6 Cambridgeshire companies win King’s Award for Enterprise 2024

Six Cambridgeshire-based companies are among the winners of the King’s Award for Enterprise 2024. The King’s Awards for Enterprise, previously known as the Queen’s Awards, have been recognising and encouraging excellence in business since 1966.

Each year around 200 companies are recognised for their achievements across the categories of Innovation, International Trade, Sustainable Development and Promoting Opportunity (through social mobility).

Three Cambridgeshire companies were awarded in the Innovation category:

• Giocoguado Ltd – for a pumpless espresso machine with excellent green credentials
• Almath Crucibles Ltd – for development of high purity ceramics for the nuclear industry
• Thermoteknix Systems Ltd – for a new night-time Augmented Reality head-up display

Cambridgeshire had two winners in the International Trade category this year:

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• Endomagnetics Limited – for a minimally-invasive surgical guidance system that improves treatment of breast cancer.
• Cambridge Precision Ltd – for high quality manufacture of complex precision-engineered components, enabling critical technologies around the world.

The sixth Cambridgeshire winner, Harry Specters Limited, a chocolate crafter, were recognised in the Promoting Opportunity category for empowering autistic individuals through employment, training, and work experience.

Well done to all our amazing #Cambridgeshire winners @endomag @HarrySpecters @Thermoteknix @CPL_Engineering, Almath Crucibles & Giocoguado Ltd – all prove you don’t need to big to be at the top of your game ranging in size from 7 to 77 employees. We are all so proud of you 🤗…

— Julie Spence, Lord Lieutenant Cambridgeshire (@Lord_Lt_Cambs) May 6, 2024

His Majesty’s Lord-Lieutenant of Cambridgeshire, Mrs Julie Spence OBE CStJ QPM said: “I’d like to congratulate all six of our outstanding Cambridgeshire winners of these King’s Awards.

“I am delighted that Cambridgeshire has been so commendably represented this year by our winners across the categories of Innovation, International Trade and Promoting Opportunity.

We're honoured to have been awarded @TheKingsAwards for Enterprise in the International Trade category.

The award judges commended Endomag for impressive international growth over recent years.

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We'd like to thank all of you that continue to support us on our mission to make… pic.twitter.com/RKk1XTYYp8

— Endomag (@endomag) May 6, 2024

“Each winner is an inspirational role model for other ambitious businesses. I look forward to seeing them go from strength to strength in the years ahead.”

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This year’s winners will all be able to use the King’s Awards emblem and fly the King’s Awards flag at their main office for five years.

🎉 We've won @thekingsaward for Promoting Opportunity, thanks to YOU!
Each purchase helps us support #autism inclusion & challenge perceptions.
Let's keep the momentum going. Here’s to change, opportunity, and delicious chocolate. 🍫#kingsawards #Neurodiversity @Lord_Lt_Cambs pic.twitter.com/FdKHMO8xNC

— Harry Specters 🍫 (@HarrySpecters) May 6, 2024

Winners will also receive a Grant of Appointment signed by His Majesty The King and be presented with an engraved glass bowl by the Lord-Lieutenant. One representatives of each winning company will also be invited to attend a reception at Buckingham Palace.

Among the winners, Thermoteknix Systems Ltd has been honoured with its fifth Royal Award, this time the distinguished King’s Award for Enterprise in Innovation, recognising its commercial success from ground breaking innovation in Augmented Reality.

Thermoteknix is a global innovator in thermal imaging, night vision and augmented reality systems around the world.

Thermoteknix celebrates a fifth Royal award. Pictured front – from left – Bruce Cairnduff (Engineering Manager), Richard Salisbury (Managing Director and Company Founder), Anna Kwiecień (Purchasing Administrator), Hollie Walsh (Sales Co-Ordinator) and Louise Barton (Office Manager) celebrating their success in securing another Royal award with Thermoteknix staff outside their headquarters in Cambridge, United Kingdom.

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Thermoteknix has won the King’s Award for Innovation with its Augmented Reality head-up display system providing immersive situational awareness.

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The system comprises of ClipIR, a miniature thermal imaging camera which provides thermal fusion, and ARTIM, an intelligent battery pack providing power and external data to ClipIR. ARTIM adds the capability of following routes, messaging, media or tracking the locations of team-mates which it presents to the user in Augmented Reality.

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Founder and managing director Dr Richard Salisbury said: “Augmented Reality is becoming an ever-present feature in all aspects of media experience.

“Overcoming the limits of technology to present realistic moving imagery while integrating information from a wide variety of sources is very challenging, but our achievement brings this to life. We are thrilled to have been rewarded with a full house of Royal Awards.”

Thermoteknix was awarded the inaugural King’s Award for Enterprise, International Trade, in 2023. Previously, the company has also been honoured with three Queen’s Awards for Enterprise in International Trade and in Innovation.

Founded in 1982, Thermoteknix has sustained continued growth from its Cambridge headquarters, manufacturing and supplying industrial and advanced thermal imaging, and fused imaging solutions to heavy industry and security markets. The company has close ties to the local community, with sourcing and manufacturing carried out in the UK.

Cambridge Precision Ltd has been announced as a recipient of the King’s Award for Enterprise for International Trade. The King’s Awards for Enterprise are the most prestigious awards for UK businesses, recognising and celebrating business excellence across the UK.

Cambridge Precision Ltd (CPL) is one of only 252 organisations nationally to be honoured this year with a King’s Award.

Tony Murray, commercial director, said: “We are chuffed to bits. What an achievement. For all our team who have, time and time again, gone the extra mile and found a different way, this award is rightly yours”.

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Employing 83 people, CPL was founded in 1991 and today is widely acknowledged in tech innovation and bio-med technology sectors, as the production partner of choice for consequential precision engineered components and sub-assemblies.

Richard Hefford Hobbs, chairman, Cambridge Precision Ltd

For CPL, establishing a dedicated production unit for Export and working collaboratively with clients (based overseas or requiring alliance with international suppliers and distributors) has been a key focus over the last five years.

Acting in partnership with customers to overcome trade barriers and implement sustainable global supply chains, has helped the business to develop greater agility and develop as an organisation within the global market.

Richard Hefford Hobbs, chairman, said: “Our clients come to us for our expertise in manufacturing complex components, critical to the performance of their product.

“They stay with us and develop long term partnerships because of our continuous commitment to helping their business succeed.

“Developing our international trade over the last five years was a deliberate objective – which proved challenging, thanks to the pandemic, material shortages and evolving trade agreements … however, the relationships we have built are stronger and more aligned than we could ever have imagined.

“It’s been a tough but a beneficial journey. Being recognised with a King’s Award is something we value immeasurably.”