A Healthy Response

Jeremy Eakin managing director of Comber-based Eakin Healthcare Group and Coleraine-headquartered Armstrong Medical talks to Ambition Magazine about his firm’s landmark acquisition and business during the pandemic.

Jeremy Eakin, Managing Director of Comber-based Eakin Healthcare Group and Coleraine-headquartered Armstrong Medical

Jeremy Eakin says Eakin Healthcare Group’s acquisition of Armstrong Medical late last year was a rapid transaction, a swift 10-week process that came at the right time, amalgamating two of Northern Ireland’s biggest and most successful family-run medical supplies firms.

The deal between the two sees a new therapeutic area – respiratory care now falls under the business chief’s remit.

It’s a diversification for the group, that will allow it to grow its domestic and international presence.

John Armstrong, the former owner of Armstrong Medical stepped back from his business after approaching Jeremy about the sale. Being kept as a family business even after his exit was of paramount importance to the medical supplies boss.

“It was a pretty quick process,” Jeremy begins. “We were contacted by John in August and he was quite focused on completing the sale before Christmas.”

Both family-owned businesses “share a common culture and philosophy,” Jeremy adds. “And we see many synergies which we believe will underpin the continued success of both brands.”

Armstrong Medical was operating at its peak during the time of the acquisition, fresh from hugely elevated sales of its respiratory products because of the pandemic.

“I’m glad we weren’t owners in the springtime of the last year,” Jeremy admits. “Because it sounds like it was a crazy time. Back then the numbers of employees at Armstrong Medical doubled from 160 to 320, but now that sits at the 200 mark and while we are still operating during a period of elevated sales it has settled and levelled out.”

He says the brawn of both firms alongside Eakin’s investment plans will “take Armstrong Medical to the next level and help it take advantage of new and exciting opportunities in the human healthcare market”.

“We always had it in our plans to diversify into different therapeutic areas and we were prepared to look further afield. We were proactively looking for acquisition and then we were approached by John. That NI familyowned setup really fitted within our comfort zone and it is ripe for scaling and growing domestically and internationally.”

Armstrong Medical is not Eakin’s first acquisition over the years. The company has acquired two other businesses that have allowed it to diversify.

“Armstrong Medical is our second or third acquisition and our largest one,” Jeremy continues. “Another significant one was back in 2008 when we acquired Pelican in GB and that gave us our UK distribution platform. There has also been a significant number of smaller acquisitions for our surgical business.”

The company also operates RESPOND, “an award-winning prescription and dispensing home delivery and support service to the stoma and continence care community”.

The buyout of Pelican Healthcare Ltd, a Cardiff-based ostomy manufacturer, saw Eakin subsequently launch the new Pelican Pouch range of ostomy pouches across many of its international markets.

Today, it has two international subsidiaries; one in Japan and another in the Netherlands.

The company has been actively growing since it was founded in 1974 by Jeremy’s father, Tom, a pharmacist, but the past 12 months have presented the firm with challenge and opportunity in equal measure.

Speaking about trading in post-Brexit terrain and during a pandemic, Jeremy says: “There was no doubt Brexit was a big challenge but we were extremely prepared, and made sure we had supply of raw materials in NI. We made sure that all was running smoothly and customers had stock in advance and I have to say that we were proactive and thanks to a number of engagement groups and forums we were kept up to date.

“We still do have some shipments that are delayed and we’ve had to reroute export orders to the EU through Ireland instead of through the land bridge and that has increased cost.”

Meanwhile he says that COVID-19 has been a balancing act.

“COVID-19 has impacted the two businesses differently. In ostomy there was less new business due to fewer diagnoses. There have also been fewer reversals too so that has levelled out but it’s been difficult for new product launches.

“Today it’s stable, peak demand for products was last year when we saw a lot of panic buying. Meanwhile, Armstrong has had a crazy time. The challenge now is for Armstrong to try to determine what business will look like post- COVID.”

To ensure the smooth transition of Armstrong Medical to the Eakin family, Jeremy, a business graduate, has relocated closer to Coleraine.

He will oversee a recruitment drive that will boost the group’s headcount from its current 650.

“There’s opportunity at Armstrong to recruit in the commercial side of the business including sales and marketing. We have around a dozen jobs live at the minute,” he says.

“What we want to get across now is that our deal with Armstrong is a chunky acquisition of significant size and it’s extremely positive to see two indigenous NI businesses joining together.

“When a family business sells, the obvious move is to sell to a bigger competitor but this transaction has been unique. I think it presents a fantastic opportunity for growth and we can build on the foundations.”

Jeremy says given the strength of Armstrong Medical the firm has no plans to rebrand.

“There was no doubt Brexit was a big challenge but we were extremely prepared, and made sure we had supply of raw materials in NI. We made sure that all was running smoothly and customers had stock in advance.”

LAW FIRM CHOOSES LEAF FOR CLOUD SERVICES

Belfast based legal fi rm, MKB Law have chosen Leaf to deliver a complete IT managed service hosted in the Leaf Cloud. MKB Law Managing Director, Gordon McElroy says, “Leaf have provided us with a robust, cost effective and secure IT solution and assisted in modernising our IT operations. Leaf’s support has been fi rst class, with a direct line to an engineer, which has proven invaluable to the day to day running of our business.”

MKB Law needed to complete their secure remote working strategy and engaged Leaf to review their existing technologies with the aim to provide a platform that delivered reliable performance. The Leaf Cloud platform is a powerful remote environment ensuring that MKB Law’s Practice Management System was able to perform effi ciently while optimising the remote offi ce experience.

With infrastructure located in the Leaf Cloud, it has enabled an always on, secure and resilient service which includes a dedicated hardware failover solution. In the David Corr, Account Manager, Leaf and Gordon McElroy, Managing Director, MKB Law. event of an outage the disaster recovery solution is triggered, providing minimal disruption so that MKB staff can continue to work.

David Corr, Account Manager says, “The goal of all of us at Leaf is to listen to customers, understand their requirements and delivery solutions that remove their pain points. MKB Law needed to transform how they were working with a cloud platform that securely enabled their remote workforce.”

Leaf’s IT services are the building blocks of their lifecycle approach, allowing clients to future proof technology investments and build IT systems that are robust, productive and cost effective. Every service provided is based on delivering tangible results, where IT investments can be matched to business successes.

For a free consultation or to fi nd out more please visit www.leaf-it.com