John Showell MSc CEng MIET

Founder, co-owner and Director of Product Approvals Ltd.

info@productapprovals.co.uk

My core regulatory technical expertise is in the field of product safety. I enjoy applying my engineering knowledge and experience, together with our highly experienced team, to help deliver the best product approvals solution for our customer's needs.

The biggest buzz I get from my role is working with our customers to achieve their compliance goals such as CE marking or UL approval of their latest products. We aim to help many more companies successfully meet their approvals needs in the quickest possible time and in the most cost-effective way. 
I started Product Approvals Ltd in 2006 and we have now completed many successful approvals related projects across several industry sectors - from some small projects such as brief safety reviews of the construction of new proposed designs, through to large and complex approvals projects lasting over a year and resulting in multiple certifications covering multiple countries, for a range of products. We've assisted companies in the UK, Ireland, EU, USA, Canada, Australia, Hong Kong, China, Peru and the list grows. 
Some of the industry sectors we have worked in include consumer products, industrial control equipment, power supplies, inverters, LED lighting, computers, laboratory equipment, electrically operated machines, consumer goods, medical devices, personal protective equipment, construction products and renewable energy.
Product Approvals Ltd is continually expanding its services and in 2016 we moved to larger premises allowing us to set up a dedicated safety, EMC and IP testing laboratory, supplementing our consultancy and compliance project management services.

Current academic interests include research in to artificial intelligence techniques applied to compliance engineering. Using AI in this and similar domains is very challenging as many AI methodologies are based on processing large amounts of data in order to render decision assistance / advice. Such large amounts of data are not typical in compliance engineering and consultancy. The way forward in the compliance engineering field appears to be in further development of expert systems / knowledge based systems, perhaps combined with machine learning methodologies.

In my spare time I enjoy travel, restoring my 1979 MGB GT. I can recommend walking Offa's Dyke - a 177 mile trail which has plenty of stunning views along the way. http://www.nationaltrail.co.uk/offasdyke/