Manage our responsibilities to wider stakeholders (QCA Principle 3)

The Board recognises its prime responsibility under UK corporate law is to promote the success of the Group for the benefit of its members as a whole. We conduct business in an ethical way and take seriously our responsibilities to our wider stakeholders including employees, clinical study partners, contractors, key opinion leaders, trading partners, research and laboratory customers, suppliers and regulatory authorities. The Corporate Responsibility Report on pages 42 to 49 of the Group’s Annual Report and Financial Statements 2022 provides more details and Principle 8 also talks about our values-based corporate culture.

Employees

We recognise that our employees are a core fundamental component to our success. We hold regular all-employee meetings to discuss business progress and provide updates on initiatives. These meetings also include opportunities for staff to present on ongoing projects. One of the goals of these meetings is to ensure that staff feel valued and engaged with the wider Group.

ANGLE provides training and development programmes, inclusive and interactive appraisal systems, merit-based promotions, flexible and family-friendly employee policies and a range of employee and family benefits. Woven throughout all initiatives and programmes is a philosophy which promotes an open culture for discussion and honest feedback (See “Our Values and Our Culture” in the Corporate Responsibility Report). Employees are encouraged to be creative and offer ideas across the Group. Group-wide competitions have been held to encourage creativity and camaraderie.

The Company places importance on the development of internal candidates for management roles and utilises a combination of competency and development plans to progress this. The Company has a Management Charter which formalises the ANGLE culture and clarifies our expectations to and from staff and puts in place a structure to ensure we achieve it. This has delivered a number of ongoing initiatives across the Group including a refined structured promotions process, a coaching programme to support managers and a New Manager training course. Regular one-to-one support is being provided to all managers with teams working from home.

Towards the end of 2022, the Company made the decision to embark on an orderly wind down of its Canadian operations which had been primarily developing a downstream analysis technology for use in combination with the Parsortix system. This decision was made in the light of proposed changes to R&D tax credit conditions by UK HMRC which would significantly increase the costs of operating in Canada, together with the backdrop of a challenging capital market environment and the improved performance of alternative downstream analysis techniques. The Directors concluded that closure of the Canadian operations was in the best interests of the Company and its shareholders. Regrettably, this resulted in the Company needing to make its Canadian staff redundant.

Contractors and suppliers

ANGLE operates a high standard of quality management to ensure we comply with the appropriate regulations in the various territories in which we operate. The Group uses external specialists where needed in relation to areas such as the quality systems and health and safety.

The complex nature of our products and product development process means that close working relationships with a number of key suppliers are essential to ensure we receive the highest quality products and services. An ISO 13485:2016 quality system is mandatory for key suppliers. This involves senior staff clearly communicating requirements and working closely with suppliers to develop appropriate products and services. We ensure there are clear processes for change control to avoid issues and clear billing arrangements and we aim to pay suppliers based on the terms agreed. As a result, we receive high quality goods delivered on time and to specification. It puts us in a position to negotiate discounts, for example, bulk discounts on cassettes through frame orders.

Key opinion leaders, customers and clinical study partners

We work closely with key opinion leaders (KOLs) and customers who have access to patient samples, who provide feedback on their use of the system, including problems encountered, development needs such as new processes and workflows and working with different downstream analysis systems. Our success, competitive advantage and reputation are dependant on understanding these needs and providing solutions. The relationships are managed by key account managers. KOLs, customers and the Group regularly present at scientific conferences. We have a leveraged R&D model driving an increased number of peer-reviewed publications enabled by the Parsortix system in order to be at the forefront of CTC research and clinical adoption. We contract with leading cancer centres to run clinical studies on our behalf as they have access to the necessary patient blood samples and subsequent outcome data.

22 peer-reviewed publications were issued in the year by KOLs and customers (2021: 17) taking the total to 76 publications as at 31 December 2022 (2021: 54). A further three publication have been issued since the year end. While conference attendance was predominantly of a virtual nature during COVID-19 we are increasingly returning to physical attendance with the associated networking benefits.

Regulatory authorities

We operate in a highly regulated area of business. National governments and regulators (Competent Authorities) implement highly structured product certification regimes to national, supra-national and international standards. Such certifications are necessary by law to manufacture and market devices for research and clinical use.

Notified Bodies are designated by Competent Authorities to perform assessments to agreed standards. ANGLE is subject to those assessments where appropriate to the products manufactured and marketed by the Company.

We employ consultants with high levels of regulatory knowledge, experience and contacts to ensure our working knowledge is comprehensive, up to date and appropriate to our needs. Guidance documents and training are identified to enable us to keep up to date with regulatory developments across different regulatory bodies and different standards domains.

Through engagement, we ensure that we understand the regulatory landscape so that we can identify and comply with all applicable product standards in all relevant territories. We engage with regulatory authorities, through telephone, email and face-to-face meetings, to ensure we obtain their views, understand the regulations and their impact on our work plans and submissions.

During the year, we maintained ISO 13485:2016+A11:2021 accreditation (Europe) and secured FDA De Novo classification and CE marking (IVDD) for the Parsortix PC1 Clinical System for the stated intended use. The scope of quality system certification for the site includes the design, development, manufacture, sale, distribution, installation and service of instruments and test methods, consumables and reagents for cellular and molecular diagnostics. The UK ISO 13485 certification is independently maintained and enables the businesses to pursue a wide range of medical device development and manufacturing activities in line with the Company’s strategic objectives.