Six Sussex companies have been recognised with Queen's Awards for Enterprise.

Five firms in West Sussex and one in East Sussex have won the prestigious awards in the Queen's golden jubilee year.

Burgess Hill-based SEOS Displays, which is a world leader in the field of visual display for flight and vehicle training simulators, picked up its fourth Queen's Award this year.

Previous achievements were in 1995 for export and 1998 for export and technology. Its latest trophy is again for export. SEOS employs 128 people and manufactures visual display systems to show outside scenes in aircraft and other simulators.

It was founded in 1984 in the garage of co-founder Owen Wynn's Sussex home. Its main market last year was North America, followed by Europe. Export marketing for North America is handled through its office in Florida where Mr Wynn is now based.

Another West Sussex export winner involved in the aviation industry was AJ Walter Aviation of Partridge Green. The firm was founded in 1932 and now employs 90 people. It supplies, maintains and repairs aircraft spares with an inventory of 310,000 parts for all aircraft types.

In three years, it has increased its overseas earnings by 66 per cent to more than £24 million, raised the proportion of its exports to 74 per cent of total sales, and more than doubled the number of employees. It has sold to markets worldwide, operating through a network of supply and repair centres.

An export award has also been won by services specialist Scientific Update of Mayfield. The firm was started in 1989 and provides conference, training and consultancy services for the pharmaceutical, agrochemical and speciality chemical industries.

Scientific Update operates from a small business unit in Mayfield and arranges events in 25 international venues on a wide range of scientific subjects with delegates from 36 countries.

It keeps ahead of the competition by ensuring its conferences are better organised, exceptional in their scientific content and give better value by including exhibitions. The company's overseas earnings have more than doubled during the past three years.

An award for innovation was won by Architectural Plants of Nuthurst, near Horsham. It achieved the award for pioneering new techniques in growing and marketing a previously unavailable range of garden plants, which have a great emphasis on their strong shapes, textures and year-round contribution to the garden.

The Crawley-based vacuum and exhaust management division of industrial gases company BOC has been named as an innovation award winner for developing a vacuum pump used in the semi-conductor industry.

Another Crawley firm, Elekta Oncology Systems, has won an innovation award for its development of the Precise Table, designed for patients being treated with radiotherapy.

The table plays a key role in delivering precise doses using digital controls allowing greater accuracy.

Announcing the awards, Trade Minister Alan Johnson said: "These prestigious awards demonstrate the talent that exists among the UK's business community. I know winning one gives employers and employees a tremendous boost and a sense of pride that all their hard work has been rewarded."