Beyond the products: The evolution of AB Vista’s Lab Service

To address the challenges of the global animal feed industry – such as escalating feed costs and tightening environmental regulations – producers need more than just off-the-shelf products. Instead, complete solutions and strategies tailored to a customers’ specific needs are required.

This includes a suite of services designed to optimise the production of quality feed and assist with feed quality assurance. A key example of this is our Lab Service – established in 1999, it officially came under AB Vista’s helm in 2011. Since then, it has expanded to meet increased global demand for enzyme analysis – reaching its 100,000th sample back in 2016. Using ELISA technology and wet chemistry, it measures enzyme activity in premix, feed and product samples – ensuring optimised diet formulations and allowing for consistent quality control.

In celebration of AB Vista’s 20th anniversary, we sat down with key members of our Lab Service team. Here, they look back on the evolution of the service, the importance of research and quality management, and what its future could look like.

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What are the overarching capabilities within the Lab Service and how it has grown over the years? What role has customer demand played in this?

Noel Sheehan, Head of NIR & Laboratory Services: “There is a need for regular and accurate analysis of manufactured feed to confirm enzyme presence and levels; ensuring this is an important part of quality control and procedures. Historically, companies needed lab services to analyse enzyme activity – and in the present day, this is still a crucial requirement.

“The Lab Service team was initially just eight people at the site in Wales; the opening of our lab in the US in late 2013 was a significant milestone. In recent years, the overall lab team has grown to approximately 30 people across both sites – another milestone being the incorporation of the regulatory work of the lab in Rajamäki, Finland, and the NIR work in Towcester.

“Customer demand has undoubtedly driven this; as AB Vista has grown, the analysis requests have grown. AB Vista’s drive to do more and to advance the industry has also played a part in this.”

Why is quality management so important in the Lab Service, and how do you ensure the accuracy and reliability of test results?

Claire Williams, Quality Manager and H&S Lead: “Quality management ensures accuracy, reliability and timely test results. We’ve implemented the ISO 9001 Quality Management Systems, which helps maintain high standards across all our processes.

“This includes regular calibration and maintenance of equipment to ensure confidence in the results; interlaboratory studies with multiple laboratories where we can evaluate relative performances of the laboratories, the method and the material being tested; using control samples to monitor that the method is running correctly, and training to ensure that the employees running the methods are competent in those methods that produce the test results.”

How does the Lab Service add value to customers?

Noel: “It’s an important part of AB Vista’s value proposition. AB Vista doesn’t just sell products – it also wishes to partner with our customers and provide them with ‘feed intelligence’. The Lab Services, along with the other services on offer, support our ‘feed intelligence’ ethos.”

The industry has seen significant change. How has AB Vista evolved to meet this, and what innovations has it introduced to the market within the realm of Lab Services?

Noel: “AB Vista has evolved to become a more diverse business, and our services also evolve to support these new products. Lab Services did much of the groundwork and continues to do regular updates for our phytate-calibration. We were the first to use ELISA analysis to analyse phytase and xylanase in-feed.”

What do you hope AB Vista will achieve in the next 20 years, and what are you most excited for?

Noel: “I hope AB Vista will continue to operate the way it always has; its products and services are well set-up for the challenges that the feed industry has been facing, and will continue to face in the next 20 years.”

Richard Jones, Research Manager: “When it comes to industry developments, I’m excited for alternative proteins to take off and possibly replace soya bean meal. Additionally, I’m looking forward to the industry having a greater understanding of gut health, as well as further developments in analysis leading to a much-reduced need for antibiotics.”

What have been some of the most rewarding moments at AB Vista, and what contribution are you most proud of?

Noel: “I’m very proud of the overall growth of the Lab Services – expanding from eight people to 30 was something I never even thought of back in 2011.

“The contribution I’m most proud of was keeping the Lab Services going through COVID lockdowns. Both labs had to split into separate teams; in the UK we only remerged into one single team after 51 weeks of lockdowns. I am proud, personally and on behalf of the entire lab team, of having kept the services going throughout that time for our customers and for the industry.”

Claire: “My most rewarding moment would be taking the UK & US Labs through the process to gain ISO 9001 Quality Management Certification which we first obtained in 2020, and maintaining this certification each year.

“The contribution I’m proudest of would be working towards ISO 17025 Laboratory Accreditation at both the UK and US Lab – it focuses on the quality of the lab work, which in turn supports accurate and reliable results from the laboratory testing that we carry out.”

Richard: “One of the biggest contributions was setting up the US laboratory – this involved not only the purchasing of laboratory equipment and furniture, but also the hiring of new staff to run the laboratory. Following on from what Noel said, we started with two laboratories in 2011 (with the office being part of the lab) and now we have five laboratories, an office and the US Lab.