Photo Caption L-R: Dr Ramesh Raghavendra, SEAM Director and Eoghan O’Donoghue, SEAM Operations Manager
The South East Applied Materials (SEAM) research centre in SETU Waterford (formerly WIT) has achieved ISO 9001:2015 certification for its quality management system. ISO 9001:2015 is an international standard for organisations that demonstrates the ability to consistently provide a service that meets customer and regulatory requirements. SEAM is a leading Technology Gateway funded by Enterprise Ireland and has been providing cutting-edge technology resources while delivering world-class advanced materials engineering services to wide ranging industrial technology and research sectors.
SEAM, which celebrated its 10th anniversary in 2019, aims to continuously improve services to meet client’s requirements and is always investing in new equipment resources as well as develop new analysis techniques to meet the ever changing needs of Irish industry. Despite the challenges the centre faced in 2020, SEAM strived to attain the ISO quality management certification while also maintaining a focus on the provision of high-quality services to industry and research; especially to essential services. The centre currently assists over 235 Irish based industries from wide ranging sectors such as Medical devices, Precision Engineering, Pharma, Electronics and Energy.
SEAM field of expertise include;
- Non-destructive investigation and product design optimisation using X-Ray Micro-Tomography (CT scanning)
- Finite Element Analysis and Computational Fluid Dynamics applications
- Failure Analysis of product components
- Material Characterisation
- 3D Metal Additive Manufacturing and Hands on training programmes on AM
Dr Ramesh Raghavendra, Director of SEAM, commends his team on their drive and perseverance which led to this accolade “I am very pleased that SEAM secured this long over-due accolade as it recognises our ability to provide consistent high quality consultancy services and applied research outputs to industries much to their satisfaction. I am also confident that this will enhance SEAM’s recognition and open up new collaboration opportunities with industries and other stakeholders in Ireland that will enable us to grow further. This accreditation will further strengthen our relationship with our existing clients and will undoubtedly increase the level of trust with our new clients as it helps our business stand out from our competitors”.
ISO Criteria
ISO 9001:2015 is an independently assessed certification that ensures management quality and shows that SEAM is committed to customer and regulatory requirements. Amongst these requirements is the ability to demonstrate:
- Leading and promoting a positive quality culture, led from top management and spread throughout the organisation.
- Ensuring participation, responsibility and engagement in quality management with all employees and third parties.
- Providing training, competence, equipment and resources necessary to ensure that customer’s expectations are always met.
- Continuously improving SEAM’s quality management through customer engagement, working with external providers, identification of risks and opportunities and proactive planning and implementation.