In dentistry, it is common practice to examine a patient's oral flora for periodontal disease bacteria. In modern dental practices, analysis machines are used to provide a highly reliable result about the patient's oral flora status in a short amount of time.

Such an analysis machine must be capable of even more, thought Wolfgang Gschmeidler, the engineer from St. Pölten, when he spoke with Ingo Discher, the sales and marketing specialist from Potsdam. In turn, Discher reported that a Legionella test as part of the preliminary examination currently takes up to ten days for a valid result using the incubation method. Precious time that could be used for measures to reduce the risk for people.

In 2018, SuSAn-Water GmbH, which stands for Sustainable Services for Water Analysis, was founded by Wolfgang Gschmeidler and Ingo Discher together with biotech specialist Otto Kanzler to develop and market a new method for Legionella analysis.

Following the financing phase and preceding research, the three founders and company owners have been working together since 2021 in a multi-competence team. This team consists of internationally renowned biotech companies, process engineers, industry experts, and is accompanied by the Federal Environment Agency (UBA) to achieve their goals. The development of Legionella antibodies and the filtering system to reduce water volume to the capacity of the analysis machine were not the only challenges they faced.

And now, preparations for the certification of the SuSAn method as a recognized alternative procedure for the preliminary examination according to the Drinking Water Ordinance (TrinkwV) are nearing completion. The plan is to detect other biomarkers with SuSAn and to continue examining processes in drinking water analysis for future improvements.