William Detry – Promo 2016 Heidi Van Dyck - Promo 2016
CEO & Co-founder of SimplyCure CEO, athena studio
What’s your fondest memory from your time at Solvay Schools?
W: Without a doubt, my best memory is the Entrepreneurship course during my Master’s, taught by Olivier Witmeur. It was in that class that he encouraged me to launch my very first project: Share My Park, an “Airbnb for parking,” which I co-founded with my current business partner, Victor.
The course was highly practical, we were able to launch the company while still studying, make it the subject of our final thesis, and fully immerse ourselves in entrepreneurship right after graduating from Solvay Schools.
H: There are many ways in which Solvay Schools shaped me to who I am today, but the first thing that comes to mind here is definitely the student life: the TDs, on-campus events (the prefabs!), and meet-ups after school at the CimDix have absolutely forged the friendships I still have today!
What industry were you in before SimplyCure / athena studio?
W: I was already deeply involved in entrepreneurship. After Share My Park, I founded my first company in the dietary supplements sector, called Compliment. It offered personalized supplement programs: users completed an online test, and based on their profile, received a monthly box with individually packaged supplements. Later, I developed software for doctors to help them prescribe supplements more easily.
H: I was a consultant at the Apparel, Fashion & Luxury practice of McKinsey & Company, where I led digital transformations for global fashion brands - including incredible projects in New York, Moscow and Tokyo.
What triggered the creation of the project?
W: Two key factors led to it. First, the Entrepreneurship course at Solvay Schools and the entrepreneurial mindset I grew up with in my family. Then, a personal experience: my father suffered a TIA (transient ischemic attack), a precursor to a stroke. He was treated through integrative medicine, where he was advised to stop taking statins and to monitor his levels of vitamin D, coenzyme Q10, and others. He had to buy several supplement jars from different places - a real hassle. I thought to myself: “Wouldn’t it be simpler if everything could be found in one place?” That’s where the idea for Compliment was born - and later, SimplyCure. It also sparked my broader interest in holistic and functional health.
H: Since my internships at tech scale-ups, I’d always wanted to start a tech company. At McKinsey, I saw how chaotic fashion product development still happened in spreadsheets, Miro boards,... Not just leading to frustration of the creative teams, who now spent >50% of time updating trackers and hunting down data, but also to real costs: time-to-market delays, overdevelopment and margin leakage from poor decision making. For decades brands had tried to solve this with rigid legacy enterprise systems, and I saw an opportunity to leverage AI to create structure from the chaos, instead of asking people to do so.
Did your studies at Solvay Schools influence your career path?
W: Absolutely. The Entrepreneurship course played a major role, and I was lucky to be part of a very dynamic cohort, with entrepreneurs like Alain and Emna from Kazidomi and Pierre Moens from Tipaw. There was a real entrepreneurial energy in our class.
The various courses also gave me a comprehensive understanding of business — from accounting and development to IT and chemistry. These skills have been invaluable, especially for grasping the technical aspects of supplement formulation.
That said, I believe the program could benefit from a more hands-on approach — more internships or in-company experience would really round out the training.
H: Absolutely. QTEM gave me an early foundation in analytics and big data, plus a love for working abroad. It sparked my focus on tech and startups: which led me from McKinsey to athena studio.
What role does artificial intelligence play in your company today?
W: A huge one! We’ve integrated AI at nearly every level of SimplyCure.
Our developers code with Cursor, our marketing team designs assets and visuals with Sora and GPT, and our sales team receives coaching from AI agents. Today, every member of our team is a power user of AI.We’ve also embedded AI directly into our product: it allows practitioners to automate recommendation creation, find the best product alternatives, and intelligently navigate the catalog.
Our goal is clear — to empower healthcare professionals to excel in their practice through AI.
H: As a start-up building an AI-native alternative to legacy enterprise tools, it’s naturally embedded in the software we build and sell. Beyond that, AI also plays a major role in our day-to-day operations: our engineering team uses it actively yet responsibly, and we build and use agents to streamline repetitive admin tasks and marketing workflows.
What connection do you maintain with the Solvay Alumni community?
W: The Solvay Alumni community remains vibrant and valuable. It provides opportunities to reconnect with former classmates, keep learning through conferences at TheMerode, and participate in a variety of events. It’s also an excellent recruitment network — knowing that a candidate comes from Solvay is often a strong sign of quality. And beyond that, there’s a genuine sense of belonging: every meeting with a fellow Solvay graduate rekindles a natural connection, a shared identity — as if we all came from the same mold.
H: I still meet up with my group of Solvay friends whenever I am in Belgium - interestingly, most of them turned out to be entrepreneurs too!
