Hera Hub is excited to share Startup Stories of our members. We periodically interview incredible business women from a variety of backgrounds and disciplines. Our goal is to share our members’ wonderful stories with the public.
Kim Lim is the Founder of Ultimate Labs. Ultimate Labs offers laboratory support services to many different industries. Ultimate Labs provides quality control testing to ensure that companies are putting safe products out onto the market.
Ultimate Labs is a San Diego-based analytical testing laboratory providing environmental monitoring and microbial, water, and food testing to the pharmaceutical, biotechnology, medical device, and food industries.
They assist companies in compliance understanding and risk assessment for better business decisions about product safety. Their unique approach creates tailored, problem-solving solutions to help companies stay compliant or get back in compliance.
With over 25 years of experience, they have the knowledge to apply microbiology to industries that impact consumer health. They have created process solutions that ensure sample custody, efficient sample testing, and professional and personal communication. Work with them and encounter a complete client experience dedicated to your success.
Kim has been a member of Hera Hub Sorrento Valley for four years!
What was the inspiration behind your business?
I’ve always wanted to help people. I was about to become an M.D. and had planned to medical school, but I really liked engineering. I liked fixing things and fixing problems, so that’ why I became an engineer. Still, I really wanted to help people. That is why our company motto is “Helping you save lives”.
Everything that we do touches a life, and it’s really important.
Who are your clients and what do you do for them?
Most of our clients are in the biotech industry, but we also do work for aerospace, food, water municipals industries. We do all of their quality control testings. For drugs on the market, we go through CP studies to make sure they are safe for people to use.
We also help companies in their Research and Development phase to make sure their product is actually feasible to go to market. We help the regulatory process altogether.
What are your business’ values? How do they align with your personal values?
I am all about family. I have two sons, and I want them to grow up to be healthy, intelligent men. My business helps others grow in their careers and be healthy and intelligent individuals.
My business fosters an environment where they are learning all the time and being able to problem solve–a big area that is needed right now. That is along the lines of the philosophy of Ultimate Labs: to learn, problem solve and create solutions.
How/Why did you choose your business name?
The name was pretty straightforward and I felt it represented exactly what we were doing.
What do you love most about your work?
I love the clients, the people and learning about the different products that people create. We are able to see brand-new medical devices before they even go on the market or new cancer drug therapies.
We can give municipals the go-ahead to turn the drinking water back on.
I love knowing that the things we do touch real people.
What is the biggest challenge in running your own business?
I would say the biggest challenge I face everyday is myself. I think that I always want to do more and be more. Being able to tone down the pressure I put on myself is a challenge I face. The expectations I have for myself are very different than the ones I have for other people–people that I employ on the staff or even at home for my kids. I want to encourage people, but not put heavy expectations on people.
What are your/your business’ goals for the future?
Our goal is to help more people. We hope to expand, adding even more tests to the tests that we do. We already cross several industries, but being able to cross even more industries.
Challenging industry standards; there are better, faster ways to do things now. And of course, having multiple locations.
What advice would you give to a new entrepreneur?
Be brave. Do it and don’t look back. Trying is better than not trying. All your failures and mistakes are learning lessons. Nothing is wasted time; the only wasted time is time deliberating about the decision whether to move forward or not.
