Skills injection boosts turnover and jobs for Calderdale medical technology firm

Malosa Medical is a leading manufacturer of single-use surgical instruments and procedure packs for ophthalmology and aesthetic surgery. The company, established in 2003, has an extensive product catalogue of more than 300 instruments and offers a bespoke pack design service providing tailor made solutions to both surgeons and healthcare professionals.

Malosa Medical sells primarily to the NHS and UK clinics but also exports its instruments internationally. The company currently employs 90 at its base in Halifax, West Yorkshire, and has a turnover of £11.3m. Growth is high on the agenda for Malosa, with plans to increase turnover through an increase in production capacity, new product development and targeting new business opportunities on both a national and global scale.

In recent years, continued growth and expansion at Malosa had led to considerable recruitment. Senior executives highlighted three different areas within the company that could be improved through training and were keen to upskill supervisors and the senior management team, as well as expanding its in-house marketing function.

The company approached the Leeds City Region Enterprise Partnership (LEP) for support and funding to train staff, with the overall aim of increasing their turnover.

Through the LEP Skills Service, Malosa Medical applied for three different bouts of skills training over a year’s period. The first round of training was to assist the company in email marketing techniques, enabling them to develop business accounts in new and emerging global markets.

Staff in senior positions at Malosa Medical took part in supervisory skills training to build on existing expertise in order to better support the supervisors’ leadership skills and enhance levels of productivity through better management of staff. The training taught supervisors best practice methods of effective supervision, delegation and motivation, and has since allowed the company to work more competently.

The company also decided to invest in sales excellence training for their team of area sales managers. At present, there are six members of the UK sales team, with possible plans to increase this to eight, who are responsible for both managing existing accounts and driving new business.

Finally, Malosa received training in how to use two pieces of Adobe software, Adobe Premier Pro and Adobe After Effects. The training allowed the company to expand its in-house marketing ability further and showcase their products and services to relevant markets and potential customers.

In total, the company received £5,361.25 funding towards the training programmes which has enabled them to work towards the next stages of their growth plans. The company has already seen year on year growth of around 22 per cent and is expecting to top £13m next year, as well as increasing staff numbers by around 20 per cent. In the future, the company plan to gain a bigger presence across Europe and globally.

Will Stewart, associate director of Malosa Medical, said: “The funding that we’ve received from the LEP Skills Service has allowed us to not only expand our operations on a national scale but on a global scale too.

“We’ve seen a significant rise in our turnover in the time that the LEP Skills Service has been helping us. We’ve developed members of our team to the best of their abilities and we’re now seeing this have a tremendous effect on our business which culminates into very exciting times for us.

Stephanie Burras CBE, Chair of the LEP’s Employment and Skills Panel said: “We’re delighted that Malosa Medical has really taken advantage of funding to help them grow and expand as a business

“They’re a company that came to us already in an incredibly strong position, but we were still able to strengthen their core values and help push the business forward. We’re really excited about where they are going as a business and we hope that we can work together in the future to make them grow even bigger, which will be great news for them but also great news for the region

“Funding is only available for a very limited time period and I would urge businesses to contact the LEP Skills Service as soon as possible.“

To find out if your business is eligible for skills support and funding, please visit: www.the-lep.com/skillsservice or contact the team on skills@the-lep.com or 0113 348 1818.