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The Business Interview: Philip Robinson, owner of Possum
When Philip Robinson took charge of Aylesbury company Possum in 1994 he had some tough decisions to make about its future.
The business, which produces high tech devices to give more independence to severely disabled people - including Professor Stephen Hawking- had originally been set up by a volunteer at Stoke Mandeville Hospital in 1961; when Mr Robinson came on board it was displaying the inefficiencies that came with it being run as a non-commercial enterprise.
"There was a necessary restructuring of the business because it had grown up owned by charities," he said. "It was not an efficient, commercial business and in reality the background for the charities selling it is they realised that.
"We used to manufacture here but we closed that down, which was painful but necessary. I decided to concentrate on product development and service. I also changed the culture - everybody clocked in and if you were a minute late your pay was deducted. Everybody was called mister this and mister that, it was really not a modern organisation and I needed to make it a modern business."
The 56 year old adds: "It did lead to us developing much better products and being able to reduce the price of our products and hugely improve the quality of our service, so there were many benefits for disabled people from that process."
The company's recent Queen's Award for Innovation is proof that those changes have indeed led to many good things.
Possum designs a range of devices to help the severely disabled keep their independence, from 'environmental control' products which operate things such as windows, doors and televisions, to 'telecare' sensors which give carers peace of mind by monitoring conditions within a home.
Scientist Prof Hawking, a long standing client, uses Possum's communication aids - electronic devices where words and sentences are selected on a screen and then spoken by an electronic voice.
"We apply technology for the needs of disabled people to improve their quality of life and by doing that help their family members and carers," said Mr Robinson, who lives in Beaconsfield with wife Jane, with whom he has son, William, 22, and daughter, Lizi, 20.
"What we do is not absolutely blue sky research into new technology but monitoring new technologies that are emerging. When the time is right we incorporate it into our products and focus it to the benefit of disabled people," he added.
Mr Robinson grew up in Yorkshire, living over his father's grocers shop. It was these formative years which gave him a nose for business. He said: "Their friends were all business people and I lived in a commercial enterprise so it's part of your background, isn't it?"
After qualifying as a chartered management accountant he started his career working for a number of blue chip companies such as British Aerospace and Tube Investments. In his late 20s he attended Warwick University's Business School, where he took an MBA in business administration. He then worked for a number of small venture capital backed companies in the technology and healthcare sectors, working as a finance director tasked with putting 'financial controls on companies that did not have any'.
He then joined prosthetics firm Blatchford, which later bought Possum. Mr Robinson then acquired the business from them in 1995.
Buying Possum made a reality of Mr Robinson's 'dream' to one day run his own business. " The fulfilment of it is the independence and the ability, with the help of others, to make your own decisions and steer your own ship and do things in the way you want them to be done, be they right or wrong."
The business, which had a turnover of 6million in the last financial year and is based in Farmbrough Close in Stocklake, employs 70 staff, who, said Mr Robinson, reflect the caring mentality at Possum.
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Wednesday 08 February 2012
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