Collaboration with industry can offer scientists more than money for research or a chance to see their work find concrete application. For postdocs, working at a biotech company can be a way of squaring the circle, of developing connections to industry while maintaining connections to the academic world. At a career stage where pressure is high, jobs are few and pay is often low, keeping as many options open as possible is important. Key to a good experience for postdocs at a biotech company is the right kind of culture. Jim Hayward, who is CEO of Applied DNA Systems and who has longstanding ties to Stony Brook and the university’s Center for Biotechnology and biotech incubator, explains: “I liked the notion of being able to recruit scientists who were open to commercial enterprise, but who wanted to be in an academic environment. We were participants in the seminar programs on campus, and I would let our postdocs attend whatever conferences they wanted and seminars on campus. That duality of environment is still operational today and still influences even now how Applied DNA recruits our staff. I would say about a third of our scientific staff are recent postdocs.”
