Earlier this month Ranil Jayawardena, MP for North East Hampshire, visited STI’s facility in Hook to meet the staff who have been working around the clock assembling Penlon ventilators.
Following his visit Ranil said “All the committed local staff at STI are doing great work and at a phenomenal pace. They have played a key part in our fight against coronavirus and I was delighted to visit them at their brilliant operation in Hook. This is just one example of the fantastic help and support I’ve been pleased to see our amazing community providing to others through this crisis – and I understand STI were offered equipment and storage by neighbouring businesses, so thank you to all involved.”
STI has been playing a key role in the group of significant UK industrial, technology and engineering businesses from across the aerospace, automotive and medical sectors, that have come together to produce medical ventilators for the NHS.
The consortium’s strategy has been to ramp up output of two existing devices made by Penlon and Smiths Medical. Ordinarily, Penlon and Smiths Medical have a combined capacity to produce between 50 and 60 ventilators per week – however, thanks to the scale and resources of the wider consortium production of the devices has been considerably increased. STI has been involved with the production of both types of ventilators.
STI is a leading advanced technology electronics manufacturer, specialising in safety critical products for high reliability industries. In addition to the ventilator project STI is also working on several other medical projects related to the COVID-19 pandemic.
Simon Best, STI Managing Director, said: “We are delighted to be part of the Ventilator Challenge UK consortium. By stepping up to meet the manufacturing challenge of building ventilators in the volumes required to support our heroic front-line NHS teams, we are helping to treat the most severe ITU cases affected by the coronavirus.”
