Uvoji® is a water treatment company conducting R&D into the application of short-wave ultraviolet light (UV-C) radiation generated by light-emitting diodes (LEDs) as an innovative disinfection method. UV-C has long been a useful disinfection technology because it is fast, does not require chemicals, and has a very high bactericidal and virucidal efficacy.

When the COVID-19 pandemic struck in early 2020, the company was forced to physically lockdown and faced a crisis over how to continue developing products remotely. Uvoji had been using SOLIDWORKS® 3D design, structural simulation, and flow simulation solutions for product development under the SOLIDWORKS for Entrepreneurs Program. They also had been a beta tester of the cloud-based 3DEXPERIENCE® Works solutions before the COVID-19 lockdowns.

“The cloud-based 3DEXPERIENCE platform provided the data management and collaboration capabilities we needed,” says CEO/Technical Director Thomas Zunino. The company chose to add 3DEXPERIENCE Works applications to their SOLIDWORKS installation because they provided an affordable collaboration solution during pandemic-imposed lockdowns.

Using cloud-based 3DEXPERIENCE Works solutions in conjunction with SOLIDWORKS, Uvoji quickly developed its new UV-C LED surface disinfection unit. They launched the product in June 2020 amid the pandemic when it would be most beneficial to its customers.

Despite working remotely, Uvoji developed its product fast—resulting in sales of 1,000 units in just one year—because of the secure, automated data management capabilities within the 3DEXPERIENCE Works portfolio.

“We were still in the process of creating the organization and quality processes within the company when we were forced to work remotely, so we didn’t have any servers or PDM system in place [nor could we afford them],” Zunino recalls. The 3DEXPERIENCE Works portfolio presented the easiest and most affordable way to develop products while maintaining revision controls and secure data management.