Innovative idea brings rent-free rewards to hi-tech business
Comments |
An
award-winning hi-tech firm has claimed its prize of a year’s
rent-free accommodation at a science park in Kent.
Purelabs won the Kent Innovation Challenge for developing its
first web-based, pay-as-you-go flat planning service for magazine
and newspaper publishers.
It saw off competition from rivals to land the £20,000 top prize
plus awards in kind - and these included office space at Kent
Science Park, Sittingbourne.
Jon Barrett, founder of Purelabs, which is based at Lenham, near
Maidstone, said after his triumph in April that the prize money
would help him develop the revolutionary idea faster.
The business, which was helped by the University of Kent and
Canterbury Enterprise Hub, won the contest after a Dragons
Den-style grilling by Kent business experts.
They were impressed by Mr Barrett’s big idea, Intelligent
Flatplan, said to be the world’s first internet-based magazine
management solution.
Mr Barrett said: “From our new Kent Science Park base we
are striking out with more research and product development plus
increased sales to publishers, design houses, marketing agencies,
typesetters and printers
“Kent Science Park is the right address for a local
technology-based company like ours. The site has the all-important
Internet infrastructure to help us market our system, deliver the
product and support our customers.”
Babs Knott, KSP site administrator, said: “Purelabs arrival will
strengthen the Park's community of ICT businesses.”
Since Mr Barrett and his team launched Intelligent Flatplan
technology 18 months ago, more than 1,500 publishing professionals
around the world have used the system to manage more than 2,200
editions, totalling some 153,000 pages.
They spotted a gap in the market for an IT solution to serve
their own publishing business. It plans to increase the
number of pages planned to a million a year by 2011.
Monday, August 24 2009
The KM Group does not moderate comments.
Please click here for our house rules.