Women in the City Award Winner: Dr. Denise Pollard-Knight, Managing Director, Nomura Phase4 Ventures
by Elizabeth Harrin (London)
You wouldn’t expect a biochemistry degree to open many doors in financial services but Denise Pollard-Knight has found that her life sciences background has given her an excellent grounding for bioscience investment management. She is now Managing Director of Nomura Phase4 Ventures, a venture capital subsidiary of Asia-based investment bank Nomura, and has just been confirmed as the Financial Services Category winner in the Women in the City awards 2008.
One does not often see women at the top in venture capital, but Denise feels she has been fortunate to choose an excellent employer. “I strongly feel Nomura is rare in its industry,” she says. “It has managed to integrate the best of east and west, creating a culture that is both entrepreneurial and nurturing. This culture opened up a very clear pathway to success for me. When I joined, Nomura was quick in recognising my talents, providing me with a platform to build a new business, with independent reign to seize opportunities and formulate investment strategies in a completely new area for the company.”
Denise joined Nomura in 1999. Since then she has been instrumental in creating a successful healthcare investment strategy. Biotechnology is a difficult field to succeed in, but her team have a great track record and in 2000 four of their ten financings were among the industry’s top 20 biotech venture deals.
“An important component of our success and recognition has been in building a strong team of individuals who are highly qualified at what they do but who enjoy working together,” Denise says. “Like my employer, I am a big believer in empowerment – I put a lot of trust in my team members to tackle challenges as they see fit and like to pass on responsibility early on. Through a combination of skill (and some luck!) we have delivered and created a business that is highly respected in our sector across the globe. Nomura values this, they promoted me to MD and invited me to sit on the senior management committee here.”
Denise called winning the WITC award “the icing on the cake.” Teresa Sayers, Chief Executive of the Financial Services Skills Council which endorsed the award, had something else to say: “Denise has, without question, demonstrated her success in empowering women to seize opportunities and actively creating platforms for women to innovate and create their own success. She is a real inspiration to women in financial services.” “It has been a real honour,” Denise adds. “It is something that I hope to use to further raise the profile of the fabulous work women are doing in my sector and the wider business community. To be recognised in this way is very rewarding. I hope it sheds some light on the potential venture capital holds and encourages more women to embark on a career in this area.”
So, does she have any advice for women who would like to make a career in venture capital?
“Naturally, I would say to go for it, guns blazing,” she says. “It’s not for the faint hearted, it’s very challenging and a lot of the time you have to trust your intuition, but we are also very collegiate and have a great deal of fun while we are at it.”
Denise advises that if you are interested in venture capital as a career the first step is to speak to other women who have been successful, to get a complete understanding of the role. She suggests that you find a mentor who can help on a long term basis and early on with introductions. Internships are common in the industry and that can be another way to confirm if this branch of financial services is for you.
Also, on should consider what type of team one would want to join. A global group will involve travel, which might be good early on in your career but less flexible later. “I would recommend that they build a group of female friends and acquaintances in the sector early on in their career,” Denise adds. “It can be invaluable and is often what can be a defining factor in your development and ultimately your success.”
There are an increasing number of successful women in venture capital, at all levels from operations and general management to strategic and C-level positions. Denise thinks this is a catalytic process. “With more senior role models, the younger women understand the opportunities and the possibilities,” she says. “We have three women CEO’s in our portfolio companies – that’s unprecedented. I also sit on company boards in the US and EU where there are two senior women representatives and in one case in Europe three out of six board members are senior women! We all sit on audit committees, compensation committees and nominating and governance committees. The next target is to campaign for more female chairpersons…”
