This year H.E.L Group (H.E.L) expanded its operations in India with the establishment of a whollyowned subsidiary, H.E.L India, progressing from a long-standing distributor model. To support India’s growing biotechnology, process safety and the pharmaceutical industry, the new operation delivers dedi cated in-country support directly to H.E.L customers. Shortly after this announcement, Rajeev Kumria was appointed as General Manager of H.E.L India to oversee the cre ation and commercial effectiveness of the new business.
“We primarily provide direct sales and marketing, service, and support opera ti ons to customers in India,” explained Chief Commercial Officer Paul Orange. “India is an attractive market for us, where battery safety is huge. The other attraction is on the bioreactor side of the business, with massive potential there for us to make a difference. These opportunities both really tie-in to our broader mission –making a healthier, more sustainable and safer world.”
H.E.L has been solving complex chal lenges for customers since its foundation in
1987. The past few years at H.E.L have been busy whilst the business extends its reach into rapidly developing Asian markets including China, where the company’s instruments, software and automated solu tions are playing a pivotal role in improving the safety of chemical and industrial research, development and manufacuring.
The new operation in India follows a similar model to H.E.L’s move to a direct sales organisation in China, and was accompanied with the appointment of a Distribution Manager for the rest of th e Asian market. H.E.L also bolstered its team in
The UK-based H.E.L Group has 35 years’ experience developing and manufacturing innova tive scientific instruments and software designed to optimise key processes in chemistry and biology applications. CEO Louise Madden and Chief Commercial Officer Paul Orange highlighted the company’s growth and new equipment in conversation with Phil Nicholls.
the United States in line with the company’s heightened visibility around the world.
CEO Louise Madden acknowledged a selection of recent milestones for H.E.L: “We already had ISO 9001, but we’ve extended that to ISO 14001. We’ve now got three members of staff in our dedicated quality team, which was a key strategi c move. Operationally, we have made a huge investment into the company by intro ducing the SAP Business One ERP system in June 2020.”
H.E.L is based at a dedicated facility in Borehamwood in Hertfordshire, north of London. Expansion of the headquarters and upgrading of existing manufacturing capability here is planned to accommo
date H.E.L’s projected growth in output.
The facility is currently home to 65 of H.E.L’s 90 employees, but this number will increase in line with the ongoing trajec tory of the company which is experiencing a period of exceptional growth in demand.
A world-class portfolio
The range of H.E.L products consists of world-class, innovative scientific instru ments to make any laboratory safer and more efficient. The portfolio includes biore actors, adiabatic and isothermal calorime ters, parallel reactors, and battery testing systems. All these instruments are offered with a broad menu of options to meet many research requirements, allowing customers
to select the precise configuration that matches their specific research goals.
The H.E.L range is growing further with the recent launch of the iso-BTC+ calorimeter for isothermal battery performance testing. The market trend is for ever-more powerful batteries, as Dr Orange explained: “The new i so-BTC+ allows performance testing on physically larger batteries, but more impor tantly, it allows testing of higher power bat teries than previously – it’s really about the power of the battery. For everything from e-bikes all the way to Tesla’s new car, the market wants more power.
“It’s easy to think about batteries in isolation, but a battery operates within a product. Our new testing equipment
enables researchers and developers to look at the battery as a component of a device because that’s how people interact with it.”
H.E.L’s equipment operates with labCONSOL®, the company’s own laboratory automation software. labCONSOL is fully cus tomisable to support laboratory operation, controlling both H.E.L systems and associ ated third-party hardware. The software implements safety controls and enables
equipment automation, and also records and controls experimental variables.
“Our USP really comes from our soft ware capability,” said Dr Orange. “There’s 35 years of knowledge and programming skills in our software, it’s an inherently highly flexible platform that is essentially device agnostic. We’ve invested recently to make the software even more intuitive with a truly user-friendly interface, which is getting a lot of good traction.”
The combination of flexible software and the bespoke capabilities of H.E.L’s prod ucts are demonstrated by a recent project highlighted by Dr Orange.
“A major national lab in the US came to us, because we have a certain skill set in the bioreactor area,” he said. “Our speciality is benchtop parallel bioreactors with the ability to work at high pressure, which is a really dif ficult space to work in. This lab essentially does contract work, so giving them a system that’s flexible enough to deal with the dif ferent rigours of their contract work is our sweet spot.”
A growth trajectory
As well as the recent growth of the com mercial organisation, H.E.L is investing in key leadership positions. “We have a new Director of Product Development,” said Ms Madden, “who joined us from a scientific instrumentation business where he’s run product development departments. Another new arrival is our Global Director of Service who will focus on making sure that our customers are happy.”
These new appointments highlight the importance of product development and customer service to the growth strategy at H.E.L. The company is focused on maintaining a steady release schedule of innovative products into the global market. A key pillar of supporting the company’s growth profile includes an internal training regime to bring the company’s new hires up to the knowledge levels of the experienced staff, further enhancing the levels of service offered to clients by H.E.L.
Healthy, sustainable and safe H.E.L is also invested in the future of the planet.
“This is part of our mission statement,” Ms Madden explained, “to help create a healthier, more sustainable, and safer world for everyone. We took the decision last year to achieve ISO 14001 accredita tion which focuses on enhancing our environmental performance, and each year we want to perform better than the last. I definitely do not want the company to be an ‘average Joe’; I want H.E.L to be the best in class for the size of our company.”
A close relationship with suppliers is part of making H.E.L best in class. “It is clear that the electronics industry has been hit hard by the global supply chain crisis,” said Ms Madden. “We have good
relationships with our suppliers, working with some of them for decades; but as a small company, our purchasing power is relatively low compared to the global giants.
“So, we agreed with our suppliers to place a two-year buying commitment with them. In turn, this gives them the purchasing power to work with their suppliers. This strategy has moved our suppliers further up the chain in their sector.”
H.E.L’s purchasing strategy has miti gated some of the effects of the global supply disruptions, yet, this issue remains the largest challenge facing the company. Sup ply fluctuations for electrical components, circuit boards, and even packing materials have all
had an impact, but the dedicated team at H.E.L keep the orders rolling out of the doors.
It is the quality of this H.E.L team which makes the company a great place to work, according to Dr Orange: “What delights me is seeing our staff demon strate how they’ve learned a new skill or stepped-up which then manifests in an improvement that aligns with the company’s goals. We work with machines all the time, but machines don’t get things done; people get things done.”
“H.E.L has a clear roadmap for scaling up,” concluded Ms Madden. “Our invest ment in the future is all about the three ‘P’s: People, Products and Processes. We know we’re a small company, but we want to do great things.”
CEO Louise Madden
Chief Commercial Officer Paul Orange
