A TECHNOLOGY business is forecasting £100,000 of sales from its first commercial oil and gas product.
LUX Assure has designed the OMMICA system to detect the concentration of methanol or monoethylene glycol (MEG) in oil and water.
The chemicals are used to stop the build-up of methane hydrates, which can block pipelines, and need to be strictly monitored so they don't contaminate the oil supply.
The testing kit designed by LUX gives results in an hour, and the company believes it is easier to use than the traditional chemistry methods currently employed.
The Edinburgh firm, which had a turnover of more than £100,000 in the year to May 2011, predicts the market for the product is worth more than £1 million a year.
Emma Perfect, managing director, said: "This is a major milestone for the company. OMMICA is the first of the company's products to be launched since we became focused on the oil and gas industry in 2010.
"Monitoring these chemicals is not easy to do at the moment unless you use traditional, analytical chemistry which is not really suited to the vibrations and other aspects of the offshore environment. Our kit comes in a cardboard box, a chemist mixes it together with oil taken from a pipeline and they can see a detectable result."
The perishable elements in the kit mean operators have to place orders each time they want to do a test, which LUX hopes will lead to repeat business.
A second oil and gas product called CoMic will be used for corrosion monitoring and will launch later this year.
Ms Perfect has plans to grow from the current six employees to more than 50.
She said: "We only take on collaborative projects which is our way of ensuring there is a market for what we are doing.
"We are planning on significant growth in the next couple of years.
"We have always been a research and development company but have not had much of a sales presence so we need people in that and in business development.
"At the moment we only have two people trained to go offshore so we would like to expand the offshore chemistry part of the business as well."
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