A New Year’s Honour
Abcam started the New Year in the same way it finished the old one – by securing another business award. The company was runner up in the region’s Business Weekly New Year’s Honours List, ICT category.
Abcam started the New Year in the same way it finished the old one – by securing another business award. The company was runner up in the region’s Business Weekly New Year’s Honours List, ICT category.
Not content with a Deloitte top five regional placing, Abcam went one better in December by securing a top 20 position in Deloitte’s National Fast 50. The award came at the end of what was an incredible year, even by Abcam’s standards. Four major business awards had been secured, a move to larger premises in Cambridge was completed and the company’s first overseas office was opened in the US. In addition, distribution networks in expanding markets such as South Korea, Taiwan, China and Japan were established. In-house production and supplier relationships were also overhauled to meet the increase in demand for Abcam’s 6,900 products that were sold directly to over 60 countries.
Abcam retained its top five regional position in Deloitte’s Technology Fast 50. A growth rate of 626% was achieved placing the company in fourth position.
In the widely respected Sunday Times Arm Tech Track league table for 2003, Abcam secured 13th place nationally for fastest growing unquoted technology companies.
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UK staff met HRH Duke of Kent during a specially arranged visit to Abcam, one of the Cambridge Phenomenon’s brightest lights.. During his visit, the Duke got the opportunity to improve his knowledge of antibodies by meeting and talking with staff from across the company. His visit included a tour of the laboratory which carries out purification, characterisation and quality assurance. |
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Abcam established its first permanent foothold outside the UK with the opening of offices in Cambridge, Massachusetts. The move reflected the growing importance of overseas trade to the company and the rapid expansion of its international customer base.
By the time of the opening a large proportion of orders were coming from the USA: it was recognised that existing levels of customer service needed to be further increased and that the barriers associated with purchasing goods from outside the USA should be removed.
One of the major challenges associated with the opening of the new office was the decision to build an integrated intranet-based stock management, customer relationship management and order processing system. The in-house designed package manages both customer demand and supplier stock across both the UK and USA operations from a single database. It gave Abcam an immediate and unique competitive advantage, a point not missed by a fast growing customer base.
Cambridge, MA was an easy choice. The area is home to a cluster of world-leading bioscience and pharmaceutical companies and lies close to world renowned educational institutions including MIT, Harvard and the Whitehead Institute.
Jim holds a degree in Computer Science from Christ’s College, Cambridge University. From 1986 to 2003 he worked for Analysys Ltd, a Cambridge based telecoms consultancy, heading up their IT, software and web development initiatives. During this period he also held a number of external non-exec directorships including Workbench Software Ltd, a start-up with a targeted software package for time recording systems and VBN Ltd, a web-based hosting company specialising in business cluster and innovation network solutions. Jim joined Abcam in 2001 as Technical Director, initially part time then full time from 2003. He has overseen the expansion of Abcam’s bespoke web-based systems.
Having narrowly missed out on top honours in 2002, Abcam went one better in 2003 by wining the Small Business category at Cambridge Evening News’ Business Excellence Awards. Against tough opposition across the eastern region, Abcam showed the imagination, innovation, product quality, customer service, marketing and management skills required to make it stand out from the other eleven companies nominated in the same category.
Abcam moved just 200 metres to its new home on the Cambridge Science Park. At 6,500 sq ft, the new premises is twice the size of the company’s former unit and positive proof of Abcam’s sustained growth over the previous three years.