Lab to Market Leadership with Chris Reichhelm

The State of UK Deep Tech | Dr David Cleevely CBE FREng FIET

• Deep Tech Leaders • Season 1 • Episode 22

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In this episode, host Chris Reichhelm is joined by Dr. David Cleevely CBE FREng FIET, co-founder of Cambridge Angels and a leading figure in UK science and technology. Together, they explore the intricate process of scaling Deep Tech companies, the importance of talent and vision, and the systemic challenges facing the UK’s innovation ecosystem.

David shares lessons from decades of investing, building companies, and influencing policy, shedding light on how serendipity and networks can drive innovation. He also reflects on the differences between the UK, US, and China in shaping their technology industries and what the UK can do to maintain its competitive edge.

Key Topics Covered:
- Overcoming scaling challenges for Deep Tech in the UK
- The critical importance of talent and senior leadership
- Creating a vision and building boards that add value
- The transformative role of serendipity in innovation
- Comparing innovation strategies in the UK, US, and China

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Podcast Production: Beauxhaus


David Cleevely:

The implementation of serendipity, for me, is the most important thing we could do as a small country. If I'm looking at a strategy for the next 30 years, It is, we don't have the resources to compete in the research and the development of all these things. What do we have? We have a fantastic education system. We have a small country. We can network together.

Chris Reichhelm:

Welcome to the Lab to Market Leadership podcast. Too many advanced science and engineering companies fail to deliver their innovations from the lab to the market. We are on a mission to change that. My name is Chris Reichhelm, and I'm the founder and CEO of Deep Tech Leaders. Each week we speak with some of the world's leading entrepreneurs, investors, corporates, and policy makers about what it takes to succeed on the lab to market journey. Join us. The city of Cambridge in the UK is without question the country's most successful and dynamic science and technology hub. And a large part of that is thanks to my next guest. Dr David Cleevely is a living legend in the field of science and technology. He is a serial entrepreneur, having set up multiple companies across the technology domains. Uh, he's scaled those. He's gone on to have main market listings with those as well. He's a prolific investor, having set up Cambridge Angels, one of the UK's leading business angel investment networks and personally invested in over 55 technology companies. He's sat on multiple boards, advised multiple entrepreneurs, and even had a hand in shaping science and technology policy across the UK and the European Union. If you don't know him, you really should. Dr David Cleevely is a living legend, and I am delighted that we have him on the show today. I want to talk to him about how he sees the state of UK technology and science right now, about his views on what we can do to make more, to get more of these companies through the lab to market journey, what role the state plays, what role investors play, what other roles management needs to be playing too. This is going to be a dense and enthralling episode, I'm sure. And I can't wait to get started. I hope you enjoy. Let's get into it. David Cleevely, thank you so much for joining me.

David Cleevely:

It's great to be here, Chris. Thank you very much.

Chris Reichhelm:

You have seen an awful lot of development of the science and technology industry in the UK over decades now, and you've played, if you don't mind me saying, a pretty significant role in that too. What is your take on the current state of science and technology company development in 2024?

David Cleevely:

I, my, my take on the current state is that we're suffering from, um, the general slowdown in the UK economy. Um, and of course the changing relationships that we've had internationally, um, are affecting our ability to, um, respond to markets, but also to bring in people and other inputs into what's going on. So that has two effects. I think it's, one is, there's a, there's a kind of slightly lower level of expectation from people who want to start companies and grow them. And there's also a lowered expectation, um, and the caution. on behalf of the people who are investing. Um, so the thing that I've noticed, um, since, since COVID is there's a certain reluctance to take risk. Um, and that seems to be Um, the kind of thing that, that, that, you know, if you've got a bit of, too much of that caution, then you're going to, you're going to slow growth up. Um, it's not that there aren't lots of things coming along, but, um, it's that the rate at which they're turning into stuff that I would hope would be the foundation for the economy for the next 10 or 20 years, that, that rate appears to have slowed.

Chris Reichhelm:

Is, is there anything, and just to be clear on that, is that a function of immigration policy, uh, of trade relationships, uh, that we have of the broader economy and the changing geopolitical landscape and how that affects the economy going forward? Or is there more to it than that?

David Cleevely:

It's all, it's all, it's all, it's all of those things.

Chris Reichhelm:

Yeah.

David Cleevely:

Um, I think that they, you know, we've, we've had. You know, no matter how, what particular side of the political divide you sit, um, you know, we've had a few very turbulent years, um, a great deal of uncertainty. Um, we've had the exit from the European Union, we've had the COVID uh crisis, which, which was really quite a serious crisis. I mean, we, you know, it's almost as if people have forgotten that this thing had happened, but actually it was a very serious change to the impact on the, on the economy. Um, and, and so all of those things, um, Uh, I think one of the Chinese politician once said about the Chinese, the, the French Revolution,'it's a bit too early to tell.' It's a little too early to tell exactly what the real impacts of all of this will be. Um, and it's, it's entirely possible, you know, that, that over the next two, three, four, five years, we can do some resets and we can reset expectations and get our sights set a little bit higher. But at the moment, There isn't that kind of level ambition that I saw, say, in the early 2000s, or indeed, the kind of thing that, that you go in the 2010 to 2015 kind of time frame. That's, those are the things that I'm missing at the moment, that kind of sense of optimism and momentum.

Chris Reichhelm:

And that it is possible to build something substantial in this country.

David Cleevely:

Well, it is possible to build something substantial in the UK. Um, I'm doing it in Glasgow at the moment. Um, it's, uh, and, and that will be very substantial. You know, there's, uh, a sociologist in the 1920s said if enough people believe something to be true, It will be true in its consequences. I think we just need to be a bit more optimistic and it will be true in its consequences.

Chris Reichhelm:

The, um, the, in your view, what are, what's missing from the discussion on scale ups and how to scale up particularly advanced science and engineering companies? If I step back for a moment, I remember in the late 90s, early 2000s, we were talking about how we can never build any significant technology companies here. And then we started building big software companies and we kind of got the hand, you know, we got a handle on how to scale successful software companies in this country. Now we're, it's the age of deep tech, advanced science and engineering, multidisciplinary technology solutions, mix of software and hardware and all, all novel technology platforms as well. And we're struggling to scale these, not just the UK, by the way, but many countries struggle to scale these because they're hard companies to scale. But given your vantage point, when you look at it, when you look at the problem, what are the, what are the things we're missing here? If you think we're missing anything at all, is it just a lack of ambition or do you think we're missing some fundamental bits here that would help?

David Cleevely:

Well, uh, uh, the, the, the, the ambition expectation, um, uh, we need to unpick a little bit of that. I'll do, let me deal with that first and then get onto the other missing ingredients. The, the, the, the, I remember back in, um, the late, in the 1980s, um, talking to the head of strategy of BT, who was told by one of the, um, senior civil servants in the government that there was no point in BT trying to be ambitious on a global scale because we were never going to build any global companies. Um, and at the same time, we were deregulating the mobile business and, and for a period, several years, Vodafone, a UK company, was the largest mobile company in the world. Um, now, of course, that wasn't going to last because of the sheer weight of numbers in China or, um, and in the US. But nevertheless, that, that, that is an indicator that it's possible to do these things. Um, what is it? So, so, I, I, I am, I'm against ruling things out. I think you should be optimistic. I think you should be ambitious. I think it's entirely possible to build large companies in the UK. And we shouldn't talk ourselves out of it. What, what are the missing ingredients, which was the other part of your question, how do we grow companies? Well, uh, one of them sits within your realm and that's talent. Um, and you need Very, very good individuals. If I look at my company in Glasgow, one of the things that we're doing fairly early on is recruiting some very senior and experienced people who have done this kind of thing before and who are therefore enabling us to expand, grow our operations and be more effective. And we should not underestimate the impact of that talent. I know, I know I'm saying all the right things, Chris, but we shouldn't underestimate the impact of that talent. As a friend of mine from Cambridge Angels once said, what was the solution? He said, hire Beethoven. I mean, you want to, you've got to get the top talent in to be able to make something actually work. And I think that there's There's another, there are other things that then go alongside that, which is, you've got to have a clarity of vision, not be driven by the fact that you've got the best widget in the world. and that everybody is going to worship your intellectual property, you, that you understand how this stuff is going to be used by the market. Um, it's not enough to have a technology and to have intellectual property, um, and to believe that the world is going to be the path to your door. Um, that, that is actually quite an unhealthy strand of thinking that runs through, unfortunately, an awful lot of, British culture. We may come back to that in a sec.

Chris Reichhelm:

Yeah.

David Cleevely:

And the other one then is, if you've got the talent, if you've got the vision, and you can show clearly what you're going to do, there is still a sticking point in mobilizing enough resource, enough investment within the UK to be able to match all of that. Um, and that is because if, if I'm an investor and I'm looking at the average kind of field of opportunities, the fact that this particular company has the vision, has got all the staffing, and is going to go places, makes it an outlier, and therefore I'm a distrust as outliers I'm not sure I've really discovered this particular pot of gold, and therefore I'm going to be cautious. It's a system that you need to gradually spin up so that you, um, get it working as a virtuous circle. We're not, we're not really there at the moment in the UK.

Chris Reichhelm:

Yeah. You've invested in something like 55 companies, I've read, uh, over your career, over your time. and you've sat on the board of a large number of those, and you've advised a lot of entrepreneurs, you've mentored, you've served as chair. What, you know, from a, and this is, in a way, this is a question that gets back to what we were just talking about. From your perspective, what skills do we seem to be lacking in this country? What things are we particularly good at? And what things do we need to improve if we want to set more companies down that lab to market journey?

David Cleevely:

Um, well, I mean, the skills we're good at, we're very good at the science. Um, we're pretty good at the engineering, um, understanding the technology. Um, I think the British education system is, is very good. It's a, somewhat, its emphasis is somewhat on an elitist kind of education, you know, putting Oxford and Cambridge and other universities... Edinburgh and Glasgow and so on at the top, you know, it's the Russell League, 19 or is it 20 universities that are supposed to be the top ones. So there is this emphasis on somehow being pointy head, um, uh, which I, I, it's fine because, you know, you get talented individuals, but they're not rounded. Um, and they haven't got the experience. If I look on my own, um, just talking about my own career experience.

Chris Reichhelm:

Mm-Hmm., David Cleevely: uh, looking back significance, but I was sponsored at university by what was called then Post Office Telecommunications. And before I went to university, I did a kind of mixed set of activities, you know, I've gone down into manholes and jointed cables and I've helped lay telegraph poles and maintained exchanges and done all that stuff, as well as in that year doing machine, um, lathes and Making stuff, mechanical engineering and general relativity. I mean, making an analog computer. I did all of those things, many of which were very practical. I don't re I didn't realize it at the time, but it was setting the stage for, for me personally. Um, to, to have this, I think, rather practical bent, this, this notion that you should always be thinking about the outcome of things. And that bit is missing. We have this emphasis too much on the theoretical, um, and we have this, um, We hold scientists and some of these intellectuals in very high regard. I know British society isn't very keen on intellectuals in general, but the scientist is somehow held in high regard. And therefore we've displaced what you would otherwise see on the other side of the pond, for example, in America um, a, a huge respect for people like Edison or his, um, the people who've come after Edison who have built companies and who've demonstrated that it's practical and meets a commercial requirement. And, and, and I think that that's the, that's the issue that we see. You've, you know, you've had a large amount of success and, and actually in quite diverse fields. So you had Abcam of which you were a founder and that went on to have good success and it went on to a main market listing and you were in, you know, you've been involved in Raspberry Pi, uh, and, uh, I believe you were the chair there, uh, for some time and that's gone on to be very successful as well. And there have been a range of other opportunities as well that have succeeded. When you think about those opportunities, are there, and you think back at, you know, the Abcam experience or the Raspberry Pi experience, are there, are there activities from a management perspective that were done there that are not carried out as much in other businesses, do you think?

David Cleevely:

Yeah, that's a very interesting question. Um, as I reflect on that, looking back on literally decades, I think the, the importance of having A strong vision about where the company is going to go. And I rather like Simon Sinek's framework for this. You know, the idea that you've got a vision, and then you look at how it is that you're going to achieve that vision, and then the actual product is the what that drops out of that. Um, and I think that the focus on the vision and understanding how you're going to go about approaching that is, is very important and something which is not perhaps as well understood as it, as it ought to be. There are various techniques, um, which are about envisaging the future, which help you align people as well. Um, I'll give you a case of Abcam, for example. Um, the, I did a little model. early on about, uh, Abcam's growth and, um, that included a particular thing about fridges. Now, um, for your listeners, I better describe Abcam sold antibodies. It does rather more than that now, but sold antibodies over the web for research purposes. And you have to keep these antibodies at minus 80 degrees centigrade in order to, um, keep them in the condition that they're saleable. And when we looked at the, the sheer floor space that was going to be required, when I did the model, the sheer floor space that was going to be required to do the, provide those fridges, that kicked off probably about three years in advance, a program for constructing robot fridges that would save all of that space, allow us to pack many more antibodies per square foot or per square meter, um, and collapse the amount of space that we would need probably by a factor of 10. And though it's that kind of forward thinking, um, that I think is, is very important. Now I've given you a, it's a, it's almost a mundane example. It's almost a mundane example, but applies across the whole thing. Where are you going to be in 10 years? What is the company going to look like in 10 years? And therefore, what is it that you need to be doing now that in 10 years time, you'll all be sitting around going, gosh, wasn't it a good idea? We did those things 10 years ago.

Chris Reichhelm:

And so is, and that's about imagination and careful planning and, uh, and vision, vision, vision, vision, vision.

David Cleevely:

It's about the whole piece.

Chris Reichhelm:

Vision. It's about the whole piece. Yeah.

David Cleevely:

It's about the whole piece and the vision and taking people with you. So I'll give you another example with Raspberry Pi.

Chris Reichhelm:

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

David Cleevely:

So with Raspberry Pi, um, I was chair of both the, the, um, the manufacturing company, so the, the company, the technology company that was actually developing all these things. And I was chair of the charity. Now, they have two very different roles, but I was approaching the charity on the basis that it had to be a business, and so I did a lot of work on the governance structure and how that operated to hold people accountable. One of the difficulties with charities is that people think they're good people, they're doing good things, and therefore anything they do is good, right? It wouldn't wash in business, right? And you need to, you need to run things on that basis. So that, that was on the charity side, but on the, on the, the, the technology side, which is the company that's floated recently, um, All of that, a lot of, not all of that work, because there was a lot of work done after I left, as being chairman, but the groundwork gets done way before you get to flotation, and flotation gets discussed eight years, eight years before the actual event, and the technology and the technology roadmap goes out those eight years, and what you're going to do and how you're going to do it. It may not quite turn out that way, but you have made a serious, it may not quite turn out that way, but you made a series of decisions and put resources in place and developed projects that will lead you in the right direction. As I say, at the end of that period, you look back and say, I'm glad we did that. You know, I had discussions in 2015 and 2016 about how this was going to get structured. There were, uh, I remember wandering around in a car park, an underground car park, discussing the strategy for the Raspberry Pi Zero, um, which was going to break absolutely every single rule in the book. Um, again, for your listeners, this was a $5 or £5 single board, little computer that, that had, you know. Could do all the computing functions of a full, full fat Raspberry Pi. And we were going to, we were going to launch it, like, giving it away as the only computer that's ever been given away free with a magazine, right? Um, uh, those, the, the reasons for doing that were embedded in the vision and the longer term strategy for where we were going to get to and, and I can't emphasize that too much, as my role as chair, you know, in terms of being, you know, on a board, your role as chair is to bring all of that together. It may not be your ideas, because the board is always bigger than the sum of the parts, but you have to make sure that everybody's subscribing to the same vision.

Chris Reichhelm:

On that point, boards. Boards have a very mixed rep amongst, um, in the technology industry broadly, and especially in advanced science and engineering. A lot of them, I would say most of the people I speak to see boards as a pain and not supportive enough. You've sat on a lot of boards and, uh, I've watched you perform, if that's the right term, on your boards. I find you very effective. I'm not just saying that because you're my guest, but you lead the board. You, but you actually lead the board. You lead the board in discussion. You've got an agenda and things get done and so on. Do you, you must have seen your fair share of, of boards that don't perform and boards that do perform. What advice do you have? for, for getting boards to perform and they, in the way they need to in order to support these businesses.

David Cleevely:

Um, listen, um, it's very, very important to listen, uh, to everybody's views, to encourage people to put their views forward, to try and then synthesize that into something that you think can be the common ground. Um, the thing in the middle of the board table that everybody's going to look at and they're going to subscribe to. That, that really, that's almost the main role of a chairman. It is to say, right, we're constructing, we're jointly constructing this thing. And here it is in the middle of the table. Let's all now contribute to it. I, when you were talking about the, the mixed response, uh, I've encountered people, um, it must be, I don't, I don't want to denigrate anybody, but it must Getting a rescue animal from a pet's home, um, because when you encounter these, um, people, they have been badly treated, they really have. Um, and they will have all sorts of weird behaviors as a result of what they have learned in trying to cope with boards that are antagonistic and are not behaving in the way that I just described. Um, I've sat on, you know, as you say, I've sat on boards, um, uh, I've sat on boards where the, the members of the board apparently just did not understand what the company was really trying to do or what the people involved, the executives, were actually trying to, trying to, trying to push forward, and it's, it's horrible. It's actually really horrible. I wasn't in the position of chair on the particular board that I'm thinking of. I was just a non exec director, and therefore less powerful or less influence. Well, power is more influence. Um, there's, uh, it's, it's wholly dysfunctional. And the trouble is that you, you need a board. The board is there to support the executives, right? It's there to make the company successful. The company, the executives are there. They're going to be operating the company. They're going to make it successful. What is the board going to do to help them? Right? That's the primary thing that a board needs to do. As soon as the board turns its function into, um, come into the headmistress's or headmaster's study, and you've now got to answer to me for what you're doing, um, forget it. I mean, you've got a wholly dysfunctional situation.

Chris Reichhelm:

Does there need to be more training of non execs? You know, how do young investors, for example, nothing against investors. We need investors. Investors are very important, um, But there are a lot of young investors, for example, that sit on boards and that may have not had a lot of training as an executive. They may have not worked in companies before, they may be new investors. Is there more training required in order to understand how to help, or is it just a good set of ears, energy, and willingness, and good problem solving ability?

David Cleevely:

Um, well, uh, let me, let me be very delicate here, Chris. Um, if I had a principal investor who'd never actually worked in a company and never done a startup, um, and all they'd ever done was somehow accumulated some money that they were going to invest. Um, I, I would wonder why I'd accepted their money in the first place to invest in my company and join the board of directors. Um, is that delicate enough?

Chris Reichhelm:

Sure. And yet,

David Cleevely:

um,. Chris Reichhelm: And yet, but now, now look, and yet, and yet, no. Look, there are some, um, you know, I'm, I'm working with investors who. Um, are rather more mature than that, um, and they have a great deal of experience. Part of their experience is actually seeing across a whole range of companies and seeing how they've done and how they've responded. Um, they, uh, and I would say that their, that, that experience that investors bring is very valuable. But it isn't the only thing that you would need for a successful company. If you're going to have a successful company, a successful board operating successfully in support of the executives, then you need to make sure that the membership of that board is configured in that way and that you don't have particular voices or particular interests dominating. The discourse, that's, that, that is, the level of diversity is really important.

Chris Reichhelm:

Is, is there an ideal size of a board for a company at a particular stage of development?

David Cleevely:

Yeah, I prefer boards that are of the order of five to eight. Um, there's supposed to be a bit of a problem with a board with eight people in it, because it tends, you know, in classical, Research shows that people tend to block up in terms of four versus four if there's a, um, a kind of dispute. I've never really got into that situation with boards of eight. Um, nine is okay. Ten is a bit tricky. As soon as you get into the dozen, um, the dynamic has completely changed.

Chris Reichhelm:

You've also been involved in influencing policy and helping to define standards. With governments, with the EU, and helping to define policy in the EU and in the UK. Uh, I've been wanting to ask you this for a while. What role do you think the state should play in the development of the technology industry?

David Cleevely:

It's a very interesting and very controversial question because it's often posed as the state shouldn't pick winners. Um, but the state has, um, three important roles, I think. One is actually the state purchases stuff from people. Um, and therefore, you know, there are programs in the U. S. for how government procurement operates in order to support and encourage, um, homegrown talent. That's one. Number two, I think there is the point about regulation. Now again, you know, this is often said about red, it's often said this is red tape, but actually regulation can have a transformative effect. We adopted, um, the GSM system. In fact, actually it was the UK and the chap called Stephen Temple who got that adopted by the European Union, um, uh, or European, European communities, it was at the time as the, as the global standard. And as a result, we opened up markets that unlocked enormous amounts of value. And you, there's a lovely example from California where they introduced regulation on hairdryers. Hairdryers, most of your audience won't remember, but you used to have to use two hands to use a hairdryer, and if you, if you If you placed it wrongly on your head, it would burn your hair off. These days, it's not like that. Those hairdryers are lightweight, they're low energy consumption, and that's due to Californian regulation, right? And that's spread across the whole world. So regulation can help on innovation. So there are ways in which government intervenes, but it doesn't intervene at the level of the firm, right? Other than, I mean, could it outsource grant giving and procurement?

Chris Reichhelm:

Sure. Sure.

David Cleevely:

That's fine. But to pick a sector as a particular thing is already a bit fraught with danger. Let me give you my, my favorite example about AI, right? Which we're, we're all experiencing, right? So, so the, um, AI or machine learning as I like to refer to it, but let's call it AI because everybody uses that word these days. Um, the, the investment in that is, is very important. Obviously it's going to be strategically important for the, for the 21st century, no doubt. And if you're not using, as somebody said, I'm not worried about losing my job to AI, I'm worried about losing my job to somebody who knows how to use AI properly. And therein lies the point that the value add is not in creating the AI, as much money as and however headline grabbing that is about the size of the companies. It's about, um, knowing where the value is going to be added. Um, and that's probably more in the application of AI in and further downstream than it is in AI itself. Now, of course, you need to know about AI. You need to have done some research in AI. You need to have that bedrock so that people have been trained in it and they, They understand where it's going, but if I were government, I would be thinking much more about the application of AI and machine learning in my industries than I would in my existing industries and their potential evolution than I would in AI itself. This is another thing that I find difficult with the United Kingdom and particularly with the media. They're obsessed with heroes. They're obsessed with hero companies. They're obsessed with hero entrepreneurs. They're obsessed with hero sectors. That's not really how it works and It's taking enormous risk when you focus in on narrow sectors or individual companies, you've got to think about how the whole system works, not about the fact that somebody is going to get applauded for having been successful and created a $10 billion company.

Chris Reichhelm:

Do you think other governments play by those same rules? And I'm not saying the UK government doesn't necessarily back domains, back areas, or back com or back sectors. Take the U but, you know, do you think the US plays by those same rules? Are they backing sectors? Are they backing Are they backing winners? China?

David Cleevely:

Well, the, the US and China pursue very, very different policies. Let's, let's take the US, that kind of thinking about how you can create things and make things work. Excuse me one sec. The US has a particular advantage in optimism. It's a big market. Huge, but that gives the field of play for that optimism. This, this idea about the future goes all the way back to Edison and the way that the American business culture and overall culture approaches life. Um, and so you, um, that, that optimism plays out in government policy in, in a, in a very interesting way. So if you take the Advanced Research Projects Agency. Um, and the way in which that intervenes all the, uh, SBRI stuff where the, the government purchases things, that is where the, the, the, the American policies to intervene in a much more commercially savvy way in, in, in the economy, um, the military. Uh, plays, uh, defense plays an awfully big role, uh, and of course ARPA is really DARPA, comes out of DARPA, with the defense in front of the Advanced Research Projects Agency. And if you look at Silicon Valley and look back at its history, an awful lot of that, I mean, going back to the early 1900s with the, with the naval radio stations in, over on the west coast for, for looking into the Pacific. And accumulating that kind of technological savvy and know how laid those foundations. Now, of course, you get the hippie movement, you get Fairchild Semiconductors, you get all those other things that spin off and create all that wonderful kind of chaotic mess that generates all this, and then you get the attraction of the capital coming in to fund it. So it's complicated and, and different in the United States, but as I say, don't underestimate the amount of government intervention. It's there.

Chris Reichhelm:

Yes.

David Cleevely:

It's, it's very closely co commercially aligned and it's playing to this optimism.

Chris Reichhelm:

Yes.

David Cleevely:

In China it's very different. In China, it's a, it's a con. China is doing what Japan did in the seventies and eighties, which is tail lighting in the fog. Right. Tail lighting in the fog is much easier, um, you just watch what everybody else is doing and you do it much better, and because you're coming at it later, um, you can avoid all their mistakes. And I think Shenzhen is a good example of that, it's a very, very clever example, um, but the Chinese are doing other things, um, they understand in green energy, um, and in renewables. Much more than we do, I think. Um, 'cause they're facing some very, you know, they, they, they have constraints on their natural resources and on what and what they're able to access. So that, that is always the mother of invention. But they do, they have thought ahead through the rest of the century to think about where things are going to go. And the Chinese are putting in multiples each year, they're putting multiples of the total generating capacity of the UK in renewables. Um, their car industry, you know, everybody's running scared of that because basically, two decades ago, they, they started to think about where this was going to go, what all the implications were and, um, now you get, um, now you're getting a car industry in the, in China because of domestic market, um, which is, is cheaper and very, very high functioning cars, electric cars. I mean, the Chinese moved from, um, combustion engines for motor bicycles a long time ago. We're, we're not even catching up with electric bikes and, and that kind of thing. So there, that, that, as that play, as I was talking about, about regulation as well as in government direct intervention, it strikes me that in both cases, both the American case and the Chinese case. There is quite a deep level of thinking about the, the system, right, about how that operates. It plays out rather differently in America to China, but it's a very similar deep understanding about the way in which everything interacts in the economy and where that's going to evolve and therefore where do you need to put your resources now.

Chris Reichhelm:

Well, to take it back, it's a vision has been established, and a vision in two different environments. But nevertheless, there is a vision. America is good at developing a vision and thinking about where it wants to go. It's got to contend with the democratic process and new administrations, which may throw things out a little bit. But generally speaking, maybe because of the optimism about what you speak, it carries a long, it carries along a forward line for the most part. It continues to progress and move forward. China doesn't have such democratic issues. It can afford to define a vision and hold to that and execute on that vision over a period of decades. And it's one of the benefits of that system of government.

David Cleevely:

It's also a weakness. It's also a weakness as well.

Chris Reichhelm:

So I'm not, I'm not promoting that.

David Cleevely:

You know, yeah, you know, the, the, the, the future is not certain. And, and, um, you know, I'd, I'd rather have, personally, I would rather have a system that was flexible and responsive and a little bit chaotic compared to a system that apparently was, you know, getting it right at the moment, but might actually find itself in a bit of difficulty as a result of placing down some, you know, some solid, those solid bets without the flexibility.

Chris Reichhelm:

Agreed. Agreed. Do, in the UK, we hear about a number of different, uh, areas, uh, you know, semiconductors looking for more support from the government, life sciences looking for more support from the government. IOT and transportation and mobility. UK is a relatively small country though, compared to, certainly compared to the US and China. Do we, do we have any right to, to, you know, to establish a significant footprint in all of these areas? Or to the point we've been talking about, should we, at least in some way, think about which industries we're going to back over others? Or do we leave that entirely to the market? to decide because we can't win at everything.

David Cleevely:

Right. So I'm going to pick up on this point about leaving it to the market to decide. Uh, and it's my biggest gripe about kind of neoclassical economics that somehow there's perfect information and everybody knows everything and therefore, you know, the, the old joke about the two economists walking down the street and one says there's a 20 pound, 20 dollar note on the pavement. And the other one says it can't be, the market would have cleared it by now, right? Um, and the, the, the, it's, we know it's false. We know, we know there's imperfect information. Um, and I'm going to do a blatant, blatant plug at the moment, now, because I have a book that I'm just finishing off. I'm hoping to publish it in the new year.

It's called 'Serendipity:

It doesn't happen by accident.' And it's, it's, the main thrust of this book is that they, it's these chance encounters that actually make things happen. Um, and taking Cambridge as a case in point, I think Cambridge is extremely successful because it encourages, enables all those chance encounters. It's, it's got lots of networks through which people operate and therefore it can mobilize the resources. It can have the conversation in the Panton Arms that leads to the main technology now that's used for gene sequencing everywhere in the world. Those kinds of things are the stuff that I think we haven't really understood its strategic advantage. As you say, the UK is a relatively small economy for us to be able to compete in spending terms on AI or quantum or these other things with the European Union or China or America doesn't seem to be, to be terribly sensible. So what is it? What is it that we've got? A bit like Reagan's question about, you know, come on, what have we got more than the Russians, right? What is it that we've got? Well, actually, the advantage of being a relatively small country is that you have a network of people and we're an open country, so we're, you know, we, we draw on that talent all across, across the world. We need to operationalize, need to put into place structures that enable those people to talk to each other, meet each other, understand, understand each other, and so mobilize the resources. And understand what those opportunities are. The more people that we have are discovering those £20 notes on the pavement and mentioning them, the better it is for us. And, and that I, that is, that's actually the thrust of my entire career has been bumping into people, finding them interesting, having chats with them, and then finding that it's the linkages turn into opportunities and things that neither of us separately were ever going to realize but together and with the networks that we have at our disposal Then actually generating enormous value in a world where the metaphor is is kind of Wikipedia, right? This is this is not somehow some central government has Some great insight into which sectors you should, you should, um, uh, back where what you need to do is construct networks of people so that through those networks that that information and insight can be transmitted so that you know where the thing is going to go. That for me, that serendipitous, uh, implement, the implementation of serendipity for me is the most important thing we could do as a small country. If I'm looking at a strategy for the next 30 years, It is, we don't have the resources to compete in the research and the development of all these things. What do we have? We have a fantastic education system. We have a small country. We can network together. I was in a meeting in Dublin once. Years ago, and the, the Minister of Telecommunications, um, I was working with the Irish government. The Minister of Telecommunications had brought in every CEO of American telecommunications and cable companies that claimed Irish ancestry. Now, You and I know that at least 120 percent of Americans claim Irish ancestry. And, um, the, so she had managed to assemble in this meeting and then in the dinner afterwards, the most stellar list of people as part of a way in which the, the, the, the government of Ireland was then regenerating technology and starting to move the telecommunications in that particular the telecommunications sector forward. It was brilliant. I've been in, I've, I've, I've walked into a hotel in Delhi by accident, I mean, I was staying in this hotel, they, there was a, there was a meeting of the Indian diaspora, um, um, and there was a chap called Sam Patroda, who's, uh, quite famous in India, a mate of mine, and he was, he was invited by the Indian government. Um, we're standing up and speaking and I wanted to have a chat with him. Of course, that's serendipity. That's serendipity on a global scale. But actually what the Indians were doing, were bringing all these people back to have a chat so that they would network together with the local entrepreneurs as well as connecting India with the outside world. Where are we doing this stuff? Where are we operationalizing it? Where are we creating? The kind of thing that I see every day in Cambridge, this morning I was networking with people and creating and doing interesting things. We can, we shouldn't just, we shouldn't just leave this to we've got universities, we've got catalysts, catapults, we've got these things. We need to really major on this because otherwise, otherwise we don't have a strategic advantage that we can play to.

Chris Reichhelm:

Yeah. Is there a structure for this serendipity? Is it just very, you know, very considered events, very specific, precise, structured events? Is it, or, or is it, again, just kind of let the market create something, or do you imagine more of an invisible hand creating something?

David Cleevely:

Yeah, the invisible hand, the invisible hand will do a lot of work for you, but you've got to get the incentives aligned so that the invisible hand will work in the right direction. Where it comes to this kind of, you know, Network structure, um, it does exist, of course, because universities collaborate with industry and they, they do research projects together and, you know, bits of industry do partnerships and so on, so it does happen at some level, but it's, you know, we need to up our game by an order of magnitude or two. Um, I've, I constructed in Cambridge a thing called the Centre for Science and Policy. Um, which had its roots back into, I co founded Cambridge Network, and the thing called Cambridge Wireless, and Cambridge Angels, all of which are kind of super networking organisations in effect. Um, and with, but with the Centre for Science and Policy, I did something rather different. Um, this was the notion that you've got this problem about, Academics, scientists, trying to talk to policy makers, and the scientists want to write reports and then tell the policy makers what they're doing wrong, right? It doesn't work. So what I, what I constructed was a scheme where a policymaker has a series of questions, we find 30 interesting people for them to talk to, they go and talk to them for an hour each, and as a result they go back to their work, they've now got a network of 30 people, you can augment that by having other events and things around it, but it's that core of, you met 30 really, really interesting people, of which maybe 6 are going to be really important for the rest of your career. We've had 14, 000 meetings like that. Over 600 people have gone through this system.

Chris Reichhelm:

Wow.

David Cleevely:

Cambridge is now very well connected into policymaking in government. Um, and the, the fruits of that are still unfolding. It's a, it's a, it's a, it's a decades long strategy, this thing. This, I would, I'd say that was the prototype for what we need to do at the national level.

Chris Reichhelm:

I get it.

David Cleevely:

And having a similar kind of scheme with the order of about a thousand people a year going through something like that. would, you're not going to get instant results. It's not going to be three or five years, it would be 10 years or 15 years before you really see the results of all of that.

Chris Reichhelm:

Yeah.

David Cleevely:

But you would see results.

Chris Reichhelm:

That is inspiring, David. I, well, for whatever this is worth, I completely agree with you. And I think that actually plays to this country's strengths. That's what it can do, and it can globalise that network as well. It doesn't just have to be individuals, it should be people from all over the world. But the British have always been, dare I say, the best at doing that, historically.

David Cleevely:

Look, I don't want to get, you know, unnecessarily kind of nationalist patriotism or stuff. I mean, it's all over the top, it can be a bit unhelpful. But you're right. I mean, the thing is, we're a maritime nation in that sense. We have the very, I'm not going to comment on having created an empire, um, uh, and, and, and, you know, we are connected across the world.

Chris Reichhelm:

It's true.

David Cleevely:

But the, the thing is, we do have, you know, what, why was I in Delhi? I mean, what, what, what, what is, what is, what is the strength, right? That is the strength. Those networks, and how does Lloyd's of London work? I mean, how does the finance sector in the UK actually operate? If you dig down, it's about those kinds of networks. Um, so, so look, it's staring us in the face, in a sense. That is our strategic strength. Don't go off doing the same old, same old, same old about copying somebody else's industrial strategy. We're just not in the same position.

Chris Reichhelm:

That's it. That's, that's, yeah, you're right. You're right. David, I have loved this. Thank you so much. Thank you so much for joining me. This has been, this has been wonderful and I'm glad we've been able to cover so many topics too. Uh, I would have been disappointed if we weren't able to, but thank you for joining me.

David Cleevely:

Well, Chris, it's, uh, been a pleasure. Sometimes occasionally when I was speaking, maybe a little bit too much, but, but thank you very much. I hope you found, hope your, I hope your listeners find this interesting.

Chris Reichhelm:

I have no doubt they will. Thank you.

David Cleevely:

Thanks.

Chris Reichhelm:

You've been listening to the Lab to Market Leadership podcast, brought to you by Deep Tech Leaders. This podcast has been produced by Beauxhaus. You can find out more about us on LinkedIn, Spotify, Apple, or wherever you get your podcasts.

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