Architecture
Development of a Natural Hydration Powder
Our client developed a new hydration powder which was the first of its kind in several areas. The client had to undergo a rigorous testing process in order to get approved and, due to the unique make up of the product, to be approved by users across the UK.
Within the hydration powder, our client was the first in the market to combine natural flavours and Himalayan rock salt into a hydration pack. The basis behind this is that salt will help pull water into fatiguing muscles allowing the muscle to exert over a longer period of time than it would otherwise be able to. This gives endurance athletes a distinct advantage when in long periods of physical exertion.
Further, they were able to substantially reduce the number of ingredients necessary to produce the powder (7 in comparison to their closest competitions 9).
They were also able to increase both the levels of sodium and magnesium in their product by over 50% in comparison to the market standards.
As this was a clear advancement within the sector, Wilby Jones were able to successfully show HMRC the baseline and advancements within the sector. This has led to a substantial refund which in turn has helped the company grow and expand their range further.
Ben Thompson
Ben is one of our senior sector specialists leading the Engineering team. He conducts the technical interviews with product developers, software developers and manufacturing clients to ensure the details of their work is understood and all areas that have potential to claim a tax credit through the R&D scheme are identified. During his career at Wilby Jones, Ben has been involved in over 250 R&D claims and helped businesses claim across a range of industries. Over the course of the last year, his engineering team claimed over £6 million for our clients and aim to always deliver high quality tax advice. Before starting work at Wilby Jones, Ben gained a first-class honours degree from the University of Lincoln, with his dissertation focusing on computational traffic flow analysis. Having joined our graduate scheme in 2020, he is now an ATT qualified tax advisor and aims to complete the ATT/CTA pathway to become a full chartered tax advisor within the next year. He enjoys the variety of the work undertaken by each of his clients, and learning about new concepts directly from the professionals researching them and innovating within their industry every day. Whether talking to aerospace professionals or nuclear engineers, there is always something new to learn and it is exciting to see the trends across all industries appear during conversations with clients. A keen guitarist, Ben teaches in the Norfolk area and has played for the last 18 years – Look out for him playing in several local bands around the city.