The 2 firms provide a range of managed laundry services to higher education customers such as universities, colleges and providers of student accommodation. These services include supplying and maintaining washing machines and tumble dryers, refurbishing laundry rooms and providing cashless payment services and apps to monitor machines remotely.

When JLA New Equity Co Limited (JLA) acquired Washstation Limited (Washstation) in May 2017, the transaction represented a merger between the 2 leading providers of managed laundry services to the higher education sector.

After receiving a complaint about the completed merger, the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) opened an initial Phase 1 investigation into the takeover in February 2018. It found significant competition concerns, namely that JLA’s purchase of its nearest competitor would give the merged company a market share of more than 90%.

As a result, the case was referred to a group of independent panel members at the CMA for an in-depth, Phase 2, investigation.

After considering a wide range of evidence, the CMA has issued provisional findings. It is concerned that the merger is likely to result in customers paying more for laundry services or receiving a lower quality service, which might ultimately impact students.

The CMA found that, following the merger, JLA now faces only limited competition. Other providers of managed laundry services in the higher education sector are not currently in a position to compete strongly with JLA / Washstation, and it is unlikely that any future expansion by these firms would be sufficient or quick enough to offset the loss of competition caused by the merger.

The investigation has also shown that companies providing laundry services in other sectors – for customers such as hospitals, care homes or leisure centres – would find it difficult to enter the higher education market and create enough competition to act as rivals for the merged company.

The CMA is now inviting comments on its provisional findings until 31 August. It will also seek comments up until 21 August on its remedies notice, which outlines measures the CMA could take if it finally decides that there has been a substantial lessening of competition.

Further details are available on the investigation case page.

Updated: Competition now open.

DASA is launching this competition to seek ideas for innovative technologies that provide an improved way to detect and locate hazardous biological agents in the field, in real-time.The ultimate aim is for a fieldable system that would detect and report without users (including trained military specialists and civilian first line responders) coming into close contact with the hazard.

By detecting these hazards as early as possible and remotely, this will enable users to safely avoid areas and highlight in real-time where decontamination procedures need to take place.

This competition has an initial budget of £500k for Phase 1. Additional funding is anticipated to be available for future phases of this competition.

Further details about the competition are in the summary document.

The competition will close at 1pm on 7 November 2018

Details on how to apply will be included in the full competition document which will be available soon. If you have any queries on this competition, please do contact us at accelerator@dstl.gov.uk or sign up for alerts.

A waste transfer package has been lifted into the building for the first time.

The 50-tonne package was safely placed onto one of three machines that will begin grabbing waste out of the building’s 22 silo compartments from next year.

Originally constructed as six silos in the 1960’s and then extended three times, MSSS stores magnesium cladding or ‘swarf’ that was stripped from Magnox fuel prior to reprocessing.

The swarf is stored underwater in the 16 metre-deep silos but over time the magnesium releases heat and hydrogen meaning the facility requires constant management and monitoring.

Since the early 1990’s this type of waste has been immobilised in concrete instead as this makes it more passive and practical to manage.

The radioactive inventory and lack of modern standards in MSSS makes it the most complicated and highest-priority mission in the Nuclear Decommissioning Authority’s estate.

Preparations for removing the 11,000m3 of historic waste from the silos and placing them into safe, modern storage have been over twenty years in the making.

Next year three 360 tonne Silo Emptying Plant (SEP) machines will start reaching in to the silos and removing the waste with a hydraulic grab.

The waste will then be loaded into the shielded transfer packages and safely stored on the Sellafield site until a permanent geological disposal facility is constructed.

Head of Programme for MSSS, Chris Halliwell, said:

The transfer package is the essential link in the chain to safer storage.

It’s a big moment to see it finally being attached to the SEP machine inside the silo.

Never before have these two bits of machinery met inside the place where they’ll be carrying out our biggest job in hazard reduction.

The first transfer package to enter MSSS was manufactured by Workington firm TSP Engineering and is one of nine original packages they have built and modified for Sellafield Ltd.

TSP is currently competing with Cavendish Nuclear to build the next batch of 15 transfer packages; an advanced manufacturing contract worth tens of millions of pounds to British Industry.