Rob Adams joined Thomson Scientific in 1986 as a Technical Editor responsible for creating the abstracted content for the Derwent World Patents Index (DWPI). He has since held various customer facing positions in the company. He was a patent searcher in the customised services department, before moving to the product group as a product manager, and then head of product development group. After this he had responsibility for managing and developing the Sales and Marketing teams in Europe, the US and Asia, again focusing on the engineering sector. In 2003 he turned full circle to become the Senior Director for the engineering editorial team, again focusing efforts on the production and ongoing development of DWPI.