Celebrating how things have changed in 25 years.
Yes, that’s right: it’s our quarter-century anniversary! This January marks 25 years since the formation of Facility Monitoring Systems Ltd.
Reaching 25 years in business is a notable milestone, and it’s incredible to reflect on how much has evolved over the past quarter-century.
Looking back to January 2000, the start-up month for FMS Ltd, other memorable events include worldwide relief that the threat of devastation from the Y2K ‘Millenium Bug’ failed to materialise. Bill Gates stepped down as CEO of Microsoft. The UK’s National DNA database reached its own milestone with one million profiles, making it the largest of its kind in the world. And in a related sphere, progress in the Human Genome Project (which delivered a draft sequence later in 2000) spurred pharmaceutical investment and collaboration. It marked the beginning of precision medicine as drug development began targeting specific genetic markers.
Accreditations
We’re rightly proud of a raft of accreditations we’ve built up over the past 25 years which highlight our achievements and commitment to quality:
- ISO 9001:2015 (Quality Management System)
- ISO 17025:2017 (Testing & Calibration Laboratories)
- ISO 45001:2018 (Occupational Health & Safety)
- ISO 14001 (Environmental Management System)
- Cyber Essentials (Cyber security standard for UK organisations)
- Joscar (Accreditation system for suppliers in defence, aerospace & security)
Where We Live
Understandably, many more things have changed in 25 years. This is our Malvern HQ and Service Centre back in 2004 when we moved in.
We occupy the same building today, but it’s a lot smarter, has been extended, and is fully fitted out to suit our admin and operational functions, including a dedicated engineering and UKAS-certified calibration lab.
Collaboration
A major milestone for our contamination control business was our collaboration with TSI Inc. We became a channel partner in 2009 with gold level status. We enjoyed notable successes in supplying and supporting TSI instruments and systems. FMS still has the accolade amongst TSI channel partners globally for the largest facility monitoring solution. Installed at cell and gene therapy manufacturer Oxford Biomedica’s OxBox facility in late 2019, the system has a capacity of over 1,000 sample points.
In 2021, we established and formalised our operations in Ireland. An alliance forged with Astech Ireland Ltd now delivers the exemplary levels of support our customers in the UK have enjoyed for years.
Technological Evolution
Take a look at how times have changed with the TSI airborne particle counter instrumentation we supply. These Condensation Particle Counters from TSI date back to the millennium; compare them with their successor, several generations on: the AeroTrak™ 9001CPC is perfect for applications in semiconductor manufacturing and graphene processing, thanks to its astounding 10 nanometre particle detection capability.
Celebrate With Us
As we mark 25 years in business, we know that this quarter-century of accomplishments is founded on the customer philosophy at the very heart of our business and the support infrastructure we’ve created. To this day, all our field engineers are employed. We don’t outsource. But we do provide exemplary service that’s second to none; it’s a key component of our success.
