A Sheffield-based environmental monitoring company is through to the British Chamber of Commerce national awards in London, following regional success.
Environmental Monitoring Solutions (EMS) won both Small Business of the Year and High Growth Business of the Year at the Regional British Chamber of Commerce Awards, and will now travel down to London on the 24th of November to compete against other winners in the national awards and could even win the overall title of National Business of the Year.
The company has had numerous successes in awards this year, picking up the Best Partnership with Academia Award at the YCF awards for its work with Leeds Beckett University. It is also shortlisted for the High Growth Business Award at the Sheffield Business Awards, which will take place on the 1st of December at Ponds Forge.
EMS employs a team of 25 and has seen year on year growth of 25 per cent. The company has received business support and advice from the Sheffield City Region Growth Hub.
EMS helps businesses meet and maintain environmental compliance by providing services and products for water and wastewater monitoring, air and emissions monitoring, and services in data acquisition, environmental management and training.
Dr Kieran Williams, development manager at EMS, said: “It’s really great that we won the regional awards and we can go forward and represent Yorkshire at the national finals. We’re really proud to be representing the region.
“The company is forever changing and the support from the Growth Hub has made a huge difference into how we operate as a business.”
EMS has five apprentices in a variety of roles ranging from accounts to engineering. The company has seen a 100 per cent retention rate of apprentices at the business with 25 per cent of the staff originally starting as apprentices.
Kieran said: “We’ve seen a real value for apprentices at the company and with us being based in Sheffield we really are in a great place to get some outstanding talent to join our growing team.”
As part of their nomination for Best Partnership with Academia at the YCF awards, EMS has collaborated on the MANTIS project (Monitoring and Analytics to Improve Service) with Leeds Beckett University to help small villages and communities in Africa by providing operational information on the status of hand-operated water pumps.
Collaboratively, they have designed and deployed a tamper-proof design for hand-operated water pumps that will not need to be repowered for years at a time. MANTIS devices are installed to transmit data to pump operators and they can maintain the pumps from mobile devices where appropriate. The device is currently being piloted in Sierra Leone.
Jim Scott, growth advisor for the Sheffield City Region Growth Hub, said: “I’m starting to lose track of all the awards that Environmental Monitoring Solutions are nominated for. And not only nominated, but winning as well.
“They’re a great company to work with and it’s a testament to all their hard work that they are now seeing some merit on the back of it. My fingers will be well and truly crossed when they attend the national awards in November.”
The Growth Hub has worked closely with Kieran and his team of account managers to help them develop a marketing plan that has focussed on developing and managing a customer engagement strategy. The Growth Hub has also helped in developing more business from existing customers and putting in place a planned contact strategy has directly led to a significant increase in business.
For more information about the Sheffield City Region Growth Hub and to see what support your company could receive, call 03330 00 00 39 or visit www.scrgrowthhub.co.uk
Notes to editor
Attached photograph shows Jim Scott of the Sheffield City Region Growth Hub and Dr Kieran Williams of Environmental Monitoring Solutions.
The Sheffield City Region Growth Hub offers access to business support, working collaboratively with regional and national support programmes, as well as working with local authorities and private sector business to ensure consistent access to the best advice from the region.
For more information about Environmental Monitoring Solutions visit www.em-solutions.co.uk or call Dr Kieran Williams on 0114 272 2270.
For more information about the Growth Hub go to http://www.scrgrowthhub.co.uk or contact David Grimes on 01142 203424 or at david.grimes@sheffieldcityregion.org.uk
Additional media contact: Joshua Nutt on 01226 766900 or Joshua@capitalbmedia.co.uk