ABS Engineering Control Services, based in Castlemahon has won the Regional award for the South West Region, comprising of Counties Limerick, Clare, Kerry and Tipperary, at this year’s National Enterprise Awards, organised by the Local Enterprise Offices to celebrate Ireland’s best small businesses.
Founded by Colm Cussen, ABS Engineering currently employ eight people and by 2020 are expecting to double their workforce. ABS is opening a new R&D department for their latest projects, one being their BEMS (Building Energy Management Systems) for the domestic home to reduce its carbon footprint.
ABS Engineering Control Systems Ltd. focus is on providing and installing state of the art Building Energy Management System (BMS) that meet individual needs, and process controls working in commercial industrial and pharmaceutical sites. The system that ABS Engineering Control Systems build on behalf of their clients provide control solutions that manage functions such as heating, cooling, energy usage and monitoring from one centralised location that can be accessed both on-site and remotely.
Further product development is being undertaken by ABS Engineering in the domestic market developing control systems for domestic building to create a ‘smart home’ so that a central system can control boilers/heating systems, heat recovery functions, underfloor heating, geothermal pumps, lights and energy sources, energy monitoring and more.
Pat Breen T.D., Minister for Trade, Employment, Business, EU Digital Single Market and Data Protection, made the announcement in front of 230 guests in the Mansion House in Dublin on Thursday (29 May 2019).
Presenting the awards on stage, he said: “I want to pay tribute to all the winners and finalists in this year’s National Enterprise Awards. Their drive, determination and passion for building successful businesses and creating local jobs is what this competition is all about. This year’s winners, like all those in previous years, represent the backbone of Ireland’s enterprise success and contribute hugely to the economic vibrancy of their respective regions.”
“All this year’s finalists and winners have been supported by my department through the Local Enterprise Office network. The Government, through the Local Enterprise Offices, will continue to play its part in helping to prepare small business for the challenges and the opportunities that lie ahead.”
Congratulating the local winner, Head of Enterprise, LEO Limerick, Eamon Ryan said: “ABS Engineering are very deserving winners of this year’s Regional Enterprise Award and the team in the Local Enterprise Office Limerick are very proud of their achievements.”
A skincare company, Pestle & Mortar, won the overall title this year (backed by LEO Kildare); Clean Cut Meals, which makes and delivers portion-controlled healthy meals, won the ‘Best Start-Up Business’ award (backed by LEO Galway), the ‘Best Export Business’ award went to Kilkenny-based Mechanical Modular Solutions (backed by LEO Kilkenny), and an ice-cream manufacturer in Cavan, Ice Cream Treats, won the ‘Innovation’ award (backed by LEO Cavan).
Winners share a €40,000 investment fund.
The full list of Regional Award winners were:
- Gym + Coffee in the Dublin Region (backed by LEO Dublin City)
- ABS Engineering Control Systems Ltd in the South West Region (backed by LEO Limerick)
- Dotser Ltd in the Mid East Region (backed by LEO Offaly)
- VirtualVet in the South Region (backed by LEO Waterford)
- Harte Outdoor Lighting in the South East Region (backed by LEO Wexford)
- MMG Welding in the North West Region (backed by LEO Donegal)
- Rivval Ltd in the North East Region (backed by LEO Monaghan)
- Skillko Ltd in the West Region (backed by LEO Mayo).
Previous Limerick winners at the National Enterprise Awards include DesignPro, now based in Rathkeale, who won the award in 2013, and Bespoke Sauce Ltd, based in Raheen who won in 2017.
Funded through Enterprise Ireland, Local Enterprise Offices in local authorities were established by the Department of Business, Enterprise and Innovation in 2014 as the ‘first-stop-shop’ for anyone wanting to start or grow a small business. Over the last five years, LEOs have helped companies create 18,640 new jobs (net) and have provided €81.5 million in direct financial assistance to over 5,000 business projects. LEOs have also organised over 40,000 business mentoring appointments and provided enterprise training for 144,830 participants since 2014 (www.localenterprise.ie).