Author: Rob Ferris

The team at Feritech Global are celebrating after the announcement from Buckingham Palace that they will receive a King’s Award for Enterprise for their outstanding success in international trade.

The award will be presented by the Lord Lieutenant of Cornwall, Colonel Edward Bolitho OBE, at a special ceremony at Feritech’s Innovation Centre in Falmouth. Feritech has also been invited to a reception with His Majesty The King at Buckingham Palace in the summer.

The King’s Awards for Enterprise (previously known as The Queen’s Awards for Enterprise) is an awards programme for British businesses and other organizations who excel at international trade, innovation, sustainable development or promoting opportunity through social mobility. They are regarded as the highest official UK awards for British businesses.

Feritech Global Ltd was founded in 2015 by Rob Ferris and Gemma Ferris. It is an advanced engineering company specialising in designing and building products that are used in extreme marine environments. The company built its reputation by carrying out marine geotechnical surveys. This involves going out into deep oceans and sending down specialised electronic systems to conduct tests to work out certain properties of the ocean floor. This is vital information for clients who want to install infrastructure out at sea, such as wind, tide or wave turbines, power cables or pipelines.

Before being named a winner of the King’s Award, Feritech Global had to undergo a rigorous assessment process, including a detailed audit of their financial figures. The company won the King’s Award for International Trade for Outstanding Short Term Growth in overseas sales over three years. In the period under review, Feritech demonstrated overseas earnings growth of 1,210%. The company trades in more than 40 countries around the world, including the USA, France, Germany and Singapore.

 

Commenting on the award, Managing Director, Rob Ferris, said:

“This is a huge honour for our business and fantastic recognition for our dedicated team and all their hard work. When we founded Feritech, we challenged ourselves to develop world-leading products that would set new standards in our industry. That approach has served us really well, and we now have the privilege of working with great customers around the world.”

Due to  its rapid international growth, Feritech has opened its own purpose-built Innovation Centre near in Cornwall, which is one of the most advanced facilities of its kind in the UK.

 

The image shows Feritech Global technology deployed offshore in the USA.

Photo credit: TDI-Brooks International, Inc.

Feritech Global has been shortlisted for awards in two categories in the FSB Celebrating Small Business Awards 2023, in the South West region. The company is a finalist in the ‘Sustainability’ and ‘Exporter of the Year’ categories.

The high profile FSB Celebrating Small Business Awards celebrate the achievements and contributions of small businesses across the UK. It is the largest event of its kind. Winners from each category secure a spot at the prestigious UK final and a chance to be crowned the UK Small Business of the Year.

MD Rob Ferris says: “We are thrilled to have been shortlisted in both the categories we entered. We faced stiff competition from businesses in all sectors right across the South West. We have won multiple awards in the last year, including ‘Exporter of the Year’ at the Cornwall Business Awards 2022 and ‘SME of the Year’ at Western Morning News Business Awards 2022.

“Feritech is investing in the future of marine tech and engineering in the region, with customers in over 40 countries and a strong growth plan based on innovation and sustainability.”

The South West final takes place on Wednesday 1^st March 2023 at the Winter Gardens in Weston-Super-Mare.

The Feritech team is celebrating after securing another major business award win.

At the Western Morning News Business Awards ceremony, held on 30^th November 2022, Feritech triumphed in the SME Business of the Year category.

This award celebrates growing businesses of up to 150 employees that are having a positive impact on the region’s economy.

In selecting Feritech Global, the judges examined all aspects of the company’s performance, paying particular attention to:

• Managerial and financial performance
• Evidence of success against targets set
• Potential for growth
• Long-term plans and company strategy
• Product and service development
• Staff training and development

Commenting on this accolade, Feritech Global MD, Rob Ferris, said:

“Our brilliant team have been working incredibly hard this year to drive our business forward. Receiving this prestigious award just as we enter the start of the Christmas season seems the perfect way to celebrate their achievements.

“This year, we have opened our new £3 million Innovation Centre, launched major new products such as the Sealance and our new generation Vibrocorer, and expanded our export business to more than 40 countries around the world. All this has been done with a small but highly dedicated team.

“We have now built a really strong platform for future growth and are looking forward to more exciting new projects in 2023.”

Feritech Global have been awarded ‘Highly Commended’ in the Marine Tech category in this year’s Tech South West Awards. The awards ceremony was held on 10^th November 2022 at Aerospace Bristol.

This achievement is the second time Feritech have been in the spotlight in the Tech South West Awards. Last year, the company won the ‘International Success’ category.

Feritech General Manager, Mark Smith (pictured above at the awards ceremony), said:

“The Tech South West Awards recognise the huge amount of talent and innovation in our region. It is exciting to be part of such a fast-growing vibrant sector and to be acknowledged as one of the leaders and innovators in our field.”

Feritech Managing Director Rob Ferris added:

“We are delighted that Feritech’s achievements in marine technology have been recognised by the Tech South West Awards for the second year running. This has been a superb year for us, as we continue to grow our business around the world, from our Innovation Centre in South West England. This accolade is a tribute to our amazing team”

Feritech Global has been named as a Finalist in the Western Morning News Business Awards 2022.

The annual Western Morning News Business Awards shine a spotlight on the top companies in the South West of England and pay tribute to those whose determination and success are helping to drive the region’s economy.

Feritech Global has been shortlisted in the ‘SME of the Year’ category.

Managing Director Rob Ferris said:

“We are delighted to have been selected as a Finalist. This is a tremendous honour in the face of stiff competition from the many great businesses in our region. We are very proud of our amazing team.”

This is the latest recognition in a line of award successes for the company. Feritech scooped the award for ‘International Success’ in the most recent Tech South West Awards and was named ‘Exporter of the Year’ in the Cornwall Business Awards 2022.

The winners of the Western Morning News Awards 2022 will be announced at a glittering event at Sandy Park Stadium, Exeter on November 30th 2022.

Rob Ferris, MD, Feritech Global

It’s now six months since HRH The Duke of Kent opened our new £3m Innovation Centre so it’s a good time to take stock and reflect on how we are doing. One of our ambitions is to become an exemplar for businesses working towards a Net Zero economy. So let’s stand back and look at how far we have come already on our journey towards sustainability.

When we were planning the construction of our purpose-built Innovation Centre near Falmouth, we wanted to take a radical approach to environmental sustainability. We were on a mission to prove that our industry can work in harmony with the natural environment, as well as pioneer sustainable new ways of working,

Here are 16 exciting steps we have taken so far:

• We harvest our own water, from boreholes that we have drilled ourselves as well as collecting water from the roof.

• We have a state of the art solar roof, combined with on-site power storage. This generates than enough electricity for our needs and the surplus is ‘exported’ to the grid. We make 3 times more power from our solar roof than all our manufacturing consumes.

• We use air source heating for our offices and we use heat exchangers to reduce power for heating.

• We have planted over 3,000 trees, to help our site blend with its rural location and promote biodiversity.

• We provide vital new habitats for wildlife at our pond, which captures the surface run-off from the site.

• We carry out our own recycling on-site, including the composting of food waste from our catering facilities.

• We have taken a novel approach to the fencing and windbreaks around the facility. Rather than metal fences, we opted to plant 5,500 hawthorn bushes. What these provide is a natural, growing impenetrable fence as well as habitats for local flora and fauna. 

• We cause no noise or light pollution. The building has been built so that no noise escapes the building. And there are no external lights, so there is no light pollution. 

• We have installed six 22kW Electric Vehicle Chargers at the site for staff to use free of charge and a ‘cycle to work’ scheme.

• We have created an outdoor green leisure area where staff are encouraged to rest and recharge in nature.

• We are engaged in a project to create a woodland area for the local community. This will provide a new green public space for our local village of Stithians. It will promote biodiversity and extend the environment-friendly ethos of the company across our wider community. 

• As a global company with customers in over forty countries worldwide, we seek to minimise our impact on the environment. Whenever possible, staff always use ground transport instead of air.

• We offer flexible working for staff wherever possible.

• We recruit young people locally. We are working with Falmouth Marine School to develop our own apprenticeship scheme so that we can recruit locally and ‘grow our own engineers.’

• We actively engage with local schools for tours and visits to help get young children fired up and enthused for engineering and show how business can work successfully in harmony with the natural environment.

• We source as many components as possible within the UK. This is not always possible due to global supply chains but ensuring what we do procure is ethically sourced is paramount. We have policies in place that are supplied (and actively managed to all our suppliers) to ensure anti bribery, child working and modern day slavery do not get employed within our supply chains.

We are so proud that we have been able to take these innovative steps at our flagship Innovation Centre but this is only the beginning. We are now looking into becoming a B Corp business and our staff are being encouraged to  consider how we can achieve still more in terms of our sustainability.  As a ISO14001 registered company, we will continue to track our performance and constantly strive to reduce our environmental impact.

Working in harmony with the environment is at the heart of our approach.