The Dragonfly product was 4 years in the making from the first sketches and research inquiries to its launch to market. When it was first conceived we’d already been a major player in the confocal microscopy market for many years. By the time the architecture was finally laid down, we were confident that its performance, feature content and compactness would make it stand out.

Dragonfly draws together a number of sensitive and complex technologies. I was involved from very early on with our advanced R&D team to prove out the toughest technical challenges through proof-of-concept developments and performance modelling. I then had the opportunity to follow it all the way to launch as project Technical Lead. It meant working with a fantastic development team to make sure that the concept the business wanted, could become a reality. 

Allister, Principle Systems Engineer

Belfast, Northern Ireland

My team and I had the task of turning the original prototype into a product we could manufacture. We needed a clean room environment where we could build the product, because it’s exceptionally clean on the inside where the optics are. We took steps to set out the production environment, decide what tools and equipment we'd need, how much space we’d need and how many people.

We also had to plan ahead to look at how it would be packaged for shipping. The cameras that we’ve created up to now have been a single box you can pick up yourself. Dragonfly is a whole system and can weigh six or seven hundred kilos. The most interesting part of my job is that no two systems are the same. There are a lot of additional parts you can add to Dragonfly to make it perform differently depending on what the customer wants.

Tim, Microscopy Systems Team Leader

Belfast, Northern Ireland

My team was involved in producing the launch material for Dragonfly, with a brief to demonstrate that we had developed a new and better way to do confocal microscopy. With the name Dragonfly we could get creative with, for example, the beautiful colours, large multifaceted eyes and incredible flexibility of movement in flight. In our teaser campaign we used a close-up of a Dragonfly eye with the text describing a ‘new breed’ that was coming soon to the microscopy market.

During beta testing, I had the opportunity to listen to customers sharing their thoughts on the product. This helped us to understand what excited them the most, and we were able to use this knowledge to share the Dragonfly story through a series of professional videos. We featured the people who had developed and supported it, as well as insights from the customers themselves. 

Jonny, Marketing Manager

Belfast, Northern Ireland

Dragonfly is operated by a powerful workstation, using our Fusion software, and we discovered fairly recently that the workstation we had been buying would be going end of life. At the time, I was part of our Fusion development team, in our Software Department. I had mentioned this change to my manager, and she agreed that I could lead the project to upgrade the workstations.

I reviewed our current processes to understand how they could be improved and configured, and then built a custom workstation in the factory, to investigate the cost and the specifications needed. Using this workstation, we ran experiments with a Dragonfly to ensure we had a workstation that met all our customer requirements.

I discussed our specification and requirements with our suppliers, and we managed to agree on a cost-effective solution which also saves us time as the workstations come ready built. 

Matthew, Desktop & IT Engineer

Belfast, Northern Ireland