Senior Management Team
Chairman
Sven Royall
Sven has almost 40 years of experience in the Chemicals Industry, initially with 34 years working for Shell which included assignments in Thailand, Malaysia, Singapore, Houston and London - most recently as Vice President of Global Intermediates and Ventures. Sven is currently a Managing Director of Pilko & Associates, a leading risk management adviser to the Energy and Chemicals Industry.
Sven has a Master’s degree in Natural Sciences from Cambridge University and a Doctorate from The City University, London.
Chief Executive Officer
Ross Baglin
Ross has over 30 years' experience in the oil and chemicals industry, including eight years as an Executive Vice President at Infineum International Limited, a specialty chemicals company owned jointly by Shell and ExxonMobil.
Previously, he held various senior human resource and commercial positions at Shell, in both upstream and chemicals businesses.
Prior to taking up this role in April, Ross provided business planning, analysis and communications support to IPL for two years through his own company, Brightfield Gold.
He has a bachelor's degree in statistics and psychology from The University of Melbourne, Australia.
Business Development Director
Simon Waddington
Simon has an impressive track record in marketing and business development roles in the plastics industry including 24 years with Dow Chemical Company. Along with his substantial commercial experience in polymer-based product innovation, he brings a wealth of senior contacts across the European plastics industry and its value chains.
Simon holds two patents for inventions relating to polyurethane polymers and has recently been involved in another highly successful polymer industry spin-out named Novomer, where he played a key business development role.
Simon has a BSc (Hons) in Material Science and Polymer Chemistry, from Brunel University.
Application Development Leader
Dr Tim Clayfield
Dr Tim Clayfield leads the product and application development at Interface Polymers. Tim is an expert in elastomers, plastics and polymer blends and is passionate about recycling, sustainability and the contribution that polymer science makes to society.
He spent the first part of his career at Dow Chemical, in functions ranging from process support, through product development, technical service and business development. He has also worked with Resinex/Ravago and with Tyre Recycling Solutions.
Chief Scientific Officer
Dr Christopher Kay (Founder Director)
Christopher's PhD and post-doctoral research at the University of Warwick generated the intellectual property on which Interface Polymers Ltd is based. Both Christopher and his academic supervisor Professor Peter Scott, were quick to see the commercial potential of the breakthrough, and Christopher soon saw a future for himself as an entrepreneur.
Working with the ICURe programme (Innovation to Commercialisation of University Research) via Innovate UK, £500,000 of grant funding was won that enabled Chris to start the process of spinning out Interface Polymers Ltd.
Along with his invaluable scientific expertise, Chris brings his wonderfully infectious enthusiasm, entrepreneurial passion and a relentless ambition to turn his discovery into a huge commercial success.
Non-executive Director
Professor Peter Scott
Peter is Deputy Chair of the Faculty of Science at the University of Warwick, and head of the Chemistry Department's Scott Group. Peter supervised Dr Christopher Kay's post-doctoral research which led directly to the scientific discoveries that underpin the company's intellectual property.
Peter’s core expertise is synthetic chemistry at the industrially-focused interfaces with polymer science, materials and pharmaceuticals.
Peter is delighted to see the fruits of academic research being translated into commercial impact on a global scale.
Non-executive Director
Jean-Lou Rihon
Jean-Lou is a co-founder and director of 24Haymarket, a London-based business angels group created in 2012. 24Haymarket members invest their own funds in young and growing companies in a range of sectors. Prior to that he spent over twenty years in private equity, primarily at Silverfleet Capital. As a partner of the firm Jean-Lou was in charge of investments in France and Benelux. Over the years he was directly responsible for a number of successful investments made by the firm. Jean-Lou started his career in manufacturing in the USA and then went on to work in commercial and later investment banking.
He has a bachelor’s degree in commercial and financial sciences from ICHEC in Brussels.
Chairman
Sven Royall
Sven has almost 40 years of experience in the Chemicals Industry, initially with 34 years working for Shell which included assignments in Thailand, Malaysia, Singapore, Houston and London - most recently as Vice President of Global Intermediates and Ventures. Sven is currently a Managing Director of Pilko & Associates, a leading risk management adviser to the Energy and Chemicals Industry.
Sven has a Master’s degree in Natural Sciences from Cambridge University and a Doctorate from The City University, London.
Chief Executive Officer
Ross Baglin
Ross has over 30 years' experience in the oil and chemicals industry, including eight years as an Executive Vice President at Infineum International Limited, a specialty chemicals company owned jointly by Shell and ExxonMobil.
Previously, he held various senior human resource and commercial positions at Shell, in both upstream and chemicals businesses.
Prior to taking up this role in April, Ross provided business planning, analysis and communications support to IPL for two years through his own company, Brightfield Gold.
He has a bachelor's degree in statistics and psychology from The University of Melbourne, Australia.
Business Development Director
Simon Waddington
Simon has an impressive track record in marketing and business development roles in the plastics industry including 24 years with Dow Chemical Company. Along with his substantial commercial experience in polymer-based product innovation, he brings a wealth of senior contacts across the European plastics industry and its value chains.
Simon holds two patents for inventions relating to polyurethane polymers and has recently been involved in another highly successful polymer industry spin-out named Novomer, where he played a key business development role.
Simon has a BSc (Hons) in Material Science and Polymer Chemistry, from Brunel University.
Application Development Leader
Dr Tim Clayfield
Dr Tim Clayfield leads the product and application development at Interface Polymers. Tim is an expert in elastomers, plastics and polymer blends and is passionate about recycling, sustainability and the contribution that polymer science makes to society.
He spent the first part of his career at Dow Chemical, in functions ranging from process support, through product development, technical service and business development. He has also worked with Resinex/Ravago and with Tyre Recycling Solutions.
Chief Scientific Officer
Dr Christopher Kay (Founder Director)
Christopher's PhD and post-doctoral research at the University of Warwick generated the intellectual property on which Interface Polymers Ltd is based. Both Christopher and his academic supervisor Professor Peter Scott, were quick to see the commercial potential of the breakthrough, and Christopher soon saw a future for himself as an entrepreneur.
Working with the ICURe programme (Innovation to Commercialisation of University Research) via Innovate UK, £500,000 of grant funding was won that enabled Chris to start the process of spinning out Interface Polymers Ltd.
Along with his invaluable scientific expertise, Chris brings his wonderfully infectious enthusiasm, entrepreneurial passion and a relentless ambition to turn his discovery into a huge commercial success.
Non-executive Director
Professor Peter Scott
Peter is Deputy Chair of the Faculty of Science at the University of Warwick, and head of the Chemistry Department's Scott Group. Peter supervised Dr Christopher Kay's post-doctoral research which led directly to the scientific discoveries that underpin the company's intellectual property.
Peter’s core expertise is synthetic chemistry at the industrially-focused interfaces with polymer science, materials and pharmaceuticals.
Peter is delighted to see the fruits of academic research being translated into commercial impact on a global scale.
Non-executive Director
Jean-Lou Rihon
Jean-Lou is a co-founder and director of 24Haymarket, a London-based business angels group created in 2012. 24Haymarket members invest their own funds in young and growing companies in a range of sectors. Prior to that he spent over twenty years in private equity, primarily at Silverfleet Capital. As a partner of the firm Jean-Lou was in charge of investments in France and Benelux. Over the years he was directly responsible for a number of successful investments made by the firm. Jean-Lou started his career in manufacturing in the USA and then went on to work in commercial and later investment banking.
He has a bachelor’s degree in commercial and financial sciences from ICHEC in Brussels.
Working together for mutual success
We know that the full potential of our technology will not be realised by ourselves alone. We understand the value of collaboration with suppliers, customers, OEM’s, end-users, funding agencies and other service providers, and we promise to work tirelessly to achieve the shared goals that we sign up to.
We also recognise the importance of building a strong internal team. A team of highly motivated and committed people with the right blend of skills, positive attitude and determination to succeed. That’s why we believe in a values-led approach, where flexibility, creativity and individual responsibility is both encouraged and rewarded.
Teresa Waite - Office Manager
Teresa is an experienced Office Manager who is crucial to the smooth running of the business, overseeing IPL's purchasing, HR, Accounting and general administration.
Shaun Morris - Polymer Development Scientist
It’s great to be developing a completely new range of additives and helping customers to do things that were previously not possible.
Dr Luke Hollingbery - Senior Polymer Development Engineer
I am really excited about helping customers to optimize performance with our additives.
Alessia Di Nicola - Polymer Development Scientist
It is so exciting to be developing an innovating polymer additives technology, which offers customers new opportunities to improve the performance and recyclability of polyolefin-based materials.
Andrew Leeson - Polymer Development Scientist
It's great to see the additives we have developed helping customers in a wide variety of applications.
Our vision.
Our vision is to revolutionise the polyolefin industry by opening up a new world of high value opportunities in polymer blending, joining and finishing. Read more