Our growth story

In 2001, while on a trip to Japan, Abhishek Goel (he/him) was approached by a researcher from the University of Tokyo. The researcher explained that since English was not his first language, he needed help to make sure the manuscript met the standards of international journals in terms of grammar, syntax, and clarity.

Abhishek realized that researchers around the world who didn't speak English as a first language struggled to get published in international journals. He thought that a team of language and publishing experts could partner with these researchers to help them overcome the barrier of language and reach. This is how the idea for CACTUS was born.

Brothers Abhishek and Anurag understood the need to fill the gap between research in the East and West. In 2002, they co-founded Cactus Communications, with Editage becoming CACTUS's first business brand.

Editage offered high-quality English language editing and gave researchers who didn't speak English as a first language a level playing field.

At a time when the academic publishing process was largely offline, Editage joined the first league of companies to go digital with MS Word's Track Changes feature. This allowed researchers to collaborate with subject-area experts from around the world and they no longer had to rely on local connections. It also meant quick, hassle-free online submissions. An innovative pricing model that allowed standardization as well as scalability eliminated price uncertainty and wait time.

Soon enough, Editage started offering localized support in Japanese, Korean, Chinese, and English.

While working with authors who viewed English as a formidable challenge, we realized they needed to be equipped with information and skills like scientific writing to help them plan their publication journey better.

And thus began CACTUS's training and knowledge-sharing initiatives for authors.

We started the Center for Research Writing Resources (CRWR), later called Knowledge@Editage, to publish e-books and newsletters on improving research writing skills. We also started i-osmosis, later renamed Cactus Education, that offered scientific essay writing courses led by instructors.

Today, all these initiatives are offered under Editage Insights (launched in 2013), a growing online community committed to help authors master academic publishing.

In just five years since its inception, Editage's customer base grew to over 7,800 researchers worldwide, with most of them located in Japan.

To meet the needs of this primary market, CACTUS launched its first subsidiary in Tokyo.

CACTUS had entered the corporate market for the first time. It offered translation services to Japanese universities and companies in Japan.

Technology and innovation brought about changes in the publishing space and led to a significant growth in research volume as well as the pressure to publish and internationalize for better funding and growth. With these changes, the need was felt for a shift from mere English polishing to more technical and consultative support throughout the publication process.

To cater to this evolving need, Editage introduced the Premium Editing Service that offered structure-focused input with multiple rounds of editing; Publication Support Services that offered publication strategy, pre-submission peer-review, etc., to improve the chances of publication; and Academic Translation Service for researchers who are either not proficient or too busy to write in English.

Editage also conducted its author-focused workshop in Japan, the first of many such workshops to come.

After Editage became an established global brand in Academia, CACTUS ventured into the Life Sciences industry where specialized communication solutions were the need of the hour.

CACTUS launched its US subsidiary in Philadelphia, and later expanded in Princeton, New Jersey.

Through this vertical, CACTUS was able to provide specialized solutions in medical communications to pharmaceutical and medical device companies and doctors.

Growing competition and hyper-specialization in academic publishing meant a demand for high-quality content with technical specialization and formatting.

To meet this need, CACTUS introduced Centers of Excellence, subject-specialized editorial teams led by a Managing Editor, to ensure the quality of edited papers.

To attract the best talent pool from around the world, CACTUS moved to a freelancer model and focused on hiring individuals who spoke English as their first language with strong scholarly backgrounds and subject-matter expertise.

To provide faster service and cater to our customers' niche requirements, CACTUS invested in a homegrown platform that created a seamless workflow system and allowed us to identify the most suitable specialist editors and writers for clients. This platform kept evolving to meet the changing, complex needs of operations. Today, it processes around 1000 assignments on a daily basis and automates invoicing for a global workforce of over 3000.

As CACTUS grew, we began providing support to meet the market-specific needs of our customers. With a special focus on East Asia, we set up offices in Seoul in 2011, Shanghai in 2012, and Beijing in 2018 to provide a wide range of services customized for each market.

Soon after completing 10 years, we realized that we wanted to give back to the research community that helped us grow. We launched ScienceTalks, a science media and community platform for empowering the sciences in Japan.

In 2013, the ScienceTalks committee of researchers and science stakeholders was formed and the first ScienceTalks Symposium was held. In 2015, young researchers were invited to discuss science research, policy proposals, and impact with the Japanese government for its 5th Science and Technology Basic Plan.

Since then, ScienceTalks has held more than 10 talk events, symposia, and open forums.

In 2019, ScienceTalks was launched in China in partnership with ScienceNet, one of China's most influential academic news and blogging platforms.

With the aim of empowering authors to take control of their content and create high-quality papers, CACTUS launched Editage Insights, a content and training platform for academic authors.

The platform is now available in four languages (English, Japanese, Chinese, and Korean) and provides useful learning content for authors, peer reviewers, and anyone who wants to stay abreast with the research publication landscape.

Editage Insights also conducts author-dedicated workshops and online seminars across countries, and runs subscription-based online courses for researchers.

Editage continues to be CACTUS's flagship brand and strives to provide better services to its customers across the whole research publication process. In 2016, its translation services got a facelift. Multiple levels were introduced to meet the more complex needs of the translation industry, including a collaborative service where authors could approve the translation before it moved to the editing stage.

CACTUS has fostered an atmosphere that encourages talented professionals to be passionate about their work. In 2017, CACTUS ranked 1st among India's Great Mid-Size Workplaces in a study conducted by Great Place to Work Institute in association with Mint by HT Media.

2017 was also the year we made some big leaps. We opened offices in London and Singapore. By mid-2020, we had offices in 10 cities across the world: London, Princeton, Singapore, Beijing, Shanghai, Taipei (partner office), Tokyo, Seoul, Aarhus and Mumbai.

While serving universities and institutes, which form a key segment of our corporate customer base, we realized that the cross-learning opportunities among universities, both within the country and outside, are limited.

This led to the launch of Blank:a, our first-ever magazine, which aimed to disseminate best practices among universities and institutes in the areas of management and administration.

Blank:a's online version was launched in English, Japanese, Chinese, and Korean in 2019. Today, Blank:a is known as ScienceTalks Magazine.

Subject-matter expertise is most critical when catering to entities dealing in highly scientific research. CACTUS launched the Scientific Editing Service under the Editage brand to offer researchers a high-value editing service that went beyond language.

Under the service, authors received substantial editing of the content for language and structure, a technical review by someone well versed with the peer review process and journal requirements, and a detailed report-cum-checklist to inform authors of the publication readiness of their papers.

In today's world of information overload, it is a challenge to get noticed, let alone make an impact. We believe that every discovery and innovation is a story waiting to be told. CACTUS launched its research communication services to help researchers, universities, institutes, and other entities engaged in research distil and present their breakthroughs and disseminate it across global platforms. Relaunched as Impact Science in 2019, this strategy and communication brand of CACTUS helps research reach its widest audience.

CACTUS realized that technology will play a pivotal role in the speed of research and development, and incubated Cactus Tech, a dynamic technology team dedicated to innovating in the AI and machine learning field. Cactus Tech also applied AI to enhance Editage's workflow management system to automate the selection of the best editor for the customer's manuscripts and elevating the quality of the submission and research outcomes.

In 2019, CACTUS launched PubSURE, the first-of-its-kind AI-driven platform that brings together researchers and journals across multiple disciplines. PubSURE is both a marketplace (PubSURE Connect) and an automated manuscript assessment check (PubSURE Report).

CACTUS today has around 2000 freelance and contractual editors, translators, copyeditors, alt-text writers, scientific reviewers, and other experts across 70 different countries. In 2018, CACTUS ranked first in a FlexJobs list of the top 25 companies to work for in the world. CACTUS was also placed in the top 20 of the Top 100 Companies to Watch for Remote Jobs in 2018. In 2019, CACTUS emerged as one of the top 10 safe places to work for women and among the Best Companies for Millennials.

With AI becoming a gamechanger in business growth stories, we realized we had to invest in our technological capabilities to stay relevant and continue to provide value to our customers. In January 2020, we announced the close of our first acquisition, an AI startup based in Denmark called UNSILO.

After raising the bar in science communication for 18 years, we turned our focus to technology. We reinvented our identity as a technology company and scaled up our technology offerings.

Researcher.Life, a researcher ecosystem powered by AI, helps researchers read the latest articles, find the right journals, improve their manuscripts, and learn new skills with solutions. Paperpal uses machine learning to help both journals and authors carry out technical and language checks, thus making the manuscript submission process faster and smoother.

The Covid-19 pandemic forced us to rethink how we work, communicate, and collaborate with one another. Work-from-home became the norm. A few months into the pandemic, we initiated groundwork on becoming a remote-first organization.

In December 2021, we announced that any Cactizen can work from any place that makes them happy and more productive. Our efforts to support remote work were recognized by the Tokyo Metropolitan Government that certified us as a Telework Master Company.