Penarth headquartered global diagnostics firm EKF appoints new CEO

Penarth headquartered global diagnostics company, EKF Diagnostics, has appointed a new chief executive with immediate effect. The Alternative Investment Market listed business has promoted its chief product officer, Gavin Jones, to the role.

Founder of the business, Julian Baines, had been at the helm of the business in an executive chair capacity, a role that he will remain in for the foreseeable future.

Penarth-born Mr Baines, said: “I’m delighted that Gavin Jones is taking on the role as chief executive and joining the board. Gavin has over twenty years of experience in point-of-care and life sciences and has been instrumental in driving the commercial success of many of our products.

"Many shareholders have met Gavin over the last year or so as he’s become more and more involved in the senior leadership team. Gavin has ambitious plans for delivering sustainable growth and unlocking the unrealised potential that our core products and service hold. We have an exciting opportunity to increase our commercial investment to drive organic growth and I’m delighted that Gavin will lead that process.”

For its financial 2024 (calendar) financial year EKF post revenues of £50.2m (down from £52.6m a year earlier), which reflected a move away from lower margin products. Adjusted Ebitda climbed 9.2% to £11.3m while its pre-tax rose from £2.1m to £6.3m.

Mr Baines said:”The 2024 results reflect the positive effects of our rationalisation process and the benefits that a more simplified business with greater commercial focus on higher margin products and services can bring to the group.

“We have already delivered further significant improvements to our adjusted Ebitda margin and vastly improved cash generation, however we believe our five-year development plan will further improve these metrics, with sensible reinvestment into our key business divisions to drive organic growth and margin improvement.

“EKF remains a well-established business, with a core product portfolio that is capable of significant growth with the right investment. We continue to generate significant levels of cash from our operations and we believe our biggest challenge as a board is to deploy this cash most effectively to generate further growth and value for shareholders.”