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(Adds Babcock, background)
By Paul Sandle and Kate Holton
LONDON, March 25 (Reuters) - Britain has ordered 10,000
medical ventilators designed at breakneck speed by vacuum
cleaner-maker Dyson, billionaire founder James Dyson said, as
the country tries to boost the number of devices available to
treat coronavirus patients.
The government, in anticipation of cases peaking in Britain
in coming weeks, had made an urgent appeal to manufacturers to
supply the National Health Service and would also use devices
from private hospitals and other sources.
"We have received an initial order of 10,000 units from the
UK Government which we will supply on an open-book basis," James
Dyson said on Wednesday in an email to staff seen by Reuters.
"We are also looking at ways of making it available
internationally."
The government did not comment on the Dyson email.
Britain had been in talks with over 3,000 businesses about
supplying ventilators to quickly increase the health service's
capacity, Prime Minister Boris Johnson's spokesman said earlier
on Wednesday.
But he stressed that any design would need regulatory
approval.
The country's existing stock of about 5,000-8,000
ventilators is inadequate if cases jump as predicted. The number
of coronavirus deaths in Britain rose by 41 to 465 on Wednesday.
Dyson said since receiving a call from Johnson 10 days ago,
he had refocused resources at his company, and worked with TTP,
The Technology Partnership, to design and build an entirely new
ventilator, The CoVent.
It deployed its expertise in air movement, motors, power
systems, manufacturing and supply chain gained from its products
like air purifiers and fans as well as cleaners to develop the
ventilator from scratch.
The company, which revolutionised the vacuum cleaner market
with its bagless cyclonic device in the 1990s, said it would
work with regulators and government to ensure that the product
and the manufacturing process was approved.
Dyson said it was "clearly a time of grave international
crisis", and he would therefore donate 5,000 units to the
international effort, 1,000 of which would go to the United
Kingdom.
Separately, British engineer Babcock International Group Plc
said it had joined forces with a leading medical
equipment company to design and supply thousands of critical
care ventilators.
A number of other firms had joined forces to potentially
develop and manufacture a ventilator, including Airbus,
Smiths Group Plc, Ford Motor Co and McLaren.
Reuters had reported earlier that British industry expected
the government to give the go-ahead for an emergency ventilator
production plan on Wednesday.
(Reporting by Paul Sandle and Kate Holton; additional reporting
by William James; Editing by Lisa Shumaker)
