Gateshead training and automation company expands with new staff and facility

Gateshead based training and automation solutions company Scantime has expanded into new markets, taken on new staff and built a new training facility to cope with demand for its specialised work.

Run by father and son team David and Chris Simm, Scantime Automation has its facilities near to the Metrocentre, but its services are used by businesses all over the UK, Europe, and the USA particularly in the troubleshooting and training of Programmable Logic Controllers (PLCs).

PLCs are widely used in automobile manufacturing, food and drink processing, airport baggage control, pharmaceuticals, and power generation. They are industrial computers used in all manufacturing processes with Scantime providing training and the ability to troubleshoot and design software for the event of a fault on the production line.

Scantime’s specialist courses; EAL PLC Industrial Maintenance and Fault Finding Professional for industrial maintenance engineers, enable companies to avoid downtime and increase productivity by giving engineers necessary skills.

Having already designed Level 1 and Level 2 courses, the team have taken the training even further with a new higher specification Level 3 course.

Daniel Johnston, Amazon RME engineering area manager commented: “The course provided exactly what was required for myself and my colleagues and will enable us to become more efficient when dealing with issues on the shop floor.

“It also gave us the structure we needed to understand the concepts behind PLC fault-finding, which will be invaluable to us in the future.”

To complete the growth of the company, David Perry has been taken on as a sales and marketing executive. He said: “I previously worked as a support worker supporting people with complex learning difficulties but decided I wanted to pursue my interest in engineering.”

Managing director David Simm added: “The future is bright for Scantime as we have a good team and the right knowledge and expertise to help businesses keep their manufacturing processes running thereby saving tremendous amounts of money.

“We’re very much a North East firm but have a working footprint all over the world which we are justly proud of.”