Exciting. Testing. Encouraging. That’s how co-founder and CTO of Agnos Biosciences described his time at the A2I Boot Camp. As a Group Leader at the Earlham Institute in Norwich, Richard has spent more than a decade developing a technology which enables the detection of biological organisms in the air using DNA sequencing. Alongside his co-founders, CSO Matt Clark (also Research Leader at the Natural History Museum) and CEO Simon Kim, he’s taking part in Accelerate to Investment (A2I), a hybrid programme designed to help researchers and innovators within government research organisations to build the fundamentals needed to develop credible, investment-ready spinout opportunities.
We caught up with Richard to get his take on the A2I journey so far, in his own words.
Meet Agnos Biosciences, R&D project turned dual-use deep tech venture spin out
At Agnos Biosciences we’ve spent 13 years developing AirSeq: a technology that detects biological organisms in the air using DNA sequencing. We’re a dual-use deep tech venture spun out of the Natural History Museum and the Earlham Institute, with applications spanning biosecurity, health, and biopharma – and an initial market focus on food production, where a single product recall can cost manufacturers millions.
Joining the A2I programme
We first heard about A2I through an investor. Two of our three co-founders are scientists with no prior experience of commercialising research or founding a company, so it was an ideal opportunity to begin developing the skills we’d need to lead a venture, not just the science behind it.
We walked into the Boot Camp confident about the technology we’d developed and our ability to communicate it. We were less confident about mechanisms of raising investments, building a business plan, or knowing how to present what we’ve built in a way that would resonate with potential customers and investors.
At the Boot Camp
There was one moment that stuck with me early on, and it was about the danger of falling in love with the solution, not the problem. After 13 years of our lives developing the science, it really hit home – now our focus had to shift to commercialisation, and working on the problems our customers actually have and how our product could help them.
The biggest change
That shift in thinking has shown up most clearly in our pitch. A2I has monthly pitching sessions for all the teams and each time, there’s an opportunity for feedback from the partner network of investors and advisors. This has been incredibly valuable for refining what we’re presenting and our understanding of what investors want to see. Our pitch has come on enormously and so has my confidence in delivering it.
I’m much more comfortable talking to investors now than I was and much more confident giving them the information they need. Our co-founder Simon is from a venture background so naturally leads the investment and commercial side of what we do – but I feel much better able to support him and to step up when it’s needed.
Learning from a wider network
Perhaps the most useful part of the A2I network has come from being around people who look at what we’re building from a different perspective – challenging us to step outside the technology and think more critically about the problem, the customer, and the evidence we need. It’s also been really good to be alongside other founder teams doing completely different things to us, sharing experiences and seeing how they approach things.
One idea from those conversations has changed how we interact with potential customers: interest isn’t the same as validation. Someone saying they like the idea is encouraging, but the important question is what they’re actually prepared to do as a result. It’s changed the way we approach these conversations and the evidence we need to bring with us to back our product.
The next phase
If all goes well for us, in 12-18 months’ time we’ll have secured our pre-seed round of funding, substantially grown our customer base, completed some key R&D projects that will enable an enhanced customer offering, and we’ll be preparing for a seed funding round.
What feels different now, compared to when we started, is how achievable that path feels. A2I has helped us validate that we have an investable proposition – backed by the activities and people we’ve met on the programme, who have helped us to define a genuine product-market fit, Go To Market offering, and the evidence and milestones needed to demonstrate the value of our proposition.
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