SCI’s fourth Sustainability & Innovation awards dinner, held on 10th June at the Palace of Westminster, celebrated the essential combination of scientific discovery, entrepreneurial thinking and societal impact.
Hosted by Viscount Stansgate at the House of Lords, the event brought together industry decision-makers, academics and policy makers and more to honour outstanding achievements in science-led industry.
In her introduction, SCI CEO Sharon Todd said the evening aimed to celebrate the incredible innovation and entrepreneurship that goes on across a wide range of science-based industries - innovation that impacts us all on a daily basis.
‘SCI was established in 1881 to accelerate science into industry for the benefit of society. Our charitable purpose still holds strong today. Building a science-based economy for society is what SCI is about,’ she told the audience.
‘SCI does what is does because of the members and the community that helps support us in our purpose.’
‘There is no doubt that improving relations between the scientific community and Parliament is an extremely important thing to do,’ said Viscount Stansgate, opening the evening, noting SCI’s engagement with government and Parliament over issues such as industrial strategy. ‘I want the SCI to continue to do what it does so well.”
As well as the Sustainability & Innovation Awards themselves, the event also took time to recognise three other SCI awards from the last year: the Young Chemist in Industry representing excellence in early career scientists, the Bright SCIdea entrepreneurial challenge, and the Westminster Medal as awarded by the Parliamentary and Scientific Committee.
Professor Harry Kelly from GSK presented the first award. The annual Young Chemist in Industry event gives early career scientists the chance to showcase their industrial research to an external audience. The event, organised by the SCI Young Chemists Panel, attracts more than 100 industrial and academic early career researchers to hear talks from eight to ten presenters who share their research. This year’s winner was Jonathan Reuven from Syngenta.
Ana Perroni Laloe, President, Coatings & Construction Solutions and EMEA at Synthomer presented the award to the 2026 winers of SCI’s Bright SCIdea entrepreneurship challenge. BrightSCIdea supports young scientists from all over the world, bringing them together, training them in business skills with a set of finalists pitching to a panel of experts. This year team AvennaX picked up the win with their idea for an automated computational platform for protein structure analysis.
Viscount Stansgate returned to the stage to present the Westminster Medal, won by Ané Kritzinger, early-career research scientist at the University of St Andrews for a poster winning poster, titled “Towards safer spirits: non-invasive detection of methanol in sealed bottles using Raman spectroscopy”
The first of the three Sustainability & Innovation awards to be announced on the evening was Leadership in Inclusion in Science-Led Industry.
This award, recognises an initiative, led by an individual or a team, which has resulted in a significant impact to encourage a more equal, diverse and inclusive workforce in science-led industry, and was presented by Simone Coultress, Head of Diversity and Inclusion at Johnson Matthey who said it was important to ‘celebrate the hard work and the efforts of anyone driving diversity and inclusion.’
In first place was Synthomer. “At the heart of our organisation, DE&I stands as one of five strategic pillars shaping leadership, processes, and culture. Championed by role models including Lisa Mistry, Manisha Pandey, and Ying Ho Lee, this commitment goes beyond initiatives. Together, they are embedding inclusion as a defining part of organisational identity,” the company said.
Second place went to Syngenta Huddersfield: “Syngenta Huddersfield has driven a step change in DEI through the creation of a dedicated local team delivering quarterly initiatives. Their innovative “shift awareness” approach ensures often-overlooked shift workers are actively included. This work is embedding a more inclusive culture across all levels of the site.”
In third place was Unilever: “Through SCI, Haidee Booth established a mentorship programme that is strengthening the future of scientific talent. By training Unilever scientists as mentors and connecting EnzAct students with industry leaders, she is bridging critical gaps. Her work is creating meaningful pathways between academia and industry.”
Special recognition in this category went to Scientific Update.
SCI’s Sustainability Award is presented to an individual or team in recognition of science innovation in industry which has led to significant, measurable improvements in environmental sustainability in product/process development or of business/operational processes. The award is open to an individual or team working in a company of any size or in any country.
Presented by Baroness Brown of Cambridge, she said: ‘It couldn’t be a more critical time to be celebrating sustainability.'
In first place was AstraZeneca which has transformed peptide research by dramatically reducing unsustainable solvent use, setting a new benchmark for safety, sustainability and environmental stewardship in pre-clinical chemistry.
In second place was Reckitt. Introducing PCR into Reckitt’s plastics hit a 25% recycled content target, reduced virgin plastic, and advanced circular, sustainable packaging innovation.
In third place Chemetall Ltd BASF which was recognised for VIANT, a coating technology that had led to a 45% reduction in carbon footprint, and provides eco-friendly, heavy-metal-free corrosion protection with minimal resources.
Special recognition in this category went to Unilever, Johnson Matthey and Eutechtics.
SCI's Innovation Award recognises and celebrates scientific innovation in industry that has been enabled as a direct result of collaborative partnerships. Innovations from the finalists include rare-earth recycling, recyclable packaging, and greener drug discovery.
George Freeman MP, presenting the award said: “I believe deeply that innovation can bring people together, it creates opportunity, it creates hope, it gives people left behind the chance to participate.”
In first place was GSK partnered with the Francis Crick Institute for the development of a transformative covalent chemoproteomics platform to unlock undruggable targets and deliver life-changing medicines.
In second place was Bayer AG partnered with Bayer CropScience K.K. Japan, the University of Bristol, ESPCI Paris and Bayer CropScience Limited India for Felujit SC, the world’s first purpose-designed crop protection formulation optimised for drone application.
Joint third place went to Ionic Technologies partnered with LCM, GKN and Ford for the UK EV Supply Chain innovation project which showcases pioneering chemistry that strengthens global supply chain resilience by maximising rare-earth recycling and enabling a circular economy for all permanent magnet grades.
Joint third also went to UCB Biopharma partnered with the University of Strathclyde who developed a scalable solubility model that reduced cost and waste while advancing Biopharma 4.0, supported by £11M in UKRI-funded collaborative innovation.
Greg Clark, Chair of SCI's Board of Trustees in his closing speech described SCI as an organisation that is "really on a roll." “The influence that it has continues to be felt right across Whitehall and Westminster. It’s appropriate that we have this awards ceremony in the heart of Westminster which is where SCI has been so effective,” he said.
“Founded by some far-sighted Victorian industrialists who thought that industry and science should have a voice in places like this, in Westminster and Whitehall, I would say that mission is not only alive and well but is being prosecuted as brilliantly as it ever has been under the current direction.” Clark added that SCI’s Manifesto for an Industrial Science and Innovation Strategy, published in 2023 ranks as a “seminal document in science policy and communication”. Among other things it advocated that there should be an industrial strategy with a focus on high growth sectors where research and innovation funding should be targeted, along with incentivising pension funds to invest in innovation. “I think it’s obvious how many of those recommendations have now become part of the government's policy and the mainstream thinking,” he said.
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