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Ayrshire Business Women (ABW) is the leading business, entrepreneurial and professional women’s group in Ayrshire and are one of Scotland’s most successful networking groups for business and professional women. The ABW offer networking and training opportunities; relevant motivational speakers and a chance to share experiences and challenges with other women. Reciprocal trading between members is also encouraged.

Our strapline is “We know a woman who can”.

We have over 120 members including individual and corporate members which is growing all the time. Being in business can be a lonely journey and at ABW we are here to  support and encourage our members through the many challenges that being a women in business brings.  

Aberdeen Exhibition and Conference Centre (AECC) is home to the BHGE Arena, established in 1985 and sits as the North of Scotland’s largest conference, arena and exhibition centre. Our range of events varies, from large exhibitions and conferences, live entertainment, small to large meetings and banqueting events. The current venue is a multi-purpose space capable of hosting conferences of up to 2000, banqueting events up to 1,400, an arena capacity of up to 8,500 all standing.

In 2019 the new purpose built, state-of-the-art venue will open its doors. The new venue will be more accessible offering larger spaces for events including an arena capable of a 12,500 capacity. The site will include a 200 bed, 4-star Hampton by Hilton Hotel connecting direct to the venue on the ground and concourse level and further to this will be another two hotels providing an additional 300 bedrooms on-site.

Stuart Mills, CEO, STAR-Dundee said:

“I’m delighted to win, we didn’t expect to. We won an award at the first ever Courier Awards so we thought our turn had come, but we put ourselves in again anyway. It’s a great award to tell people about. Fantastic things are happening in Dundee so to be a part of that is wonderful. We recently became an employee owned company so this is a great reflection of all the hard work that they do. When we won four years ago it was great so it do it again is brilliant.”

Scott Cunningham,  MyWay Digital Health:

“We are an online self-management platform for people with diabetes and we’re currently  trialling this concept beyond Scotland, which we’ve been working very intensively on. It is absolutely fantastic to get such an honour for our team. It will help us advertise the services we offer.”

Derek Petterson, CEO, McLeod Glaziers:

“We are delighted to win, absolutely. It’s  a fantastic achievement. We’ve been in business since 1836, which is amazing. It is my 20^th year with the company, and although myself and my nephew own the business, it’s the team that have helped win this award. I want to thank them for all their hard work – they really are a dream team.”

Chris van der Kuyl, Chairman of 4J Studios:
“I am overwhelmed. I nearly ended up not coming so I’m glad that I did. I have incredibly support from my family and the team behind me so I hope it is an indication for all the of them. This is my home town so I am glad to to be awarded this here. When I left for university in Edinburgh 30 years ago when I was 18 I wasn’t sure if I’d come back but I did and there is so much technology going on. I had no idea this was going to happen. There’s been many years of work gone into transforming this city and we’re finally seeing it come through. It’s been wonderful watching the change in the city over the years. There’s so much going on in Dundee now and I could not be more excited for next year.”

Stephen Edmiston, Director of Operations, Ingenico:

“I’m  absolutely overwhelmed that we have won this award. When I first found out we had won I was lost for words. It is a tribute to the staff who have put so much dedication and innovation into making customers’ lives easier, through the solutions they provide. We are very proud of them all, and they absolutely deserve the recognition for all their hard work. What we do is provide seamless payment solutions, reducing the risk for customers in the payment industry. We have a large market share, and over the past year we have been working to retain that. We are all about innovation in technology, but at the same time we’re very customer focused – out customers shape the way we do business. Winning this award will be great for business, it’s a recognition not only of our staff, but our customers who have stuck with us and helped us develop our products. The awards ceremony itself was impressive. It’s the first time we’ve been to it and we were so impressed with the organisation and the atmosphere. We were very proud to have been invited and to have been part of it all.”

Homelands Trust – Fife:

“We opened in September 2014, and it was a very hard start, so to have got back on track and to have got this award is fantastic. We’re now looking forward to the future and planning to expand. All the hard work of the trustees and staff has really paid off.”

Jackie Brierton, Enterprising Eastern Perthshire (GrowBiz) said:

“I’m absolutely delighted that we won. This is a win for the businesses that support as well as our own. We’ve got a fantastic team who give more of their time than they need as well as voluntary business mentors that give their time for free so it’s wonderful for them. It’ll be on display on our shelf as it’s quite a prestigious award. It’s good that a rural business won as sometimes the smaller businesses don’t get as much attention.”