The Knowledge: Spin-out targets bad smells

A UNIVERSITY of Manchester spin-out is making its mark with equipment that zaps bad smells.

Stockport-based Plasma Clean emerged out of the university’s school of chemistry in 2006 with private equity backing and is now targeting global markets.

Its products, which are primarily aimed at commercial kitchens, work by injecting ozone into kitchen extraction canopies where it reacts with odour, grease and smoke, and oxidises them into carbon dioxide and water vapour.

The technology was pioneered by Prof Christopher Whitehead who took it to UMIP, the univeristy’s commercialisation body, where he met business development manager David Glover. He was so convinced of the potential he left his job to run Plasma Clean.

“It was my role to go out and hunt for academic ideas which we thought had mileage so we could commercialise them,” said Mr Glover. “Plasma Clean was born from that. We developed a business plan and raised venture capital of £500,000 in 2006 with the Manchester Technology Fund as the lead investor.” Nesta and YFM were also involved.

The first products launched in August 2008 were targeted at the food production and catering industry.

“It’s nice when you walk past a fish and chip shop,” said Mr Glover, “but if you’re living next to that it can become a bit of a nuisance and increasingly local councils are saying ‘if you’re creating a nuisance and don’t do anything about it we can shut you down’. Commercial food premises have got to comply and the same is true for food factories.”

Plasma Clean has five people working in sales and marketing at its Stockport office and a further four dedicated to producing its units at a Macclesfield manufacturing business. According to Glover sales increased by 70% to £500,000 over the past year and it made a “small profit”.

It is taking market share from several other players that use different technology and have larger machines that require more power, says Glover. An agent has just been appointed for the south of England and partners have been identified in Germany, Holland and Australia.

The company is now looking beyond the catering sector at other applications for the technology. It is involved in a European Union-funded project to remove unpleasant smells from pig farms and is also working the University of Leeds on using its technology to control hospital superbugs. Tests have shown that its kit can remove 99.9% of microbes, including MRSA and c.difficile.