IoT-Ready Sanitisation
The sanitisation process has come a long way, with IoT-enabled machines doing the work more efficiently in much less time. Ronak Shah, Co-Founder & CTO, Atron has developed such IoT-enabled machines. In an exclusive interaction with PC Quest, he shares some details. Excerpts follow
Can you explain this deep sanitisation technology in a little detail?
Pharma manufacturers produce multiple types of drugs in their facility – this creates a need for batchwise production, which results in changing from one drug to another within the production unit quite frequently. Whenever such changeovers take place, the production areas and equipment need to be sanitised to prevent cross- contamination between different types of drugs.
Conventional sanitisation machinery for this use- case achieves the desired result in between 8-12 hours and consumes 3000L of water and 20L of isopropyl alcohol per session. Our technology achieves the same result in just 4 hours, using only 1L of water and no iso-propyl alcohol whatsoever. Our technology, distributed in form of patent-pending machinery called “DSX” and “DSY” achieves this result by leveraging water atomization, molecular pressurization and IOT capabilities.
The DSX is our 1st and most popular machine; in the pharma-production scenario, it sanitises production areas and the DSY is a heavier- duty version of DSX, which directly tackles pharmaceutical production machinery. Typically provided to pharmaceutical manufacturers as a combined “set,” the DSX and DSY work beautifully in conjunction to achieve the necessary result. Pharma factories generally purchase one set of our machines for every one production area of theirs. The DSX and DSY are engineered to reach every nook and cranny of the necessary application areas, whilst being operator-safe, and resource- efficient.
Thus, switching from conventional processes to our technology makes drug changeovers 60% faster and 40% cheaper for pharmaceutical manufacturers.
Can you give a comparison with some other similar machines? Are there other imported machines that compare with this?
There are imported machines that function on the same fundamental engineering principles as our machines. However, the delivered outputs, operating mechanisms, aesthetics, safety protocols, and valueadded features are different.
This is because while most manufacturers have attempted to use the engineering to derive generic utility for product (to be able to target larger market), we have focused on solving the pain-point we’ve identi
fied in the pharmaceutical space to the best of our ability. The other core differentiator of our technology is that it has utility for multiple other industries in addition to pharmaceuticals – these include hospitality, aviation and oil and gas.
We’ve designed our machines to be able to competently and rapidly address deep- cleaning and sanitisation-related pain-points across the aforementioned sectors. For example, a typical hotel has multiple categories of machines in its inventory for cleaning and maintenance of the various surfaces e.g. floor disc scrubbers, wet vacuums, UV emitting diodes, amongst others.
Our machines cater to the applications of all the aforementioned appliances, thus being universal in application. As a result, investment in our machines shall reduce the inventory load on institutions – where a hotel would typically have 7 cleaning machines in inventory, it can thereafter switch to having just our DSX unit, and derive utility of all the 7 machines.
The chart below outlines some feature comparisons of our DS-series machines against indirect competitors:
The one advantage our competitors have which we lack at this stage the presence of an after-sale support network. We’re presently doing an equity-based fund-raise from which we will use a proportion of proceeds to establish the infrastructure necessary to provide prompt after-sale service pan-India.
How does this technology function in different sectors that you’ve mentioned above in addition to pharma?
In addition to delivering FDA- compliant sanitization to pharmaceutical manufacturers, our technology is useful for the hospitality, aviation and oil and gas sectors. For the hospitality industry, our machines are used for deep- cleaning kitchens and guest rooms at 5 and 7 star hotels. This keeps food production areas safe, while reducing housekeeping costs and efforts at guest rooms and making them allergy and odour-free by scientifically eliminating all bacteria, viruses, fungi, moulds and other pathogens.
Does the handling of this machine require special training?
Yes, we typically train machine operators for two 4-hour sessions, after which they become competent enough to handle the machine and operate it at full efficacy.
What kind of R&D is involved in its making?
R&D involved in the making of our technology began with an in- depth study on patents granted for apparatus involved in making deep cleaning and sanitisation appliances. Leveraging the latest developments in even the tiniest of components like nozzles results in a significant leap in the efficacy of the final product. Starting with the smaller components, such research evolved to the larger parts which made up the machine, and then finally the external body, which is designed to look like a machine straight out of the Transformers movie series. We began by just hacking components from and modifying existing housekeeping machines for ease of production and till date, this is the system we mostly rely on.
In addition to research on hardware apparatus, we also did primary research via interviews with doctors, chemical engineering and lab operators to identify the pros and cons of the various surface and air-borne pathogen-testing techniques. This led to the commencement of development of sensors that are an integral part of the IOT- capabilities that the upcoming iteration of our machines boasts of.