Last year's Torbay Business Awards winners are pioneers on the world stage

The aim of the Torbay Business Awards is to celebrate the remarkable impact of local businesses, not just on the Bay, but the world. Last year’s overall winner, QLM Technology, is an example of just that.

Based out of the Epic Centre in Paignton, QLM’s products have the power to change the world.

QLM Technology started from an idea of Chief Technical Officer, Xiao Ai. Xiao's postgraduate research at the University of Bristol focussed on using high-power lasers and single-photon lidar to measure carbon dioxide gas from a satellite. However, after the project ended, Xiao realised that the technology could be used in a more localised way to drastically reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

In many industrial sectors, huge quantities of methane are released into the atmosphere through gas leaks, without companies even knowing.

What QLM developed was a device that could detect this through a low-power lidar beam that simultaneously measured both the shape and the concentration of plumes of methane and therefore determined how much gas was being leaked - exactly the information gas operators needed to know.

Chris Wardle, Chief Manufacturing Officer at QLM, explained: “These leaks have a large impact on the climate but a large proportion of them are going undetected.

“What we’ve developed is a continuous monitoring system that you can put up on a mast in a facility and it will constantly scan the area in the field of view.

“While other companies are doing different kinds of monitoring, we believe we are the only people in the world using this technology in this way.”

QLM’s biggest investor and partner, SLB, is one of the world’s largest service providers to the oil and gas industry, meaning that QLM’s devices can truly have a global reach.

As well as some of the biggest players in oil and gas, QLM helps to reduce emissions in industries such as wastewater, landfill and coal.

After being founded in Bristol during the pandemic, QLM founded its first manufacturing facility at the Epic Centre in Paignton in 2022 with one unit. The company now occupies six.

“Our plan is to grow manufacturing in Paignton,” said Chris Wardle, who also chairs The Epic Centre’s Hi-Tech Cluster; a group of tech businesses in Torbay and South Devon.

The Hi-Tech Cluster’s objective is to build a future for technology within Torbay through engagement and development of partnerships with Government, Education and Industry to provide a growing sector for generations to come.

With over 25 years of experience in operations, manufacturing and engineering, Chris is perfectly positioned to spearhead this drive.

He explained the Cluster’s aims: “We have just had a levelling up fund approved to (in part) build a technology Park at the bottom of Long Road. We need to ensure that this gets built. We need to do this so that businesses like ours can incubate in the Epic Centre and then grow into facilities within the local area. The park is due to be built by 2026.

“We can then work with local educational facilities to ensure that when the park goes up and we're ready to move, that talented people are coming through so we can continue to grow the tech sector.

“We're invested in the Torbay Story, there’s a long history of technology in the Bay and it has the potential to create well-paid, high-productivity jobs in the area. There are currently about 1000 people employed in tech in the Bay. Growing that will bring in further investment and grow this pocket of knowledge and technology in sectors very relevant for the future.”

With the first wave of tech businesses already in the Epic Centre and the new multi-million-pound technology park in the pipeline, Chris is optimistic that Torbay has the opportunity for a bright future.

He said: “We have what we need here, we have the organisations here and we have the skills here. All we need to ensure now is that it stays here.

“The technology park going up enables the whole story of growth, investment and evolution to occur in the Bay.”

That was a story repeated time and time again at last year’s Torbay Weekly Naturally Inspiring Business Awards, in which QLM won the award for Best Overall Business. Hosted at the Riviera Centre, the event recognised the achievements of the many fantastic businesses in Torbay.

Chris remembered: “We entered several different awards. We expected to hopefully pick something up, but we didn't expect to win Overall Business of the Year - we didn’t think that was going to happen at all!

“It was a memorable evening. It was a really good platform to see the diverse business sectors within the area come together under one roof, that doesn't happen very often.”

Reflecting on the win, Chris said that he thought a fundamental reason for QLM’s success was in its linking of local and global issues:

“I think we do represent the Torbay Story well. We’re a local company with a product that can impact the world, and that goes for a lot of the high-tech industries in the Bay.”

He added: “The award gave us a platform and a voice to talk to local government. It allowed us to get more involved locally but more importantly, it raised the profile of not just QLM, but technology in the bay as a whole.

“I would encourage anyone to get involved. It’s a great platform to showcase the capabilities of the businesses, to get involved with peers and do something positive for the future of the Bay.”