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SYNGROUP - PROUD PARTNER OF THE PCR-TEST PROGRAMME IN VIENNA
Mayor Michael Ludwig and Syngroup MD Heinz Marx at the presentation of "Alles gurgelt". The campaign brings up to 4 free PCR tests per week for all Viennese.

To set up a testing offensive for all Viennese to fight the spread of the Covid pandemic, it takes the best from many fields working together. Lifebrain Group, Lead Horizon, Rewe Group, Post and Syngroup are working together on the campaign of the City of Vienna and the Chamber of Commerce.

Syngroup is proud to be part of the project core team and to contribute process optimisation know-how built up over 25 years to the large-scale roll-out of this unique initiative. In this way, we are helping to increase the processing and evaluation capacity of PCR tests from approx. 5,000 samples per day to up to 200,000 samples per day within a very short time. We support the Lifebrain Group laboratory in analysing up to 2 million samples per week in the future.

OPTIMISED PROCESSES FOR UP TO 2 MILLION TESTS PER WEEK

The range of activities and services for the Syngroup team of consultants within the framework of this large-scale project include a variety of topics in and around the laboratory operation across all levels of expansion – the planning and optimisation of material and product flows, the development of warehouse management and infrastructure, as well as the establishment of laboratory operations and the development of an IT infrastructure including security and access concepts. Extensive logistics planning and the development of traffic concepts are also among the tasks of the multi-disciplinary team of consultants. Here, the fact that a vehicle arrives for unloading every 3 minutes during the day is an example of the magnitude of the project.

After a thorough analysis of all existing workflows, the laboratory processes were set up from scratch and automated as far as possible. Based on capacity calculations using state-of-theart simulation models, Syngroup created the conditions for massively increasing the use of equipment in the test analyses by developing automatic pooling programmes. Where automation or digitalisation were not feasible, manual processes were improved and optimised to such an extent that, for example, packing processes could be accelerated up to 2.5 times.

Challenging tasks in solving personnel issues are another area of application for the Syngroup project team. The task was to design and implement time recording and shift planning as well as to multiply staffing levels in initial expansion stages within a few weeks.

Syngroup Managing Director Heinz Marx on the motivation to get involved in the test initiative:

“As specialists for efficient and effective processes, it is a matter of concern for us at Syngroup to provide the best possible support to all parties involved in this so far unique project and to make a contribution to being able to return to a new normality as quickly as possible”

The free PCR self-tests are open to everyone in Vienna, and a roll-out to other regions is under discussion.

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