Proteome Sciences plc (LON:PRM) Chief Executive Officer Jeremy Haigh caught up with DirectorsTalk for an exclusive interview to discuss the latest trading update, the consolidation of their Frankfurt laboratory, the head office move to London and the appointment of new Chief Commercial Officer Richard Dennis
Q1: Now, you’ve announced a strong trading update this morning, can you give us some more background on the progress made throughout 2016?
A1: Yes, certainly. I’m reasonably satisfied that following a strong first half we’ve shown good performance also in the second half of the year and ended with results which are in line with expectation and predictability is obviously very important. I’m very encouraged by our sales of TMT reagents through our exclusive partnership with Thermo Scientific and these are really underpinned estimated at 46% revenue growth but I think services have also been strong and operating costs stable so, as far as I’m concerned, we’re moving in the right direction. 2016 was a difficult year for by bioscience sector and a pretty turbulent one generally as a consequence of Brexit, major moves in foreign exchange in the second half certainly, but for us it’s sort of netted out because we’ve had increases in our foreign denominated revenues kind of balanced by our increases in the operating costs of our Frankfurt facility. So, I think we’re in a good place, there’s obviously more to do in 2017 but I’m reasonably satisfied with where we are.
Q2: You’ve said that you’re consolidating your laboratory facilities in Frankfurt and moving the head office into central London, can you explain the rationale behind these moves and what effect it will have on the business?
A2: For a small company like ours I am really interested in efficient resource utilisation, I’m obviously interested in cost containment but I’m also interested in coherent interactions between staff, currently we sit in a number of different places. For me, the laboratory consolidation enables us to do all of those things I just mentioned, clearly it wasn’t an easy decision but the Frankfurt lab that we have is a high quality location, it will allow us to pursue GCLP accreditation which, as I’ve said before, I think is really important for the company in the longer term. I should say I’m deeply grateful to the staff in the London lab who have committed themselves to Proteome Sciences over many years but I think this consolidation in Frankfurt is absolutely the right thing for the business now.
In terms of Cobham, I’ve always been a big fan of scientific integration, collaboration, communication, putting yourself in a place where scientific people meet and Cobham’s a lovely place but it’s a bit detached from the scientific community, I want to be more accessible to the people with whom we will partner. Location matters as they always say and it does for us and I’m hoping that move into a more central location for our headquarter office will benefit us in lots of ways.
Q3: You’ve also announced today the appointment of Richard Dennis as Proteome Sciences’ new Chief Commercial Officer, can you tell us a bit more about Richard and the role that he’ll be playing?
A3: So, this is back to our core issue of commercialisation and I’ve talked about this a bit in the past building our service business, we have a long and successful heritage as a scientific organisation but we do need to create a stronger commercial focus and that really comes through leadership. Richard brings with him very deep sector experience of both strategic sales and marketing, he’s got good technical depth, he really appreciates the space that we’re operating in, so, he’s got a recent history in companies like Quanterix and Bioscale and I’m really delighted that he’s decided to join us. He’ll be starting April which is relatively soon, his obvious focus is going to be refinement and then execution of the commercial plan, developing for us new business and hopefully bringing with him a wealth of new contacts that will benefit Proteome Sciences in the short, medium and long term. So, I’m really excited that he’s coming and I think it’s a big step forward for the organisation.
