Mike Penman has 40 years experience in managing toxicology, regulatory affairs and information technology within major companies (ICI and ExxonMobil), associated trade associations and, since 2007, Penman Consulting.
With an experimental background, initially working on alternatives to long term cancer testing at the ICI Central Toxicology Laboratory in the UK, he moved to provide toxicological and regulatory information services to the whole ICI Group, and then to specific businesses on Teesside, UK. During this time he was awarded a UK civil honour for “Services to Environmental Safety”.
For nearly 10 years Mike worked for ExxonMobil in the US and Belgium as Senior Toxicology Advisor for Europe, and later as the Technical REACH / GHS Implementation Manager. During this time he worked on the ECETOC TRA exposure model, IUCLID and chaired the REACH Implementation Project responsible for the initial EU guidance on Information Requirements.
In May 2007 he founded Penman Consulting bvba, providing managed service solutions to industry and Consortia on chemical regulation, toxicology and environmental sciences. These services include Technical (toxicology, environment and exposure issues) Product Stewardship, and Regulatory activities.
The team at Penman Consulting has grown and provided pivotal roles in major consortia and SIEFs, steering these through the entire registration process – legal, technical and financial – for hundreds of successful 2010 and 2013 REACH registrations. It has also developed successful strategies and approaches to deal with the subsequent challenges of evaluation and testing complex categories of substances and UVCBs with minimal animal use.
The major consortia Penman Consulting have managed are the Lower Olefins and Aromatic Consortium(LOA), the Higher Olefins and Polyalpha Olefins Reach Consortium (HOPA) and, since 2011, the Hydrocarbon Resins & Rosin Resins REACH Consortium (H4R).
Mike has also overseen a many other REACH and regulatory activities for clients from both regulatory and industry backgrounds.
In managing these activities, Mike has continued his interest in developing expert systems to provide cost effective solutions for the challenges met by businesses and consortia. The latest of these is Active Steward™ which provides proactive product stewardship tools for companies.