“It’s crazy out there right now”

Advanced Test­ing Sys­tems Inc. —locat­ed in Bethel, Con­necti­cut —spe­cial­izes in high-volt­age test­ing tech­nol­o­gy and equip­ment test­ing. It has been a mem­ber of HIGHVOLT, a Rein­hausen Group com­pa­ny, since 2022, there­by fur­ther expand­ing HIGHVOLT’s ser­vice net­work in the USA. Mike Sower­by, Gen­er­al Man­ag­er of Advanced Test­ing Sys­tems Inc. explains why his team’s ser­vices are more in demand than ever.


What does Advanced Testing Systems Inc. do?

We essen­tial­ly serve two areas: One con­cerns the test­ing of medi­um and low-volt­age sys­tems at pri­vate com­pa­nies, for exam­ple in indus­try, as well as at state facil­i­ties such as hos­pi­tals or retire­ment homes.

We car­ry out rou­tine main­te­nance tests on switch­ing sys­tems, motors, and trans­form­ers. If equip­ment is defec­tive, we repair it and return it to our cus­tomers ready for use again. In this field, the focus of our oper­a­tions is on the states of New York, Con­necti­cut, and New Jer­sey.

And the other area?

This is our ser­vice in the high-volt­age range and includes our large AC volt­age and DC cur­rent tests with test capac­i­ties of up to 1000 kilo­volts.

„HIGHVOLT and Advanced Test­ing Sys­tems com­ple­ment each oth­er per­fect­ly here. We are also plan­ning to work more close­ly with Rein­hausen Man­u­fac­tur­ing.”“

Mike Sower­by, Geschäfts­führer

We offer this ser­vice through­out the USA as well as in Cana­da and Mex­i­co. Cus­tomers include major man­u­fac­tur­ers such as Siemens, ABB, Hitachi and Nex­ans. We also test gas-insu­lat­ed switch­ing sys­tems (GIS), cables for ener­gy sup­ply com­pa­nies, and trans­form­ers.

And we car­ry out main­te­nance on the high-volt­age test­ing sys­tems required for this type of equip­ment. In this regard, we sup­port all test sys­tems from all high-volt­age man­u­fac­tur­ers such as HIGHVOLT, Hae­fe­ly, Phenix, HVTest and oth­ers, and also sup­port the com­mis­sion­ing of HIGHVOLT projects in North Amer­i­ca.

HIGHVOLT and Advanced Test­ing Sys­tems com­ple­ment each oth­er per­fect­ly here. We are also plan­ning to work more close­ly with Rein­hausen Man­u­fac­tur­ing, and we expect lucra­tive syn­er­gies in the long term with such a strong part­ner behind us.

Man­ag­ing Direc­tor Mike Sower­by of Advanced Test­ing Sys­tems Inc. with his team at the company’s site in Bethel, Con­necti­cut. (© Johannes Kroe­mer)

What makes your services special?

We have high­ly qual­i­fied and expe­ri­enced employ­ees who are very famil­iar with the tech­nol­o­gy. For oth­er mar­ket play­ers, this is not always a giv­en. They often offer low­er prices, but even in regard to rou­tine main­te­nance, our exper­tise can make a dif­fer­ence because we rec­og­nize prob­lems ear­ly on that oth­ers might over­look. We pre­fer to work long-term.

We also offer an emer­gency (24/7) ser­vice. Our cus­tomers can even con­tact us on a Sat­ur­day night, and we will send a tech­ni­cian as quick­ly as pos­si­ble. We have always received very pos­i­tive feed­back for this flex­i­bil­i­ty as well as our exper­tise and we can offer ser­vice for HIGHVOLT test sys­tems with very short response times.

How do you see the current market situation?

The mar­ket in the high-volt­age sec­tor seems to me to be the best we have ever seen. It’s crazy out there right now at the moment with gigan­tic infra­struc­ture projects cur­rent­ly being launched in the US. The state of New Jer­sey alone has recent­ly spent bil­lions to mod­ern­ize its sub­sta­tions.

More and more cables are also being laid under­ground for high-volt­age trans­mis­sion in the 345 kV range, which is great news for our AC tests. Until now, over­head lines have most­ly been built for this pur­pose in this coun­try.

And there is also a change in aware­ness: In the US, there is sig­nif­i­cant­ly more test­ing than there was 15 years ago because many now real­ize that some prob­lems can be avoid­ed if they are iden­ti­fied and elim­i­nat­ed in advance. HIGHVOLT’s test­ing sys­tems will there­fore be in greater demand. And as a ser­vice com­pa­ny, we are adapt­ing to this trend. 

At a glance

Advanced Test­ing Sys­tems Inc. was found­ed in 1982 and has been steadi­ly expand­ing its port­fo­lio ever since. Mike Sower­by stud­ied elec­tri­cal engi­neer­ing and has been on board since 2005. In 2023, the British native took over man­age­ment of the com­pa­ny from its founders and now runs it with a total of 18 employ­ees.

The most important services are:
  • Alter­nat­ing cur­rent and direct cur­rent tests up to 700 kV
  • Instal­la­tion, main­te­nance, and ser­vices for test sys­tems
  • Com­mis­sion­ing tests for GIS and cable sys­tems
  • Cable fault loca­tion
  • 24/7 emer­gency ser­vice

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