Cather Simpson: entrepreneurial academic

Using the parlance of basketball, Professor Cather Simpson describes herself as a ‘point guard’.

A team player, she’s the one who sets up the plays, making sure the ball gets to the right players at the right time so they can take the shot.

The professor of physics and chemical sciences is certainly in full swing in the role when she meets with UniNews. The fourth start-up company that she has co-founded through the University’s Photon Factory has just been spun out. She established the Photon Factory in 2009 to harness cutting-edge research in photonics, the science of light, to solve real-world problems.

The start-up, Beam Agritech, is developing tiny low-cost lasers that zap parasitic varroa mites off honeybees as they fly into their hives. The mites feed on honeybees and their larvae and pupae, spread disease and can cause bee colonies to collapse, representing a global threat to food security due to bees’ critical role as pollinators.

The idea, which began in one of the Photon Factory’s brainstorming sessions over beers at Old Government House, was developed by Cather and Dr Francesco Merola, a University senior research fellow in physics, in collaboration with Plant and Food Research. Francesco is now taking the reins as the company’s chief science officer, alongside a CEO.

Cather is also immersed in a multimillion-dollar capital raise for another Photon Factory spin-out company, Orbis Diagnostics. She is CEO of the company, which is developing a low-cost, point-of care diagnostics platform that offers clinically accurate blood test results using just a drop of blood from a fingerstick.

Cather says her drive to turn research ideas into commercial ventures is likely due to a range of factors. One is her love of working in teams; another is the creative excitement that comes from finding innovative deep-tech solutions to globally critical problems.

She also points to her peripatetic upbringing. She was born in Germany, where her father was stationed as a US military officer, and she moved well over a dozen times in her childhood.

“Because I moved around so much, I tend to be adaptable, and to see new landscapes through the lens of opportunity rather than constraint,” she says.

As well as working on the front lines of start-ups, Cather is supporting others to shoot for their goals through her high-profile national and international governance roles.  

She’s on the board of Fisher and Paykel Healthcare, one of the country’s biggest technology success stories, and is president-elect of SPIE, the international society for optics and photonics. The 25,000-member organisation brings together engineers, scientists, students and business professionals to advance light-based science and technology.

She’s also bringing her extensive experience translating research into commercial applications to the board of the New Zealand Institute for Advanced Technology (NZIAT). The new Public Research Organisation was announced last year, as part of one of the largest reforms in decades of our science sector, and is charged with connecting research, industry and investment to translate world-leading science into new products, services, industries and high-paying jobs. The NZIAT articulates this mission as ‘From frontier research to frontier firms for a prosperous New Zealand’.

Cather says she jumped at the opportunity to join the board to help address New Zealand’s persistently stagnant productivity levels. She points to a couple of major challenges the country needs to overcome to turn the tide.

“You can’t point to the science and innovation system in isolation and say, ‘You guys need to lift your game and give us more return on investment’. Too many other factors are required to support the translation of innovation into economic growth – including business dynamism, taxation and policy settings, and advanced infrastructure.”

Another is shifting our innovation culture to think bigger and more expansively. That means taking a leaf out of the innovation playbooks of both established and emerging companies like Fisher and Paykel Healthcare, and Halter, respectively.

“We need to hold on to all the innovative drive that comes with our number-eight wire mentality, and apply that outwardly, to solving big, global problems; to not just fix your own paddock gate, improve one township’s water quality or deliver better patient care to one doctor’s practice,” she says.

“It’s about having the confidence and thriving commercialisation ecosystem to turn your innovation into a product that delivers solutions to the world biggest challenges, and economic benefit to New Zealanders today and tomorrow.”

– Caitlin Sykes