Wietse Mulder PhD

After working in the private sector for several years, Wietse Mulder PhD, managing director of Genome Diagnostics, is now a successful life sciences entrepreneur.

"Starting your own business is like writing your own job ad", Wietse says of his experience as an entrepreneur. It's exactly what he did five years ago. "Founding your own company is not for the faint-hearted though, you need to be willing to take risks", Wietse goes on. "But when it works it's just immensely satisfying."

For Wietse it has all worked out marvellously. His company Genome Diagnostics is active world-wide and is now one of the major providers of tools used for matching patients to donor for transplantation. "I'm a scientist at heart", Wietse says of his professional life. "I'm running a business but I'm still very much involved in science. Without my scientific knowledge I wouldn't be able to make business decision. What is more, the biggest scientific breakthroughs don't happen in academia, they happen right here in industry."

At an early age Wietse knew he would carve out a career in the life sciences. At middle school DNA interested him immensely. He went on to study biochemistry and molecular biology and received his PhD from the University of Amsterdam. “I always wanted to work in industry, I never meant to stay in academia”, Wietse says, “but after my PhD research I applied for postdoc positions anyway.” He accepted an offer at Wageningen University, but stayed on for just 2 years. Wietse: “I didn't like what I was doing, I didn't believe that my future was in academia.”

Instead, Wietse took his career in a different direction. “I accepted a job as an account manager at Westburg, a distributor of specialised laboratory equipment. I was already familiar with account management from my student years. I used to help out in the student- and rowing societies.” To his surprise, working at Westburg made Wietse a better, more skilful researcher. “I visited many laboratories, and learnt about many fields of research. There was a lot of space for my own initiative, something that I'd missed as a postdoc.”

After 7 years it was time to move on. Together with a couple of friends, scientists like himself, Wietse founded Genome Diagnostics. “The experience I gained at Westburg paved the way for my entrepreneurship. My interests and my extracurricular activities have both played an important part in my decision to become an entrepreneur."

"I quit my job at Westburg overnight. At once everybody knew I meant business", Wietse says about his success as an entrepreneur. “Make sure that people take you seriously, and don’t be afraid to make mistakes. Believe in yourself, talk to acquaintances and colleagues, but also to your competitors. You can learn a lot from the people around you. Let go of your apprehension. I’ve sold a lot of things in my life, but that’s what academics do as well. Me selling lab equipment is just like you selling your research to your peers. Perhaps industry and academia are more alike than you think.”