The judges praised the company’s innovation, as well as its continued growth after its premises were destroyed by a series of explosions at the Buncefield Oil Storage Depot in Hemel Hempstead in 2005.

Philippa Oldham, head of manufacturing at the Institution of Mechanical Engineers, and one of the judges for the awards, praised FFEI's reaction to the disaster.

"Within a matter of days the company was able to fulfil existing and new orders," she said.

Oldham also mentioned the company’s "excellent factory layout" and its continued financial improvement.

In 2008 FFEI invested £1.2m in new premises. In the same year its management team bought the company from Fujifilm.

As a result of the MBO, FFEI developed its inkjet technology for new applications in the packaging and labels sector as well as systems for scanning biological matter such as human tissue.

Andy Cook, FFEI’s managing director, said the award had been a great boost for the company’s 140 staff and had given it more credibility when approaching new clients.

"We’re currently in the middle of negotiating a deal with an international company. They were visiting last week and we were able to show them the award," he said.  

Cook said FFEI had to go through a number of rounds in the judging stage of the competition.

"We had to put in a detailed application with information on the business, our manufacturing and how we’ve improved. Then we were visited by three auditors and we gave them a tour of the company and presentations on what we do," he said.

In the final round FFEI came to London, where it made a presentation to a Dragon’s Den-style panel of experts.

"We gave a 45 minute multimedia presentation then we were grilled for 15 minutes by the panel. We had no idea we had won until it was announced at the awards ceremony – it was fantastic," said Cook.