Centronic wins Covid-19 innovation funding

Date: 22 May 2020
Centronic wins Covid-19 innovation funding

We are very excited to announce that Centronic has been awarded an R&D grant from Innovate UK, the UK’s Innovation Agency under their Fast Start Competition.

Fast Start was specially created to fast-track the development of innovations borne out of the coronavirus crisis. It is highly competitive, having received over 8600 applications and Centronic is proud to have been one of only around 800 companies announced yesterday (https://www.gov.uk/government/news/40m-boost-for-cutting-edge-start-ups) to have been awarded this funding nationally.

Our innovation project is to develop a new sensor for deep ultraviolet light (“UV-C”) as we anticipate this to become much more widely used as a non-contact method of sanitising surfaces and air volumes to enable the country to emerge safely from lockdown. It is not possible to detect the virus itself in real time so our detector will provide reassurance that a safe “kill” dose has been administered every time.

As we celebrate our 75th anniversary this year, we are excited and exhilarated to be embarking on this new product development alongside a cohort of much younger firms and start-ups. We are fortunate to have a team of experienced engineers who have research backgrounds in designing this type of device and a UK factory where our staff are eager to start making the detectors.

As part of the project we plan to engage with equipment designers and manufacturers who will be able to make new products based on this device.