- Started in 2002 with the aim of bridging the gap between research in the East and West, CACTUS today is a technology company serving customers from over 190 countries
Cactus Communications (CACTUS) celebrates 20 years of excellence and innovation today. Founded in 2002 with the aim of helping researchers break the language barrier and getting published in international journals, CACTUS is now a multimillion-dollar technology company with 1200 full-time employees, 4500 freelancers, and 800 contractors from over 190 countries. CACTUS has been recognized as one of the best companies to work for by global platforms.
The genesis of CACTUS is now part of company lore. When Abhishek Goel visited Japan as a part of his AIESEC internship, he met a researcher at the University of Tokyo who requested him to copyedit his academic paper and make it suitable for submission to an international English-language journal. This experience got Abhishek thinking about how researchers around the world, with English as a second language, might have a similar need. This led to the idea of starting CACTUS along with his brother Anurag Goel.
Reminiscing about CACTUS’s journey, Abhishek Goel, CEO & Co-founder, said, “We realized early on that researchers who did not speak English as their first language struggled to get published. We wanted to change this and there was no other company at the time trying to address this problem. We built editing and translation services under our brand Editage – which also celebrates 20 years – and soon expanded to publication support, pre-submission checks, research impact creation, and other solutions for authors, publishers, and life science organizations. Today, we have a researcher ecosystem that addresses needs beyond publication and end-to-end solutions for every major stakeholder in academia and life sciences. And we are just getting started.”
Anurag Goel, Co-founder & Executive Chairman, commented on CACTUS’s technology-first strategy: “Today, we are building technology solutions that can revolutionize the way research is being communicated. We are investing in start-ups in academia and life sciences that share our vision of propelling science forward with technology. In these 20 years, we have kept pace with the changing needs of the industry and have weathered global recessions. I’m excited to see what opportunities for innovation the post-pandemic landscape will bring.”
CACTUS has evolved into a global technology company that is catering to every need of the research and publishing industry through media, content, and AI solutions. CACTUS offers specialized author services, research impact acceleration, medical communication support, and technology products for business solutions under the brands Editage, Cactus Life Sciences, Researcher.Life, Impact Science, Paperpal, and Cactus Labs. With experts in over 500+ subject areas, it has helped 250,000+ researchers get published in the last 20 years. Its clientele includes major publishers like Elsevier, Wiley, Taylor & Francis, Sage, Wolters Kluwer, and Springer Nature, and renowned academic societies like Royal Society of Chemistry, British Medical Society, American Psychological Association, and American Management Association.
Commenting on the technological acceleration that CACTUS has seen in the last decade, Nishchay Shah, Chief Technology Officer, said, “We have entered the AI and deep learning space to develop innovative products and build tech solutions for all stakeholders in the research landscape. We are taking the integration of technology into the researcher ecosystem very seriously. CACTUS’s next growth phase will be heavily defined by technology.”
People and culture have always played a pivotal role in CACTUS’s growth. Yashmi Pujara, Chief Human Resources Officer, emphasized the pivotal role people and culture have played in building the organization: “Our mission is to enable people to reach their highest potential and all our policies are created to build an environment conducive to this. In 2021, we became a remote-first company, allowing our global workforce to work from anywhere. This allows us to find the best talent without any geographical barriers. We now see twice the number of recruits from cities where we did not have a presence earlier. We will continue to introduce policies that encourage our employees to take ownership, learn continuously, and enjoy work. We want to continue to foster an employee culture driven by high trust and high performance.”
Over the last 20 years, CACTUS has celebrated excellence through many external recognitions, including Best Customer-centric Culture at the International Customer Experience Awards 2021, Best Brand Experience at the CX Asia Excellence Awards 2021, Consumer Satisfaction Brand Award (CSBA) 2021 for the fourth consecutive year in South Korea, Best Company for Millennials 2019, Best Organization for Women Empowerment/Women Talent Development 2019, and one of India’s Best Workplace in Health and Wellness 2021 by Great Place to Work®(GPTW). Co-founder and CEO, Abhishek Goel, was recognized in the 2020 Asian brand and leader awards by White Page International, and CACTUS bagged two coveted Stevie® Awards in 2020 as the most exemplary employer and as the most valuable corporate response for Covid-19 initiatives.
