technology founded 8 july 1991 ; 25 years ago 1991 07 08 as barleta ltd. 1 founder james dyson headquarters malmesbury wiltshire england key people james dyson chief engineer max conze ceo products vacuum cleaners hand dryers desk fans hair dryers see products listing revenue gb 1.74 billion 2015 2 profit gb 448 million 2015 2 owner james dyson number of employees 7 000 2016 3 website dyson.co.uk dyson dc07 vacuum cleaner dyson ltd is a british technology company that designs and manufactures vacuum cleaners hand dryers bladeless fans and heaters . it sells machines in over 70 countries and employs more than 7 000 people worldwide . contents 1 history 1.1 patent infringement 2 the james dyson award and the james dyson foundation 3 cyclone technology 4 air multiplier 5 research projects 6 production moves to malaysia 7 criticisms and controversy 7.1 bell pottinger 7.2 lawsuit by excel dryer 8 products 9 see also 10 references 11 external links history edit this section reads like a news release or is otherwise written in a promotional tone . please help by either rewriting this article from a neutral point of view or by moving this article to wikinews . when appropriate blatant advertising may be marked for speedy deletion with db spam . april 2015 james dyson encountered problems with the conventional wheelbarrow he was using while renovating his property . he found that the wheel sank into the mud was unstable and was prone to punctures ; the steel body caused damage to paint work and became covered with dried cement . by 1974 dyson had a fibreglass prototype of a barrow with a ball instead of a wheel the ballbarrow . 4 later that year dyson bought a hoover junior vacuum cleaner . the hoover became clogged quickly and lost suction over time . frustrated dyson emptied the bag to try to restore the suction but this had no effect . on opening the bag to investigate he noticed a layer of dust inside clogging the fine material mesh and preventing the machine working properly . the machine worked well only with a fresh bag it lost suction over time . he resolved to develop a better vacuum cleaner that worked more efficiently . 5 during a visit to a local sawmill dyson noticed how the sawdust was removed from the air by large industrial cyclones . 6 centrifugal separators are a typical method of collecting dirt dust and debris in industrial settings . such methods usually were not applied on a smaller scale because of the higher cost . dyson hypothesised the same principle might work on a smaller scale in a vacuum cleaner . he removed the bag from the hoover junior and fitted it with a cardboard cyclone . on cleaning the room with it he found it picked up more than his bag machine . this was the first vacuum cleaner without a bag . 4 according to issue the journal of business and design vol . 8 no. 1 the source of inspiration was in the following form in his usual style of seeking solutions from unexpected sources dyson thought of how a nearby sawmill used a cyclone a 30 foot 9.1 m high cone that spun dust out of the air by centrifugal force to expel waste . he reasoned that a vacuum cleaner that could separate dust by cyclonic action and spin it out of the airstream would eliminate the need for both bag and filter . dyson developed 5 127 prototype designs between 1979 and 1984 the first prototype vacuum cleaner a red and blue machine brought dyson little success as he struggled to find a licensee for his machine in the uk and america . manufacturing companies like hoover did not want to license the design probably because the vacuum bag market was worth 500m so the dyson was a threat to their profits . 4 the only company that expressed interest in the new cyclonic vacuum technology was dyson s former employer rotork . built by italian appliance maker zanussi and sold by kleeneze through mail order catalogue the kleeneze rotork cyclon was the first publicly sold vacuum cleaner of dyson s design . only about 500 units were sold in 1983 . 7 in 1985 a japanese company apex ltd. expressed interest in licensing dyson s design and in march 1986 a reworked version of the cyclon called g force was put into production and sold in japan for the equivalent of us 2 000 . 7 8 the g force had an attachment that could turn it into a table to save space in small japanese apartments . 4 in 1991 it won the international design fair prize in japan and became a status symbol there . using the income from the japanese licence james dyson set up dyson appliances ltd. in 1991 . the first dual cyclone vacuum built under the dyson name the da 001 was produced by american company phillips plastics in a facility in wrexham wales beginning in january 1993 and sold for about 200 . 7 due to quality control concerns and phillips s desire to renegotiate the terms of their contract to build the vacuum cleaner dyson severed the agreement in may 1993 . within two months dyson set up a new supply chain and opened a new production facility in chippenham wiltshire england ; 7 the first vacuum built at the new facility was completed 1 july 1993 . the da 001 was soon replaced by an almost identical vacuum called dc01 . even though market research showed that people wouldn t be happy with a transparent container for the dust dyson and his team decided to make a transparent container anyway and this turned out to be a popular and enduring feature which has been heavily copied . 9 the dc01 became the biggest selling vacuum cleaner in the uk in just 18 months . 4 by 2001 the dc01 made up 47 % of the upright vacuum cleaner market . 10 a dyson airblade mk . 2 the company introduced a cylinder machine the dc02 and produced a number of special editions and revised models dc02 absolute dc02 de stijl dc05 dc04 dc06 dc04 zorbster . on 2 january 2001 the company name was shortened from dyson appliances ltd. to simply dyson ltd. 1 in april of that year the dc07 a new upright vacuum cleaner using root cyclone technology with seven cyclone funnels instead of the original dual cyclone design was launched . by 2009 dyson began creating other technologies the airblade hand dryer the air multiplier bladeless fan and dyson hot the bladeless fan heater . 11 patent infringement edit in 1985 amway was sued by dyson for the copyright infringement of dyson dual cyclone prototype machine . in april 1984 dyson claims that he had sent the prototype machines drawings and confidential information to amway as part of the contract . in january 1985 amway produced the cms 1000 a machine which was very similar to the dyson design . less than a month later dyson sued amway . 12 in 1999 the us company hoover was found guilty of patent infringement . 13 in july 2010 dyson lost a legal action against vax in the high court . the ruling rejected dyson s claim that the vax mach zen had infringed one of its registered designs . 14 however although it lost this case in britain and the subsequent appeal in 2011 it won a similar case against vax s sister company dirt devil in france . 15 in september 2013 dyson initiated court proceedings against samsung alleging they had infringed on a steering mechanism patent that dyson holds which has later been dropped . 16 the james dyson award and the james dyson foundation edit the james dyson award is an international student design award running in 18 countries . it is run by the james dyson foundation james dyson s charitable trust as part of its mission to encourage the next generation of design engineers to be creative challenge and invent . the international winner of the james dyson award will receive for themselves and for their university . 17 the james dyson foundation aims to inspire young people to study engineering and become engineers . by visiting schools and universities and providing workshops for young people the foundation hopes to encourage creativity and ingenuity . over 727 schools in great britain and northern ireland have used dyson s education boxes to send to teachers and pupils in order to learn more about the design process . the james dyson foundation also provides bursaries and scholarships to aspiring engineers . 18 cyclone technology edit see also dust collector a dyson vacuum cleaner uses cyclonic separation to remove dust and other particles from the air stream . dirty air enters a conical container called a cyclone where it is made to flow in a tight spiral . centrifugal force throws the particles out of the airflow onto the wall of the container from which they can fall into a bin . the vacuum cleaner uses several stages of cyclones . dyson states that centrifugal forces can reach up to 150 000 g. 19 air multiplier edit the dyson air multiplier is a household appliance functioning as a cooling fan . it was introduced in october 2009 . 20 like other bladeless fans the apparatus itself has no visible external blades as the fan blades are concealed within the body of the product . the principle of bladeless fan technology is that air is pushed through an annular aperture being a forward facing circular slit in a vertical ring shaped frame the amplifier . this creates a thin jet stream of air that while emerging from the aperture passes over an airfoil shaped ramp that channels its direction . surrounding air is pulled along with the airflow producing a phenomenon called entrainment . at the same time the airflow away from the ring forward creates an area of low pressure . the low pressure pulls in more air from behind the machine filling the gap which then passes through the open area of the ring shaped frame and is drawn into the air stream . this phenomenon is called inducement . 20 dyson states that the initially generated air flow is multiplied between 15 and 18 times for the models am01 am02 and am03 projecting a smooth stream of uninterrupted air . 21 in march 2014 the second generation models of the air multiplier were acoustically re engineered so that the bladeless fans were quieter than their predecessors by improved airflow and a helmholtz resonator to cancel a 10 khz whine . 22 research projects edit in 2014 dyson invested 23 in a joint robotics lab with imperial college london to investigate vision systems and engineer a generation of household robots . 24 in 2001 they got close to launching a robot vacuum the dc06 but james dyson pulled it from the production line as it was too heavy and slow . 25 dyson invested in a dyson chair at cambridge university in november 2011 . the dyson professor of fluid mechanics focuses on teaching and researching the science and engineering behind air movement . 26 in addition dyson invested hundreds of thousands pounds in a dyson research branch at newcastle university in may 2012 to investigate the next generation of dyson digital motor and motor drive . production moves to malaysia edit initially dyson vacuum cleaners and washing machines were made in malmesbury wiltshire . in 2002 the company transferred vacuum cleaner production to malaysia . dyson stated that the company requested planning permission to expand the factory to increase vacuum cleaner production but that this application failed . however the local government says that no such permission was ever sought as the land dyson planned to use was privately owned and