharma success story. To listen to the full interview this latest episode of ‘The Science of Business’ is now available to listen to on all podcast platforms and at https://q1scientific.com/
About Patsy Carney
Waterford-based pharmaceutical firm EirGen was founded in 2005 by Patsy Carney and Tom Brennan and employs more than 200 people, manufacturing high-potency drugs for cancer chemotherapy.
Prior to establishing Eirgen Pharma Patsy worked at IVAX for 14 years with Tom Brennan before they spotted an opportunity to manufacture generic chemotherapy drugs
EirGen Pharma is now one of the leading developers and suppliers of high potency niche pharmaceutical products in the world and in 2015 Miami-based Opko acquired the Waterford-based manufacturer for 135m dollars.
EirGen is now part of OPKO, a pharmaceutical and diagnostics company, which operates the third-largest clinical laboratory in the US and Patsy and Tom also remain on board as part of the OPKO operation.
EirGen continues to go from strength to strength as the global centre of excellence for R&D and Supply Chain. In 2018, a state of the art R&D facility has come online to support the product development pipeline for the corporation across multiple dosage forms including injectable, oral solid dose and dry powder inhalation products.
With over 35 years in the pharma Industry, Patsy is an investor in life sciences and pharma companies but most recently he is a Director of Kinetic Labs, a Waterford based incubator space for the life sciences industry servicing both start-ups and existing Pharma companies.
It is a new purpose-built science innovation centre set-up to provide science-based companies with the lab facilities needed to develop their products and processes. Kinetic Labs is providing over 400 m2 of high-quality wet lab space with shared lab space for companies starting out and individually furnished and unfurnished facilities for more established companies.
Kinetic Labs will play a critical role in building on the capability and entrepreneurship potential of existing indigenous and multinational life science companies. See: www.kineticlabs.ie
About the Podcast host Louise Grubb
Serial entrepreneur Louise Grubb has an incredible track record of business success. Driven by innovation Louise is currently working on her third successful start-up.
Following her graduation from Trinity College Dublin with a Bachelor of Science in Nutrition and Dietetics Louise worked as a dietician at Crumlin Children’s Hospital and despite loving this work Louise decided to place her focus on business and went on to complete an MBA at DCU and a marketing course with the Marketing Institute of Ireland. From there, she got a job in sales with Cow & Gate Nutricia where she spent the next five years, working her way up to Senior Manager. She and her husband, John, a vet, decided to leave Dublin and move back to her native Waterford where she decided it was the right time to go it alone in business and set up her first company.
NutriScience was established in 1999, the company develops and manufactures nutraceuticals for animal health and its launch was a global success. When an opportunity arose in 2009, NutriScience was sold to the Belgian animal healthcare company, Ecuphar which continues to manufacture and employ people in Waterford.
Louise had a new business venture in mind and she established Q1 Scientific in 2012. It is the first Irish company to specialise in the provision of a stability storage service, meeting the highest international standards, as required for the highly regulated pharma, medical devices and bio-sciences industries. Today Q1 Scientific employs twelve people and can count 10 of the world’s top pharma companies as clients. Louise recently moved to the role of Chairperson as another new business venture was already within her future sight.
After raising 3.2million in capital Louise co-founded TriviumVet with Tom Brennan and launched the business in 2018. TriviumVet specialists in the development of drugs and other medical devices to treat chronic diseases in companion animals. The company has already developed a beef-flavoured tablet for treating gastric ulcers in older dogs. The drug is currently making its way through the regulatory process, while a heart disease treatment is also at the advanced stage of development.
Louise’s business acumen and achievements have been recognised over the years with an array of business and innovation awards including being selected as a finalist in the 2016 EY Entrepreneur of the Year Awards. Along the way, her businesses have also been shortlisted and have won many prestigious industry awards inlcuding the AIB / Business & Finance Irish Emerging Company of the Year, David Manley Start-Up Business of the Year, Irish Industrial Products Exporter of Year, Pharma Start-up of the Year, to name but a few.
Louise is a keynote speaker at national and international conferences and also offers her time as an adviser to start-up companies on business development and marketing. She developed the Irish Business Role Models teaching program for 3rd level education in association with Enterprise Ireland and supports several local charities.
Most recently Louise has launched a new podcast series, titled ‘The Science of Business. Each month Louise meets with some of the people behind the pharma and life science sectors in Ireland who share their own career paths and interesting business stories in this leading global field, the interviews can be found on all podcast platforms.
Louise lives in Waterford with her family and it is here where her parents and grandparents before them have been in business for over a century. Her father ran a pharmacy and general store in the city and there, working part-time throughout her teenage years, Louise was first introduced to the world of entrepreneurship.
