Prof. Charlotte Williams

Chief Scientific Officer

Charlotte is a Professor of Inorganic Chemistry in the Department of Chemistry at the University of Oxford, and is also Econic’s CSO. Her research interests are in the area of catalysis and polymer chemistry, including polymerisation catalysts, CO₂ activation, and the catalytic valorisation of renewable resources.

Charlotte’s work has been recognised by awards from the Royal Society of Chemistry (the Meldola Medal, the Energy Environment and Sustainability Award, and the Corday-Morgan Prize), the Bio-Environmental Polymer Society, the UK Catalysis Hub (the Sir John Meurig Thomas Catalysis Medal), and the German Chemical Society (the Otto Roelen Medal). In 2020, Charlotte was awarded an OBE for Services to Chemistry, and in 2021 she was elected as a Fellow of the Royal Society. for She trained at Imperial College, the University of Minnesota and the University of Cambridge.

Keith Wiggins

CEO

Keith is an advocate for sustainable manufacturing businesses, latterly with early-stage businesses – notably Worn Again Technologies and Nanoco. He started work with ICI in R&D and manufacturing, before progressive commercial and business roles with Dow Chemical located around the world.

Keith is a graduate from Imperial College London, and is an Honorary Fellow of the Royal Society of Chemistry.

Yvette Go

Investor Director

Yvette Go is Investment Director at Capricorn Partners, one of the key persons managing the Capricorn Sustainable Chemistry Fund and investor director at Econic.

During the first decade of her career, Yvette worked in chemicals and performance materials at Royal DSM and Shell International Chemicals. Always at the interface of business and technology, she held various roles including polyol development for polyurethanes and global Product Portfolio Management in coating resins. In 2008 she transitioned to the venture capital industry, investing in sustainable energy technology companies at SET Ventures and later leading all fund-of-fund impact investments as the Head of Social & Environmental Impact at the European Investment Fund. She returned to direct investment into innovative companies when joining Capricorn in 2019. Building businesses-with-a-purpose using leading innovation is Yvette’s passion and common thread throughout her career.

Yvette has a MSc in Chemical Engineering from Delft University of Technology and a Global Executive MBA from IESE Business School.

Matthew Harwood

Investor Director

As Vice President of Business Strategy for OGCI Climate Investments, Matthew is responsible for developing the strategy of OGCI and measuring progress toward our vision of GHG reduction. Matthew’s career in Energy and Climate has spanned 30 years working in Strategy, Sustainability and Operational roles across the value chain.

Before joining OGCI CI, Matthew led the development of the Energy Transition strategy at McDermott and delivered the divestment of Lummus Technology as part of the company’s restructuring. At Johnson Matthey, Matthew led the development of the Hydrogen and Battery strategy and at Petrofac was responsible launching businesses in Offshore Wind and Carbon Capture. Matthew also spent time in strategy and M&A roles in Iberdrola with a strong focus on renewables and the energy supply business. Matthew has a PhD and Post Doc in Atmospheric Science and is a Chartered Engineer.

Dr Min Zhou

Investor Director

Min has diverse experience in technology development, business development and venture capital. Min spent 17 years in the US before founding CM Venture Capital in 2010 in Shanghai. CM Venture Capital is a venture capital company focused on new materials, advanced manufacturing, digital industrial, energy and environment. CM Funds are backed by leading multinational companies including GE, Samsung, BASF, SABIC, Heraeus, Petronas etc.

Prior to CM Venture Capital, Min was with Silicon Valley Bank Capital, where she was responsible for investments in the China market. Prior to SVB Capital, Min was a principal at Unilever Technology Ventures (UTV) where she led investments in companies in the fields of cleantech, semiconductor, medical device, drug development and health and wellness. Prior to UTV, Min worked as a senior scientist in the Materials Science division and a business development associate at the Technology Commercialization division at Rockwell Scientific, a high-tech enterprise.

Min earned Ph.D. in materials science and engineering from University of Southern California, MBA from Anderson Business School of the University of California at Los Angeles, and B.S. in materials science from Tsinghua University in Beijing, China.

Mark A. Weustink

Investor Director

Mark has over 20 years in of investment, debt and advisory experience across Europe and North America. Within ING Mark is responsible for Sustainable Investments and provides risk bearing capital to sustainable scale-ups active in Energy Transition and Circular Economy.

Prior to Sustainable Investments, Mark covered for nearly a decade the Benelux at ING Corporate Investments and in this capacity held various observer/board positions. Mark was also co-responsible for setting up a small leverage finance team in New York and worked in ING Corporate Finance advising corporates and PE funds in M&A transactions in the Benelux. Mark started his career in the M&A team of Merrill Lynch Investment Banking in London.

Mark holds a Masters in Civil Engineering from Delft University of Technology (NL), as well as an MSc degree in Concrete Structure from Imperial College (UK) and Executive MBA course in Strategic Management at Rotterdam School of Management (NL).

Prof. Charlotte Williams

Chief Scientific Officer

Charlotte is a Professor of Inorganic Chemistry in the Department of Chemistry at the University of Oxford, and is also Econic’s CSO. Her research interests are in the area of catalysis and polymer chemistry, including polymerisation catalysts, CO₂ activation, and the catalytic valorisation of renewable resources.

Charlotte’s work has been recognised by awards from the Royal Society of Chemistry (the Meldola Medal, the Energy Environment and Sustainability Award, and the Corday-Morgan Prize), the Bio-Environmental Polymer Society, the UK Catalysis Hub (the Sir John Meurig Thomas Catalysis Medal), and the German Chemical Society (the Otto Roelen Medal). In 2020, Charlotte was awarded an OBE for Services to Chemistry, and in 2021 she was elected as a Fellow of the Royal Society. for She trained at Imperial College, the University of Minnesota and the University of Cambridge.

Keith Wiggins

CEO

Keith is an advocate for sustainable manufacturing businesses, latterly with early-stage businesses – notably Worn Again Technologies and Nanoco. He started work with ICI in R&D and manufacturing, before progressive commercial and business roles with Dow Chemical located around the world.

Keith is a graduate from Imperial College London, and is an Honorary Fellow of the Royal Society of Chemistry.

Robert Marrow

CFO

Rob has a track record of delivering growth and building businesses, with experience across chemicals, technology, retail, supply chain & trading. He has spent 20 years in different finance roles in Shell, including in Chemicals and Venturing, and has subsequently held CFO roles in the Middle East and UK.  

Rob is a chemical engineering graduate from Oxford University, a Chartered Accountant and a member of the Association of Corporate Treasurers.

Jill Dearnaley

Chief Operations Officer

Jill’s extensive leadership experience has been developed across multiple industries, including the chemical industry at Univar, with roles in supply chain management, engineering working processes, and customer and supplier business relationship management.

Jill joins the leadership team to design develop and establish cost-optimised business processes that will deliver results driven by exceptional customer service.

Dr Michael Kember

Head of Research and IP

Mike is a co-inventor of Econic’s catalysts and has been involved in developing the technology for over 10 years. In this time, he has held personal postdoctoral fellowships from AXA and EPSRC at Imperial College London and completed his PhD thesis in the area of catalysts for CO₂ epoxide co-polymerisation.

Mike has an MChem from Oxford University, where he carried out a Masters research project in organometallic catalysis, sponsored by Johnson Matthey.

Richard Fyles

Head of Scale Up & Engineering

Richard is an engineering specialist with more than 10 years’ experience leading process engineering design, scaling chemical processes, and managing international projects. His previous roles have included Engineering Consultant, Continuous Improvement Engineer, and Engineering Design Manager.

In his last role at Johnson Matthey, Richard was responsible for the design, installation and commissioning of process engineering equipment globally for the production of coatings to line automotive catalytic converters.