Bump – Innovation in a crisis

Bump – Innovation in a crisis

We generally associate the coming of Covid to the UK as March 2020 with lock downs rapidly followed by Furlough.

In fact, for data scientists in our Digital TechnologyTeam it came several months earlier in January.  Watching and analysing Covid statistics as the disease spread through Europe, they realised that it would very soon reach and spread rapidly through the UK.  As well as the obvious health impact, the team saw potential economic disaster in store for operations- based businesses, in particular, as they faced the nigh on impossible task of keeping transmissions down.

Bump. Tharsus to the Core

Tharsus’ mission is “do the right thing.” We wanted to do something in the fight against Covid which made use of our unique experience developing new uses for technologies and launching products at scale.

We came up with Bump, a powerful data-driven social distancing system, which would help people keep distanced in their workplaces and enable accurate track and tracing in the event of positive cases.

We brought together, under one roof,  a broad, multi disciplined team to develop and deliver Bump.  To maximise our chances of success we started with multiple approaches.

Colleagues from our Digital Technology team using the latest software to accurately and rapidly test, fail, learn and refine different Bump approaches, sprinted fast with colleagues from our design, pilot manufacturing and supply teams, to iterate design into a rapid prototyping stage and on- board a supply chain.

To keep up momentum 24 hours a day we collaborated with a partner in New Zealand.  They literally worked while we slept.

In a matter of weeks colleagues from our manufacturing team were able to manufacture an initial consignment of Bump systems which were delivered to trial partners for intensive testing.

We realised that trialling Bump in real environments at the earliest possible stage would be vital to allowing us to understand and optimise both its effectiveness and ease of deployment and use. For us, it highlighted the importance of rapid prototyping in industry.

The collaboration with trial partners proved invaluable, and with their help, and the Tharsus teams’ hard work, Bump went into scale manufacture just 12 weeks after the idea for it was conceived.

We did it – but it didn’t stop there

So, in just 12 weeks, Bump systems were at work at scale in businesses across the UK helping to keep people safe, operations running and livelihoods protected. We didn’t stop there however.  We saw that Bump had the potential to do good in wider society too.

As spring turned to summer it became clear the biggest miss to society during the lockdown would be large sporting events.  We realised if Bump could enable one at least to go ahead, it would bring welcome normality into lives driven increasingly anxious by exponential change.

Virgin Money London Marathon Race Director Hugh Brasher, was searching for a way which would enable 2020’s race to go ahead in some form, even if a physical audience wouldn’t be possible.   Realising innovative technology would hold the key, he approached Tharsus.

In October 2020, with Bump deployed across the race and support teams, as well as the athletes themselves, the race went ahead, successfully and safely.

With the case for Bump as an enabler large scale events made, collaborations with other partners continue.