Interview with Ingela Hofverberg, CEO at Atlas Antibodies AB
The Life Science sector plays a significant role in Swedish competitiveness and in developing Sweden as a leading knowledge and research nation. This has been established by the government. And the sector is doing well, at least the approximately 3,800 Life Science companies in Sweden. They are growing and increasing strongly in exports. But at the same time, there are challenges. We met with Ingela Hofverberg, CEO of Atlas Antibodies, to discuss some of them.
Life Science companies are generally accustomed to handling challenges. They operate in an industry characterized by strict regulatory complexity, cost and time pressure in drug development, and the challenge of securing access to costly innovation while needing to balance it with commercialization. Additionally, new technologies present great opportunities but also further challenges, not least ethical ones. All of this greatly impacts the industry.
Atlas Antibodies is a Swedish biotechnology company. Specializing in the development and production of high-quality antibodies and related products for research and diagnostic purposes. The company has established itself globally. With customers ranging from academic research to the pharmaceutical industry. They offer products used in disease research, biomarker development, and targeted therapy. We met with Ingela Hofverberg, CEO of the company, to discuss some of the challenges they face.
What are the Biggest Regulatory Challenges your Company Faces, and how Do You Handle Them?
The biggest challenge we currently face is related to CSRD and the reporting that needs to be set up in connection with this. There is a lot that is unclear and a lot of data that is already reported in other contexts and channels. We will need consolidation in the future for it to be manageable for us as a company.
What is your Company Strategy for Balancing Cost Control with Innovation in Research and Development?
The most important thing for us is to maximize the value of the capital we manage from our owners. And to contribute to research and development in Life Science, balancing these two demands is not easy. It means using the capital where it provides the most. Which, in innovation and development, is a major challenge. Since you don’t know what it might yield in returns until you start working on something. To address this, we try to work with shorter lead times and more frequent reviews of various development initiatives. This is to ensure that we quickly make decisions and act on both continuing and ending.
What Marketing and Distribution Challenges Do You Face, and how Do You Plan to Overcome Them?
Since large parts of our sales go through distributors, our challenge is to make our marketing breakthrough in their channels. It’s important to be close to your customers and distributors to know what the need is. This means ensuring that our product portfolio is a prioritized part of our partners’ marketing focus and receives the attention we desire. Being price-competitive in the market is a challenge, especially after the financial effects of the pandemic. Due to our distributor model, we often end up one step away from our direct customers and must find other ways to connect with them and understand future needs. It’s important for us to have open communication with our distributors, and it helps when we have quick access to good reports and data.
How Does Globalization Affect your Business, and What Strategies Do You Have for Expanding Internationally?
A crucial factor for us is, of course, competitors in other countries. Who can produce at a lower price but sometimes also at lower quality. Which is not always transparent and obvious to our end customers. Here, it becomes incredibly important for us to clearly communicate about our high quality and the advantages of our product compared to others that may seem equivalent. The choice of distributor partner who can clearly market our products with a focus on quality and fast deliveries is crucial for us. Being able to centralize our information management means we can be quick on the international market and adapt to regional needs.
What future technologies or trends in life science do you see as most disruptive, and how are you preparing your company for these?
A lot is happening in AI now that can have a significant impact on our processes. It’s a great opportunity to both streamline and find new ways to increase quality. The ability to analyze and work with large amounts of data drives product development towards more complex products that strive to provide customers with parallel data for broader analysis.
Finally, What Do You See a Company like Implema Can Contribute Based on the above?
Implema will need to continue being a close partner. Who is thoroughly familiar with our business processes and continuously challenges us in how we use systems and data. All the systems we work with together with Implema are leaders in their fields, and to extract the highest value from these, we need to continuously challenge ourselves in harmony with development.
