Abcam

Abcam is a British online retailer of polyclonal and monoclonal antibodies and, increasingly, other reagents for basic research, which are sold worldwide through the Internet. The exchange traded and the Alternative Investment Market ( AIM) of the London Stock Exchange ( LSE) listed company has its headquarters in Milton near Cambridge (England). Antibodies from over 400 different OEM manufacturers were marketed in 2012 under the label Abcam and thus a turnover of approximately 157 million U.S. dollars generated a pre-tax gain of approximately $ 62 million. 17% of sales are generated with self-made antibodies.

History

The company was founded in 1998 by telecommunications entrepreneur David Cleevely and the biologist Jonathan Simon Milner, Ph.D. and Tony Kouzarides, Ph.D. Founded in Cambridge, UK. Jonathan Milner, born in 1965, received the B.sc. at the University of Bath and a PhD from the University of Leicester in 1993 with a genetic analysis of Erwinia amylovora. He is author and co-author of 6 scientific articles in PubMed. While he worked at the University of Cambridge with Prof. Kouzarides on the protein BRCA2 as a post -doc came to them the idea of ​​founding the company, by its own account, by the lack of appropriate research antibodies and the low availability of reliable data on the few available antibodies. The company Abcam is a portmanteau of (ab) antibody (English for antibodies) and ( cam) Cambridge.

Soon after the company was founded in 1998 a website was created. The site was originally a search that linked the various producers. So Abcam learned of the antibodies most-searched and then contacted even the manufacturer and sales of these products under the name Abcam. In order to bridge liquidity shortages and generate cash flow construction contracts were approved for antibodies against specific target proteins for scientific projects. The antibodies were produced externally with a Belgian company and sold by Abcam. The focus and design of the business model to the Internet and e -commerce in 1998, was not really used at a time when the Internet from the other antibody manufacturers, brought Abcam a clear competitive advantage to the company today could steadily expand.

In 2012, products were more than 80% purchased from other manufacturers and repackaged before reselling. These products are not tested in our own laboratories. There is emphasis on display at the company's website to the frequently sold products where possible, data, reviews, and ratings. For these products, the sale price may be increased. Also part of the company policy that this is done for reasons of cost, only a small part of their employees or the most part through the reviews of customers and data from suppliers. In addition, the Company will not have a sales force.

The end of 2007 bought Abcam of the laboratory automation experts Beckman Coulter, a system for automated production of monoclonal antibodies. Thus Abcam could make from 2008 own monoclonal antibodies for the first time.

According to the 2009 Report of BioInformatics LLC 's market share Abcam in the field of research antibodies to 10% growth rate in 2009 compared to 5.2 % in 2006. Abcam This was behind Santa Cruz Biotechnology, the second largest supplier.

According to an online survey in 2011 by Frost & Sullivan with over 1100 readers of The Scientist Abcam was the third leading supplier in the antibody research by Sigma -Aldrich and Santa Cruz Biotechnology. The online platform Labome indicates that in 2012 approximately 8.5 % were used by 10100 examined scientific publications in the field of biology - medicine products of the provider Abcam.

Share

Since autumn 2005 the shares on the AIM of the LSE are listed and traded on the stock exchanges today NASDAQ, Frankfurt and Berlin.

Management

• CEO, Board and Supervisory Board together 15.82%

Institutional investors with more than 3 % Shareholdings

• BlackRock Investment 8.09%
• Baillie Gifford 7.97%
• Standard Life Investments 6.07%
• T. Rowe Price 4.87%
• William Blair & Company 4.66%
• Kames Capital 3.42%

Stand January 2013

Acquisitions

In May 2011 it was announced that the Abcam 2004 in Eugene, Oregon ( U.S.) Founded in company MitoSciences purchased for $ 6 million. The company offers about 200 reagents and monoclonal antibodies for mitochondrial research and had sales of $ 2.1 million in 2010 with 24 employees.

In September 2011, Abcam took over the company Ascent Scientific, Bristol, UK, was founded in 2005 for $ 16 million. The company offers about 400 reagents and laboratory chemicals for Proteomics and had sales of $ 2.2 million in 2010 with 23 employees.

In April 2012 it was announced that the Abcam 2002 in Burlingame, California (USA), founded Epitomics for the companies in relation to the turnover of its own: buys (2012 USD 157 million (2012 ) ) relatively high amount of USD 155 million. The company offers claims to 4072 rabbit monoclonal antibodies for basic research (RUO ) and in - vitro diagnostic (IVD ) and had 2011 with over 200 employees in the vicinity of Shanghai, China and a few in Burlingame, U.S. sales of 24, $ 7 million. Prior to the sale Epitomics had abandoned the plans for the end of 2011 listed on the stock exchange in Taiwan to be. In 2010, the activities were outsourced in the therapeutic antibody field in the newly founded company Apexigen, Inc.. With the acquisition of Epitomics Abcam is now involved in addition to the research reagents in the IVD area.

Locations

In addition to its headquarters in Cambridge Science Park, Milton, the company production and distribution subsidiaries operates since 2002 in Cambridge (Massachusetts ) ( United States ), 2004 in Bristol, (UK ), 2005 Eugene ( Oregon), (USA ), 2006 in Tokyo, (Japan ), 2009 in Hong Kong, and San Francisco, CA (USA) and 2012 in Hangzhou ( China).

Competitor

Manufacturer of antibodies for research purposes

• BD Biosciences
• Cell Signaling Technology
• EBioscience
• Life Technologies
• Merck Millipore
• Miltenyi Biotec
• RnD Systems
• Santa Cruz Biotechnology
• Sigma Aldrich
• Synaptic Systems
• Thermo Fisher Scientific

E -commerce platforms

• Antibodyresource.com
• Biocompare.com
• Linscottsdirectory.com