Clean Room & Laboratory Case Study

---

Design Build + Project Management – Case Study  

Challenge

DiaSorin Molecular / Luminex Corporation experienced excellent 2019 and 2020 growth, having had success with a variety of pathogen testing kits, most importantly those for COVID 19. DiaSorin is a pioneer in point of use testing, developing several desktop machines for rapid testing using a test wheel about the size of a DVD. These point of use tests can be done at a doctor’s office, hospital, or even entertainment venues. Unfortunately, the technology for highly accurate COVID 19 tests didn’t fit on a disc in 2020, so DiaSorin set out to make them fit with help from an international team. The project was envisioned to have many intermediate milestones, where DiaSorin could prepare facilities, perfect the specialty test wheels and processes, and then scale up production. Both the low-volume, manual, learning line and high-volume automated line would be installed in their Cypress Ca. facility which is located in a two story leased office building.

Solution

DiaSorin Molecular turned to Jack Kozakar, president of the John Mark Companies, including John Mark Project Management & John Mark Construction Co, to provide project management, industrial planning, design-build services, architectural planning, engineering, equipment specifications, technical integration, emergency power planning, specialty construction, re-stack and move coordination, furniture & equipment planning, planning for multiple relocated labs, quality assurance and construction oversight for the facilities infrastructure required for the project.

The John Mark Companies were perfectly positioned to provide a cost effective approach to planning using in house technical experts and computer assisted drafting. JMPM integrated industrial design, special and proprietary planning, and architectural planning in a seamless set of construction documents, and layered in structural, electrical and mechanical engineering. JMPM used these documents to bid out and form the facilities and infrastructure project team, negotiating contracts and value engineering the project.

JMPM and JMCC designed and constructed five manual line clean rooms including two dry clean rooms, and another five larger automated line clean rooms with two ultra dry clean rooms capable of 2% RH. Implementing the project required the re-stack of four other large operating labs, and significant structural improvements to the roof and major modification to the normal and emergency power distribution. 

Results

The John Mark Companies succeeded in bringing the project in on time and on budget in spite of myriad stakeholder changes, re-organization of DiaSorin and Luminex, and technical challenges. Together JMCC and JMPM reduced project costs by 20% by providing a single point of contracting (lowering both soft and hard costs), replacing architectural time with draftsman time, bidding, contract negotiation, value engineering and cost avoidance. Most importantly, JMPM worked side by side with DiaSorin engineers to implement 32 major updates to the original two plan sets to accommodate evolving technology while holding down costs and maintaining schedule.