Congratulations to Dr Brendan McGurk (Law, 1995), who has been appointed to King's Counsel. The official swearing-in ceremony will take place on Monday 18 March at Westminster. Dr McGurk is a Barrister with Monckton Chambers, and according to the firm is "a leading junior with a wealth of experience in Commercial, Public law and Regulatory disputes. He has appeared and made submissions at every level, including before the Supreme Court and the Grand Chamber of the Court of Justice of the European Union.

Congratulations to Dr Andrew Williamson (Physical Natural Sciences, 1990), whose report of university spin-out companies and the government’s response – which was commissioned by the Chancellor – has now been published. The review, led jointly by Dr Williamson and Professor Irene Tracey CBE, offered a series of recommendations to help improve the creation and growth of university spin-out companies. 

Three former Robinson students, Michał Mgeładze-Arciuch (Computer Science, 2020), Daniel Vlasits (Computer Science, 2020) and Jan Oboril (Natural Sciences, 2020) have launched their own startup, Yoneda Labs, after securing a $500,000 investment from US-based startup accelerator Y-Combinator. 

Yoneda Labs provides software to help chemists optimize reactions. The goal is to help pharmaceutical and chemical manufacturing companies produce drugs and materials faster, cheaper and with less environmental impact.