Serstech files nine patent applications

Serstech has filed nine patent applications to the European patent office over the last two weeks. The patent applications are filed to protect the newly launched Serstech Arx products and the next generation product platform that is currently under development. Due to ongoing and expected sales opportunities in particularly the US market, Serstech recently decided to ramp up its IPR efforts to better protect its innovations.

Serstech has three already approved patents, whereof the two more recent ones have been implemented in currently available products. One of these is for the industry-first autofocus functionality that is available in the Serstech Arx and Arx+ instruments. Autofocus not only allows for more accurate measurements, but it also removes the need for any adaptors, which can be cumbersome to handle by operators in the field. The other patent is for the SERS kit, which allows for identification of substances down to ppm (parts per million) level concentrations.

“As we are working on adding value to our existing products and in parallel are in the research phase of our next generation products, the team produces many new ideas. Our R&D team is world-class, and the level of innovation is truly impressive”, says Serstech CEO Stefan Sandor.

For further information, please contact:
Stefan Sandor,
CEO, Serstech AB
Phone: +46 739 606067
Email: ss@serstech.com

Thomas Pileby,
Chairman of the Board, Serstech AB
Phone: +46 702 072643
Email: tp@serstech.com

or visit: www.serstech.com

Certified advisor to Serstech is Svensk Kapitalmarknadsgranskning AB (SKMG), phone: +46 11 323 07 32, e-mail: ca@skmg.se.

About Serstech
Serstech delivers solutions for chemical identification and has customers around the world, mainly in the safety and security industry. Typical customers are customs, police authorities, security organizations and first responders. The solutions and technology are however not limited to security applications and potentially any industry using chemicals of some kind could be addressed by Serstech’s solution. Serstech’s head office is in Sweden and all production is done in Sweden.

Serstech is traded at Nasdaq First North Growth Market and more information about the company can be found at www.serstech.com.

Interview with Serstech CEO in CBNW Magazine

Today, an interview with Serstech CEO Stefan Sandor was published in the print and online magazine CBNW. The first issue of the year included a focus section on Swedish high-tech security companies and featured major defense contractor Saab alongside Serstech.

The article covers both Serstech as a company and our solutions. Read the article here, pages 28-31: CBNW Magazine, issue 1, 2021

Serstech SERS kit brings Raman to a new level

Handheld Raman is an excellent tool for police, border control and first responders to identify unknown threats quickly in the field. Narcotics, explosives and other dangerous chemicals can pose serious threats to the operators and being able to quickly identify them reduces the risk for and improves the efficiency of the operators. With the new Serstech SERS kit, the detection levels are brought to a new level.

Serstech SERS kit is attached to the front of the instruments without the use of any tools.

The principle behind Raman instruments is based on physical properties of certain molecules and the electromagnetic signals they emit when energy is added to them by the instrument lasers. The signal is very weak, which requires the instruments to be highly sensitive, something that has only become possible to do in a handheld instrument in the last decade. Some substances are in addition not very Raman active, which means that the signal is even weaker, often weak enough to make it virtually impossible to detect. This is where SERS technology comes in. Serstech’s SERS kit greatly amplifies the signal to make it easily detectable with a handheld Raman instrument.

SERS stands for Surface Enhanced Raman Spectroscopy and is also the first part of the company name Serstech. Serstech was founded in 2006 and the idea from the beginning was to develop small Raman instruments and SERS technology to make the instruments highly sensitive, well beyond what was commercially available at the time. Serstech’s SERS kit was launched in 2019 and is now in use by narcotics police and others who need to identify low or very low concentrations of illegal substances, which is sometimes the case in street-quality narcotics seized by police.

SERS works by creating a resonance between the dissolved sample and a silicon wafer that has been nano-coated with silver particles. Due to the resonance, the signal the instrument can read is amplified by a factor of at least 10,000 and signals from low concentration samples and from substances that have low Raman activity can be read and identified.

Colored substances, such as typical ecstasy pills and many organic compounds, are hard to identify for any Raman instrument. The reason for this is that electrons are excited by the laser emitted by the instrument and the excitation energy is emitted when the electron goes back to its original state. This very strong energy can blind the instrument and also obfuscate the Raman signal of the substance. By using the SERS kit, with the resulting amplification of the Raman signal, even many fluorescent samples can be identified by handheld Raman instruments.

Serstech’s SERS kit is patented and consists of an instrument accessory that is connected at the tip of the instrument and disposable SERS surfaces that are inserted in the kit. To identify a solid sample using the SERS kit, the solid sample needs to be dissolved in methanol and the solution is applied to a SERS surface. After a few seconds, the solvent has evaporated and the surface is inserted into the kit and the instrument identifies the substance. The identification of the substance is typically made in 10-20 seconds and the instrument is operated in the same way as if the SERS kit was not attached.

The SERS kit works with all of Serstech’s instruments – the Serstech 100 Indicator, the Serstech Arx and Serstech Arx+.

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“Lundabolaget drog hem order från strategiskt viktig kund” Article in Swedish from Sydsvenskan

Article in Swedish from Sydsvenskan, Näringsliv, 27 juni 2019.
Text: Mikaela Hedberg

“Lundabolaget Serstech tog i veckan in en miljonorder från sin nederländska partner, ett resultat av bolagets nya marknadsstrategi. Kraftig tillväxt som har varit bolagets fokus det senaste året har börjat ta fart. Nu tar man sikte på läkemedelsbranschen.

Stefan Sandor tillrädde som vd för Serstech i början av 2018, han har tidigare bland annat varit på marknadssidan hos Axis.

Bolaget tillverkar och säljer mätinstrument som känner av kemiska substanser som knark och sprängmedel. Målgruppen finns inom polis, räddningstjänst och tull. Instrumenten kallas för en ramanspektrometer.

Under måndagen fick bolaget en order på 3,4 miljoner svenska kronor för hård – och mjukvara från sin nederländska partner Hotzone Solutions, som grundades av tidigare anställda i FN:s organisation för förbud mot kemiska vapen. Ordern resulterade i att aktien gick upp med 14 procent. Slutkunden är World Customs Organisation, Världstullorganisationen.

– Det här är en extremt viktig referenskund och visar att vi gör rätt produkt och har positionerat oss korrekt, säger Stefan Sandor.
Pengarna är en sak, men referenserna är särskilt viktiga för Serstech. Den senaste ordern är ett resultat på förra årets nya marknadsstrategi; att sälja genom systemintegratörer, samarbetspartners som bygger in bolagets teknik i större lösningar.
– Vi har 75 partners runt om i världen och täcker in alla viktiga säkerhetsmarknader. Dessutom har vi börjat titta på läkemedelsbranschen.

Serstech har utvecklat en så kallad ramanspektrometer, ett handhållet instrument som identifierar kemikalier med hjälp av laser.En del av företagets partners arbetar mot den farmaceutiska industrin och i början av september kommer Lundabolaget att uppfylla kraven från amerikanska FDA (United States Food and Drug Administration).
– En typ av kvalitetsstämpel att vi uppfyller deras krav från datasäkerhet till spårbarhet, vilket gör att vår produkt får användas i läkemedelsproduktion.

Serstech har funnits i snart elva år och har fått en nystart under vd:n Stefan Sandor som har en lång historia på Axis. Bolaget noterades på First North 2016 och har fått stort förtroende från aktiemarknaden i år. Det menar Stefan Sandor beror på att folk har börjat få upp ögonen för bolaget.
–Vi är relativt osynliga för konsumenter eftersom vi bara säljer till myndigheter. Inom säkerhet är man väldigt hemlighetsfull, säger han.
Det har inte bara gjort det svårt att nå aktiemarknaden utan också arbetsmarknaden, enligt Sandor.

Bolaget siktar på en kraftig tillväxt och har som mål att att nå en omsättning på 150 miljoner kronor räknat på tolv månadersbasis med start mot slutet av året. Förra året omsatte Serstech 10,6 miljoner kronor.
– Det är en stor ökning, men det ser väldigt positivt ut. Vi breddar oss från säkerhet till läkemedel efter sommaren och vi tror att den nya marknaden som öppnar upp sig är värd ytterligare 300 miljoner kronor årligen. Primärt fokus kommer fortsatt att vara säkerhet, men vi tror att vi kommer att lyckas väl inom läkemedel också, säger Stefan Sandor.

Serstech växer och anställer men har svårt att hitta kvalificerade personer i Lund, eller ens i Sverige. Ett problem de delar med andra Lundabolag. Idag arbetar 15 personer på kontoret i Lund, men Stefan Sandor beskriver en tuff arbetsmarknadssituation för företagen i staden. På Serstech har man därför startat ett utvecklingscentrum i Rumänien med sju anställda.
– Det är så vi har löst det akuta problemet, men på sikt vill vi rekrytera i Lund.”

Serstech is part of this year’s Sweden Technology Fast 50

We are pleased to announce that Serstech is part of this year’s Sweden Technology Fast 50, a ranking of Sweden’s fastest growing technology company. Deloitte Technology Fast 50 is an objective industry ranking focused on technology companies that have achieved the fastest rates of revenue growth during the past four years. In 2017 Serstech ranked no 5 in Sweden and in Deloitte Global’s Technology Fast 500™ EMEA program Serstech ranked 28th!