Moving the Lab at >45°C is not Fun (at all)

After less than a year in the building we rented in Cyprus, our team moved to a new building we bought for this purpose! We have several reasons for deciding to leave the rented building, which I will mention briefly in this article. 

We landed in Cyprus during the last days of 2022, and at that time, it was only me and Eri. George, our first employee, was hired about two weeks after. Then we hired Vicky and are currently trying out a third person for our team here. Meanwhile, the Greek lab works strongly with three highly experienced people: Socrates, Bo, and Bill.

We have had problems in the Cyprus lab because the building’s owners live above our space. They tried to make our life difficult, and the situation worsened daily. On top of that, the building’s electrical infrastructure is weak, and it is right next to a busy road, so the noise floor of our hemi-anechoic chamber is increased, especially during active hours. Hence, we had to take all noise measurements at night, which devastated me. But the worst part was the distance between the lab and our home, which didn’t allow me flexible work hours, which are ideal for a reviewer who needs to work all around the clock, with short breaks in between. We, reviewers, cannot work normal hours like most regular people. We might hit 18-20 hours of daily work during new product launches to have everything ready once the NDA ends. In Greece, where the first lab is located, I was lucky enough to have my home located about 50 meters away, so my life is easy. On the other hand, in Cyprus, the distance between the lab and the house is 30-45 minutes by car, depending on traffic. Moreover, driving here in Cyprus is a real challenge because most drivers ignore traffic laws and constantly talk on their mobile phones.

Some months ago, we started searching for a new place to move the lab and have enough space to move our home. Since we needed a huge space for the lab and a basement for the hemi-anechoic chamber, this wasn’t an easy task, but after a month of searching, we finally found something, which we eventually bought. The building is huge, close to 700m2, with a 280m2 basement, and it was in relatively good shape. The tough part in Cyprus is finding competent builders and people who will help you with renovations, but we were lucky enough to find one with a team that can handle everything. So we started all renovations in mid-June, which needed about two months to finish.

It is mid of July, and the average temperatures in Cyprus exceed 45°C, with the temperature inside our old lab exceeding 35°C during the hot hours of the day. Moreover, the electricity cost is through the roof, and the old lab’s poor insulation doesn’t help. This is why we decided to make the move the sooner the possible, starting from 17 July 2023. We expect to be fully online at the end of July and have many new reviews and videos for you. We also have a long list of Cybenetics samples to deal with, so we won’t have an easy time once we move and start working from the new place. But we are so excited to have a place of our own where the operating condition and, thanks to the solar panels we ordered already, we won’t be afraid to utilize all of our air condition devices fully.

Please give us about two weeks till we become fully operational again! Meanwhile, we will try to post videos of the new lab and the move process!