North West firms celebrate prestigious Queen’s Award wins

Six North West companies are celebrating prestigious Queen’s Award for Enterprise wins today.

Trafford, Greater Manchester-based social housing business Procure Plus has won in the ‘Promoting Social Opportunity through Social Mobility’ category.

Procure Plus Holdings, which comprises Procure Plus, Re:Vision and OSCO Homes, has been honoured as a result of its innovative approach to intelligent procurement.

The Queen’s Awards for Enterprise were established in 1965 and are the highest official recognition for British businesses.

The highly-respected honours are given to companies that excel within areas such as International Trade, Innovation and Sustainable Development. Promoting Opportunity through Social Mobility is a new category for 2017 and recognises organisations that are providing high quality initiatives and programmes that specifically reach out to people from disadvantaged backgrounds.

Procure Plus Holdings specialises in the procurement of goods and services for the social housing sector, and generates a surplus that it uses to fund training and development programmes within the communities where its clients live.

In the last eight years, it has helped more than 1,320 people into sustainable employment by providing these opportunities. People selected for its range of programmes are those most requiring support and are often regarded as the furthest from the job market, including ex-offenders.

Explaining why Procure Plus Holdings was chosen as a recipient of a Queen’s Award, organisers highlighted the long-term support that it offers, with 83% of its candidates completing a level 2 qualification or apprenticeship or remaining in employment beyond six months.

Mike Brogan, chief executive at Procure Plus, said: “We’re incredibly proud to have won this award – a prestigious accolade that is testament to the hard work, dedication and passion of the team at Procure Plus and our supporting partners.

“Procure Plus was created to deliver outstanding procurement services and significant social benefits to people in local communities around the North West. Over the years, we’ve been committed to promoting opportunity through social mobility, and being recognised for our efforts, on such a grand scale, means a lot.”

One of the many initiatives set up by Procure Plus Holdings is OSCO Homes, a wholly-owned subsidiary that has been created to offer a faster and cost effective way of delivering truly affordable quality homes. The organisation uses off-site construction methods and trains inmates from HM Hindley Prison to work in the OSCO factory, leading to full-time employment on release.

Michael McNally, a former inmate who works on the project, said: “Since being released, I’ve started working for OSCO using the new rendering skills I learnt during the training programme – it’s given me something to focus on. I’ve been inside a few times in my life and I think if something like this had been available earlier, it would’ve changed my decision making and I wouldn’t have re-offended.”

Another person who has benefitted from the support of Procure Plus Holdings is Rachel Howarth, who received training to become a plasterer after being made redundant from her job as a nursery nurse. Rachel has won several awards throughout her training, including the Apprentices Apprentice Award, and has recently become self-employed.

The award will be presented to Procure Plus Holdings in the coming months by the Queen’s local representative, the Lord-Lieutenant of the County of Greater Manchester, Mr Warren J Smith.

Meanwhile, ICC Solutions, based in Warrington, has won in the Innovation category – its fourth overall Queen’s Award.

The company is regarded as a global leader in the provision of highly efficient EMV (known as Chip & PIN) test and certification tools.

The Innovation Award recognises that ICC Solutions has achieved outstanding commercial success as a result of innovation over two years.

Utilising an industry-leading closed-loop environment, the VIABLE solution, created by ICC Solutions for the US market, provides merchants with a cutting-edge environment for Chip & PIN testing, setting the standard for ease and efficiency.

VIABLE is used by the largest merchant acquirer in the US.

The Innovation Award recognises that ICC Solutions has achieved outstanding commercial success as a result of innovation over two years. Utilising an industry-leading closed-loop environment, the VIABLE solution, created by ICC Solutions for the US market, provides merchants with a cutting-edge environment for Chip & PIN testing, setting the standard for ease and efficiency.

VIABLE is used by the largest merchant acquirer in the US.

Chief executive and co-founder Dave Maisey said: “We are deeply honoured to win our fourth Queen’s Award for Enterprise.

“This is a wonderful testament to our ongoing commitment and vision to excel in innovation to drive success in international trade. We firmly believe that the two are intrinsically linked. Delivering a revolutionary, unique and market-leading Chip & PIN testing solution to the US has resulted in our turnover attributable to export rising to 95% of our overall sales.”

Macclesfield fintech company Quint Group also received the coveted award for Innovation.

Quint owns and operates four mutually beneficial and strategically aligned fintech companies in the consumer credit sector. All of its companies are powered by the Group’s market-leading proprietary technologies.

The group was also recently named number 40 in the Sunday Times 100 Best Small Companies to Work For in 2017.

Greg Cox, chief executive and founder, said: “It’s an honour to be awarded a Queen’s Award for Enterprise in Innovation. Unlike many of our competitors we develop our technology entirely in-house, making it extremely difficult to replicate. The award is testament to the hard work of all our staff and shows that we are at the forefront of the fintech industry.

“Having recently secured a £10m financing deal this is an exciting time for the company. Our aim this year is to grow our international presence while continuing to innovate and grow in our core markets.”

Quint, which employs more than 100 staff, owns MoneyGuru.com the UK’s fastest growing consumer price comparison site, as well as financial management services such as Credit Angel and its data business, Monevo Data Services which develops and provides cutting edge credit, risk, marketing and analytical data.

Stockport-based international marketing and communications provider APS Group is also celebrating after receiving the Queen’s Award for Enterprise in the International Trade category.

It has received the gong in recognition of outstanding short-term growth. The company has seven international offices including Eindhoven, Paris and Boston, with operations out of these hubs serving a further 64 countries worldwide.

APS Group provides integrated communications and customer experience programmes for global and prestigious brands including Ford, AS Watson Group, Philips and adidas. The organisation’s commitment to international expansion has seen the business double in size over the last five years, achieving a 105% increase in turnover in the last three years.

Nick Snelson, managing director at APS Group, said: “It’s a tremendous honour to have won a Queen’s Award for Enterprise. Our ‘make more possible’ strapline is intrinsic to everything we do for our clients and winning this award is testament to this ethos. I’m immensely proud of this achievement and would like to thank the fantastic teams we have in place all over the world as well as the continued support of our customers and supply partners.

In 2017, APS Group ranked 802 in the Financial Times’ 1000 fastest growing EU companies.

The APS success was mirrored by Trafford Park, Manchester-based personal protective equipment specialist Globus which also won the award for International Trade.

The accolade, in the International Trade category, was received for demonstrating ‘outstanding, year-on-year growth’ over the last six years and reflects the achievements Globus has made in developing export markets.

Chief executive, Haraldur Agustsson said: “I am very proud of what Globus represents – it’s an innovation success story.

“We operate in some very cost conscious environments, yet despite this we have continued to achieve excellent continuous growth without having to compromise on our quality of service or commitment to innovation in protecting people. It’s an honour for the business to be recognised by Her Majesty the Queen and we will display our Queen’s Award emblem with pride over the coming five years.”

Greater Manchester-based GJD, a manufacturer and designer of electronic perimeter detection and high performance LED illumination has also carried of the International Trade gong.

Mark Tibbenham, Managing Director of Heywood’s GJD said: “This is a fantastic achievement for everyone at GJD, especially in this historic year as Her Majesty The Queen celebrates the sapphire anniversary of her reign.

“We all feel very humbled and immensely proud to have won a Queens Award for Enterprise in International Trade. It is amazing recognition and high praise for everyone at GJD who always put in so much hard work and dedication to make GJD what it is today.”

For 35 years, GJD has been designing and manufacturing innovative security solutions which rapidly identify and validate genuine alerts, identify false alarm signals and optimise the callout of responders, making GJD products a truly valuable asset to both people and properties in all industry sectors across the world.