Business Resilience
Business resilience remained a key focus during 2023, as businesses globally were impacted by macroeconomic and geopolitical challenges across all markets. In 2023, we continued the development of our new state-of-the-art distribution centre in Ireland. The team on this project has shown enormous commitment and skill in managing what is a very complex and demanding project. The resilience and dedication of our teams coupled with clear strategic objectives and agility to adapt traditional business models mean Uniphar is well positioned to continue to deliver for all of our stakeholders. The Group continues to implement its digital transformation strategy, which includes back-office systems to support our expansion and growth plans, as well as new ways to engage our customers with innovative digital solutions. With cybersecurity evolving we are continuing to enhance our awareness and improvement programme, deploying best-in-class security controls to reduce risk and improve resilience. The programme is enhancing the detection of cyber threats, as well as improving our ability to respond to attacks and recover from incidents.
Innovation
Uniphar prides itself on its innovative and entrepreneurial culture. This is evident in all areas of the business, from implementing improvements in existing systems, to identifying new market opportunities, evaluating acquisition targets, and enhancing our digital capabilities. In Supply Chain & Retail, our multi-year investment in Greenogue 2 will deliver a flagship European site that will transform how the division operates, including a step-change in automation, order line handling, operational efficiency and digital capability. We expect that this will further differentiate our customer offering and will help drive further market share growth. In Uniphar MedTech, we are working with our partners to bring innovative minimally invasive surgery techniques (MIS), supported with robotic technology, to market. Examples of areas where we are enabling MIS include laparoscopy, orthopaedics and vascular surgery. Uniphar Pharma continues to support manufacturers to bring new therapies to patients using the latest science in areas such as gene therapy.

Supply Chain Management

As set out above, a large proportion of our carbon footprint derives from our purchased goods and services. In 2023, we published our Supplier Code of Conduct which reinforces our expectations of our suppliers and their responsibilities to us.  As part of our commitment to setting a science-based target, we have committed to a supplier engagement target that 71% of our suppliers by emissions covering purchased goods and services, will have science-based targets by 2027. In order to achieve this target, we need to actively engage with our suppliers to improve data collection in our supply chain and to work together to not only set targets, but to find innovative solutions to how we can collectively reduce the impact of our supply chain on the environment. In 2023, Uniphar launched its Supplier Code of Conduct and Responsible Sourcing programme, which will embed our sustainability mission into the greater supply chain and broader business.