Phillip Rendle

Phillip Rendle

For Phill, it’s the variety in his job that keeps things interesting and challenging. “I’ve enjoyed moving more into the client relationship side of our contract synthesis business. It’s very satisfying to be able to deliver an excellent service to our clients.”

“The contract synthesis work is all done under the GlysoSyn brand, and that keeps it simple for the client. They can start with a few milligrams or grams of material for biological testing and then take it further into our cGMP facility when kilograms are needed for clinical trials. It’s a seamless transition and when it comes to the larger scale work, we can carry over a lot of what we already know about the chemical process.

“Communication is a really important part of my job. All clients are different and have different approaches and needs. Some understand the chemistry and want to know what’s going on in depth, while others are simply interested in when the product will be ready and how much it will cost. I make sure we are providing the information in a way that is targeted to each client’s requirements.

“One thing I’ve learned from Richard Furneaux is the value of being totally open with our clients. They are kept fully up to date with what’s going on so there are no surprises. It’s inevitable that things go wrong with the chemistry sometimes, but I can’t think of a case where we have lost a client after a bad result. We have usually thought of ways around the hurdle, and clients appreciate this." 

Phill cites an example of a very difficult situation that had potential to ruin a client relationship, but was turned into a positive by the GlycoSyn team. “We were doing some large scale work for a client in cGMP conditions when we encountered quite a serious problem with high levels of an impurity. We hadn’t seen any problems at all in the smaller scale reactions so were very surprised, but had to phone the client and tell them that the whole batch was irretrievable.

“What followed was a lot of detective work by a number of people to work out what was happening. Although it was pretty tough for the client to have this happen, they stayed with us and we produced the goods for them in the end. As a result of the issue, however, we ironed out a problem at a relatively early stage in the drug development process that would almost certainly have caused them major problems when they scaled up for larger volume manufacture.

“Outside work, my main interest is Wellington Batucada—an energetic Brazilian-style percussion band. There are about 50 of us in the group and we play in street parades, at the Rugby Sevens and music festivals. I play the repinique, a drum the size of a tom-tom, but it’s played with either a hand and a stick or two flexible ‘whippy sticks’. The band music pieces are not written down so we learn the different rhythms by ear and the director puts them together in real time, using hand signals and whistles. Ear plugs are essential as it’s very loud.

Phill studied for his PhD at the University of Canterbury, worked at IRL for several years, and then did a post-doc at Durham and Oxford universities. “I’m very happy in New Zealand and I really like my job, especially the flexibility to try out new things and to move into work aligned with my strengths.”