CleanRooms covers the world of contamination control
10/01/2004
NASHUA, N.H.—Reaching out to the worldwide contamination control community, the CleanRooms Group has just completed a successful conference season that spanned the globe from Stuttgart to Shanghai.
The 7th International Trade Fair for Cleanroom Technology—also known as CleanRooms Europe—was held from June 29th to July 1st in Stuttgart, Germany. This particular show has grown from modest beginnings, limited to sales and information, into an event of importance to a range of industry sectors. It now draws specialists from commercial enterprises, clinics, research institutes, trade organizations and universities with interest in every aspect of contamination control technology, clean production and hygiene.
"CleanRooms Europe was a great success," reports James Enos, CleanRooms Group vice president and group publishing director. Attendance for the exhibit was up 22 percent over the year before. What's more, the attendees, some 1800 strong, were qualified. "They were there to buy," says Enos. "The move from Frankfurt [the site of CleanRooms Europe 2003] to Stuttgart brought us closer to a large proportion of industry visitors who traveled from southwest Germany, Switzerland and Austria." Alongside its traditional mechanical engineering and automotive industries, the region is also home to companies from the pharmaceutical, semiconductor, electronics, biotechnology and food sectors.
Attendance at the forum program was excellent on all three days of the trade fair. Attendees showed particular interest in the special forum "Hygiene in the Hospital," organized in conjunction with Hospital Post and GIT Verlag (publishers of "Management & Krankenhaus"). The forum provided a valuable mix of theory and practice from expert speakers covering technical, medical and economic issues of hospital hygiene—from air contamination and climate control to cleaning strategies.
 At the CleanRooms Europe 2004 forum, which was integrated into the exhibition hall, Frank Duvernell of profi-con, Germany, presented a paper on cleaning of cleanrooms. |
From Stuttgart the CleanRooms Group moved to Shanghai for CleanRooms China 2004 from July 28 to 29. The group's third contamination control trade show and exhibition in China was a joint venture with the U.S. Commercial Service of American Consulate General in Shanghai, the Shanghai Science and Technology Department of City Government and the China Electronics Appliance Corporation.
"We had a great first day in terms of exhibit traffic," comments Enos. "With between 185 and 210 conference attendees, there was a lot of interaction." Enos reports that exhibit traffic slowed a bit on the second day of the conference, but he attributes that to the fact that the CleanRooms China 2003 conference and exhibit took place only six months earlier, having been postponed because of concerns about SARS.
 300 conference attendees participated in the two-day CleanRooms China 2004 event held July 28-29, 2004, at the Shanghai International Convention Center, Shanghai, China. |
The conference, which was designed to help cleanroom technology suppliers break into one of the fastest-growing economies in the world, comprised eight sessions:
- Design for 12-inch wafer fab project
- Contamination control and particle counting in cleanrooms
- HEPAs: chemical filtration for cleanroom applications
- The ISO cleanroom technology standards—an overview
- Regulatory guidance for manufacturing sterile pharmaceutical products: recent FDA and EC developments
- Purification and air conditioning of biologic cleanroom
- Sterile considerations in cleaning the cleanroom
- ESD control in 300 mm semiconductor manufacturing
 Dr. Hans Schicht, Schicht AG, presented two papers at CleanRooms China 2004 covering international regulatory and standardization activities. |
Plans are underway for an enhanced CleanRooms China 2005. One new feature will be a series of "road shows" that, in addition to the main event in Shanghai, will bring one-day events to Beijing and Shenzhen.
In the meantime, the group is back in the states gearing up for the CleanRooms Contamination Control Technology Conference & Exhibition, which is slated for March 22 to 23, 2005, at the World Trade Center in Boston, Mass. For information on any of the CleanRooms Group events, contact Lisa Gowern at 603-891-9267 or e-mail [email protected].