Commercial director Mark Wheeler discusses how the Guardtech Group’s off-site, plug-and-play solution came into being.
Guardtech
So, Mark, tell us how Cleancube Mobile Cleanrooms came about…
The concept was born when a number of international inquiries came in for our services and after consulting our Installation Team, none of them really had a desire to travel further afield for long periods of time. So, we tried to come up with a clever way that we could get our UK solution overseas. This is intellectual property that – back then – we'd built up over 20 years. We wanted to share that with clients further afield – to spread our solutions to a wider audience.
The first Cleancube was manufactured for Schlumberger – an Oil & Gas application. They were looking for a cleanroom for some testing over in Fort William, Nigeria, and we developed a really nifty 40-foot shipping container with rapid roll doors and a low headroom crane. We did that in a very, very quick timescale, pulling together the design and build in just a matter of weeks. The client was delighted with the solution, but we had no idea what was just around the corner – as that’s when the COVID pandemic kicked in.
Our main business went very quiet because a lot of construction sites across the UK were shut down. But we were suddenly getting floods of enquiries for PCR labs and testing facilities – everything from major airports to television studios, all across the UK. So our most experience operatives worked to define a BSL 2+ standard for the shipping container solution we’d just produced for the Oil & Gas industry, and we developed a system whereby we could create could create these rapid labs in about 10-15 working days. At times, we could do that with three or four labs running side by side. It was a period of time where we had a lot of our resource available and a huge amount of desire to help support the national response to tackle the pandemic, trying to get people back out to work and get the world mobile again.
Even during the pandemic, it went from developing single 40ft units to double units to what we now call a Maxi 10 ‘mega lab’ for Heathrow Airport. As a result of that whirlwind of activity, we had the platform to develop Cleancube as a concept and take on more challenging applications in the future.”
When did you realise you might have something special on your hands – an innovation beyond its original purpose?
I think the first realisation that we had something special on our hands, and something that could develop far beyond its original purpose, was actually quite early on in the journey. And that came from demand – we were just drawing in so much interest in the concept. The product was something a little bit out of the ordinary and Cleancube has always been able to grab people’s attention and get them thinking creatively about their own space.
What we’ve seen over the past four or five years is a real appetite for off-site construction, particularly as on-site construction becomes harder and harder to manage. A big plus was that clients were starting to see how quickly we could turn these units around, but also, crucially, that when you put these units together, as soon as you step inside, you had absolutely no idea that you were inside a shipping container.
Seeing the transformation of someone's space, installed literally over the course of a weekend, was when I realised that we had something pretty special. Although there are other companies out there that can put together off-site constructed modules, the fact that we use shipping containers as our medium allows us the flexibility to utilise existing transport networks. That, in turn, gives us a much easier solution logistically compared to our competitors in this very niche space.
What are the fundamental reasons that make this multi award-winning solution so special?
Flexibility, scalability and movability – they’re the three core tenets of the solution, and then obviously the fact it’s all off-site construction. But there’s also the minimisation of contamination risk as well as health & safety management.
When it comes to flexibility, there really isn't anything now that we can't do with these modules. In Cleancube’s infancy, there were some restrictions on how far our imagination could stretch. But we've designed a lot of those out. So now there really isn't much that we can't accommodate. You can scale them up, you can scale them down. You can stack them, construct epic multi-level facilities. You can move them to different locations. You can reconfigure them there. And one thing that is particularly special, that really drives me with Cleancube, is the approach to sustainability – this is a green solution.
If you look at many existing traditional facilities, they suffer from the fact you have to strip out materials and replace them because you've grown or expanded. Or you have to lose those materials entirely because you moved to a different building. With Cleancube, it's a solution to last forever. You can just keep expanding or decreasing in size. You can take modules out, you can sell them on. They've got a resale value. So someone else can get the benefit from them after you've used them. It's not the same with modular cleanrooms, where theoretically you can take them down, but the labour time associated with doing so and putting up the conventional cleanroom far outweighs the benefits of doing it. That's not the same case with Cleancube – you can just disconnect it, move it around, reconnect it, recommission it. Off you go!
Which of the many Cleancube projects are you most proud of?
Obviously, our rapid response during the COVID pandemic was really fulfilling and allowed us to focus our energies towards a really meaningful set of projects, but our more recent work with the NHS perhaps means even more.
We’re working with aseptic pharmacy technicians that are compounding life-saving drugs in a really short turn-around time and actually getting them to patients within 24 hours. Before now, they haven't had the ability to do that because their units haven't been operational. So we've been able to help clients re-energise those critical facilities and help support them in their mission for patient care.
What does the future look like for Cleancube?
Our Midi [single 40ft containers] and Maxi 2 [two 40ft containers] solutions are really having an impact now and we're getting significant inquiries for those quick turn-around projects. However, the Maxi and the Multi product lines [multiple containers side by side and stacked] are also developing at quite a rapid pace.
With a new manufacturing facility recently secured in Norfolk, our capacity has grown fivefold and we're already considering potential further expansion. The facilities that we're now looking at supplying span the globe and are for numerous applications, most notably Pharmaceutical manufacturers, Healthcare providers and Biotech innovators.
The biggest Cleancube project we're currently looking at is a Maxi 25 – so 25 containers conjoined side by side. But there are other Maxi 10, 15 and Multi 20 stacked projects in development – so watch this space for some ground-breaking facilities!
What is your proudest moment personally in the past 25 years of business – and what do you consider to be the Guardtech Group's greatest achievement?
My pride in the company comes from a growth that has been driven by customers seeing the value of us and wanting to work with us. Managing that growth whilst maintaining a strong company culture.
We've managed to grow a decent-sized business and yet we haven’t compromised on our core values. Spreading the ‘Guardtech way’ so that it permeates throughout the staff as we continue to grow, it’s something really special that I want us to hold on to for as long as possible.
How do you see things panning out for the Group? And, more importantly, what are you hoping to see?
I can only see the science and tech markets expanding over the next 10 years. What we're seeing in terms of innovation in the marketplace is just fueling so many interesting industries that all require operation under tight control and with a compliance focus.
What I’m hoping for us as a business is that we continue to innovate, we continue to develop and we continue to grow – not just as a business but grow our staff through mentorship. And I hope we continue to take risks. But calculated risks.
And more than anything, I hope we continue to make business fun – and we tackle every project that we get involved in with a positive, energetic, dynamic attitude. I want that to continue forever. The day that we're approaching a project with negativity and pessimism is the day that I hang up my boots!