In light of the COVID-19 pandemic, ŠKODA AUTO is supporting charities, municipalities and volunteers in a fast, unbureaucratic and comprehensive manner: the carmaker has made available more than 200 cars as well as 150 BeRider electric scooters for them. The vehicles are used to deliver medicines and food, among other things. More than 20 cities and organisations already use the fleet of vehicles, including the city of Brno and charities such as Caritas Czech Republic, ADRA, the Red Cross and Sue Ryder.
To ensure this measure could be implemented as quickly as possible, colleagues from different business units have been working in close collaboration. This includes members of staff from ŠKODA AUTO DigiLab, the car sharing service HoppyGo, Uniqway – the car-sharing platform for students – and ŠKODA dealers. HoppyGo is responsible for managing the fleet and regularly disinfects all vehicles with ozone. This particularly fast and efficient cleaning method has been made possible by ŠKODA AUTO DigiLab. On top of that, the ŠKODA team ensures that information on where to find free spots for the ozone treatment is provided online to all the relevant partners.
The wearing of special protective masks is essential to prevent the coronavirus from spreading, especially for doctors and nursing staff. With its employees’ expertise, ŠKODA is contributing here too. The research team from the Czech Institute of Informatics, Robotics and Cybernetics (CIIRC) of the Czech Technical University in Prague has been supported by ŠKODA AUTO’s development centre in Česana – where work is usually carried out on ŠKODA prototypes and models of future vehicle generations – to develop and implement a 3D printing process for the production of FFP3 respirators. Not only do these masks boast the highest level of protection but thanks to their replaceable filter, they can also be reused. ŠKODA funded their development too, and production is already running at top speed following the respirators’ certification a few days ago. The produced masks are delivered to the Czech Ministry of Health straight away, and are then distributed to hospitals and doctors. At present, around 60 respirators are produced at ŠKODA AUTO each day; the project is also supported by Czech universities and private companies that have similar printers, leading to a total daily output of several hundred masks.
ŠKODA provides financial support to combat the corona pandemic
For people and social services in the regions of its Czech sites, ŠKODA has also made direct financial aid available – to date amounting to ten million Czech korunas. In addition to Mnichovo Hradiště, Bakov nad Jizerou, Bělá pod Bezdězem, Benátky nad Jizerou and Vrchlabí, Rychnov nad Kněžnou and Mladá Boleslav benefit from this too. All of these measures help the people responsible and the municipalities to provide the elderly with food and other everyday products, or to provide urgently needed medical aid.
