Icenian Interview – Simone

I begun my journey at Langley in September 2017 and finished in March 2020 due to COVID-19, unfortunately.

I studied Business and Double BTEC sport at A-Level.

Other than being a rugby player, which was more a childhood dream than anything else, I have always been a creative person and, deep inside me, I’ve always known I wanted to run my own company and create something with the aim of helping others, as my father did.

I am currently a university student. I study Business and Management (Entrepreneurship and Innovation) at the Brunel University of London. I am pursuing my first entrepreneurial journey, covering the role of Director at Dyamotech Ltd, a newly established start-up that I personally founded in collaboration with two Italian partners.

“I am strongly convinced that we are the product of our experiences and, as with every new experience in life, Langley did, of course, shape me into the person I am right now.”

During the latest academic year (2020/2021), I have managed to be one of the Brunel Venture Competition Winners, thanks to an idea I had on rugby headgears back when I was at Langley. Thanks to that, and the fast evolution of our project, I have been then involved in a special ‘accelerator programme’ that helped my idea to take off and start its journey. With my partners Flavio, who is an electronic engineer and business owner, and Andrea, our product developer, we founded Dyamotech as a London-based registered company.

With Dyamotech we are trying to pursue two important projects. One of them is a study that has never been done in England before, which will consist of gathering data of impact to the head in children playing rugby. This research has caught the attention of a world-known Belgian neurologist Dr Steven Laureys, who proposed to collaborate with us in this study with the help of his research group Coma Science Group. The second project is the development of our product – rugby headgear for young players that will try to minimise the danger of concussion while playing rugby.

On reflection, of my time at Langley, I am strongly convinced that we are the product of our experiences and, as with every new experience in life, Langley did, of course, shape me into the person I am right now and I am glad to have taken the chance to move to Langley when I was 16 years old. Sometimes you can find it hard to change completely your normal environment. Nobody likes it. But it is when you adapt to the new environment that you find a new version of yourself and this is what Langley gave me, a new version of Simone that I couldn’t know before.

To all of those who are new to Langley, I would say well done! You have picked the right school, and I am sure Langley will take care of you along your journey. For those students who, instead, are about to end the journey at Langley with their last two years of Sixth Form, I would encourage you to not be afraid of trying new things, be dynamic, explore yourself and try to use these last years of school to understand who you really are and what you like to do, because that’s all that matters, yourself. Nobody else.

My fondest memory is an easy one, our School Vase Final at Twickenham stadium, what a memory!

I just want to say thanks for any little help that has been given to me during my time at Langley, I will be forever grateful for it, and I hope I will have the chance to give something back to this school, it deserves it.