Dr Fergus Earley is a Science and Technology Fellow at Syngenta, a leading global company developing crop improvement and crop protection technologies. He has worked for nearly 28 years as a research scientist in this industry, which has brought very broad experience of chemistry and the life sciences as well as demanding managerial and project management roles. He has initiated and managed much external collaboration with both academia and the biotechnology industry, and has also served on UK government funding committees and panels. Currently, he is also acting as an external advisor to the Midlands Integrative Biosciences Training Partnership and as an industrial representative for the EPSRC Centre for Doctoral Training in Synthesis for Biology & Medicine, University of Oxford.