Designing, making the prototype, validating and mass producing Freesterra – I, a respirator to fight COVID-19, are the tasks a consortium of Galician companies, including Cinfo, have undertaken in a race against time.
Given the urgent need of respirators and the scarcity of these machines in the market, a group of Galician companies in the technology industry are working on the development of a respirator that can be produced on a large scale, while meeting the functionality and reliability standards of the healthcare sector.
The project does not aim to produce a one-time use respirator to be used during the transfer of patients to the hospital, but a respirator that can be used for weeks at a time, uninterruptedly.
Cinfo has joined this improvised group led by Bionix, and made up by companies such as Electronica y Comunicaciones, Dimalox, 3Datlántico, Grupo Caamaño, Blanco Mayer and Tattoo Contract, as well as Cluster TIC Galicia (CTIC), Centro Tecnologico de Automocion de Galicia (CTAG), Cluster de Empresas de Automocion de Galicia (Ceaga) and an independent collaborator from the Innovation Department of the Galician Red Cross. The project also has the Profesor Novoa Santos fund as an strategic partner for the deployment of the device in healthcare infrastructures in a state of crisis.
Mobility restrictions, lack of sanitary components and saturation of transport services have forced them, in many occasions, to look for alternative reliable and safe components from other sectors, such as the food, automotive or fishing industries. In fact, the project currently works with a component from the automotive industry, which serves as the valves of the respirators; work that has been provided by three member companies of Business Accelerator Factory Auto : Lupeon, Nort3D and Inmake.
Currently, the Profesor Novoa Santos fund is working on the validation of the first working prototype of the respirator.
It is foreseen to start production within the next two weeks; and once production is in motion, start the supply of these respirators where needed.