A&M EDM, an award-winning engineering company in Smethwick is playing its role to combat COVID 19 as part of the Ventilator Challenge UK supply chain.
The Ventilator Challenge UK consortium includes Rolls-Royce, Airbus, and leading Formula One racing teams and has received an order to provide the NHS with 10,000 ventilators.
Ventilator Challenge harnesses the expertise of businesses across the aerospace, automotive and medical sectors, to produce medical ventilators to meet the demands of COVID 19.
A&M was approached by the Consortium to manufacture components for a ventilator-based Oxford company, Penlon’s ESO2 system which can be rapidly manufactured. A&M applied its CNC machining expertise, with staff working three shifts a day over the weekend to machine, turn, inspect and dispatch components.
A&M’s Production Director, Stuart Talbot told Prosper, "Like many in UK manufacturing we are proud to be part of the Ventilator Challenge response. One of our responses to the crisis was to ask staff to work in a more flexible way as the company needed, we did not expect that this would lead to more
overtime and continuous weekend working. Manufacturing these parts means our staff are contributing to the collective effort to supply the NHS with much-needed ventilators.”