August 2017

Omron appoints new director for Oceania region

Omron Asia Pacific has appointed a new director for its operations in the Oceania Region. Mr Henry Zhou, the general manager of Omron Electronics Oceania (Australia and New Zealand), joins Omron Oceania Managing Director Mr Greg Field and Mr Takehito Maeda (MD, Omron Asia Pacific) as Oceania directors. Mr Zhou joined Omron, a global leader in automation, in 1998 in Singapore before moving to Sydney the following year. He has held several prominent roles with the company including Sales Engineer, State Sales Manager NSW, Product Manager and Business Planning & Marketing Manager. And earlier this year, he was appointed head of Omron Food & Beverage and Commodities operations for the APAC region. He is a qualified engineer (automation) and holds an MBA (Management and Marketing) from RMIT University. “It is a great honour to be appointed a director and I look forward to helping the company grow its business in the Oceania and APAC region,” said Mr Zhou, who took up the appointment on August 1. “Our directors have a duty to ensure the company stakeholders – customers, shareholders and staff – receive maximum benefits. Established in 1933, Omron has 36,000 employees and US$7.3 billion revenue. Its APAC network covers over 23 countries with more than 5,200 employees.

Large-scale battery storage to transform renewable energy future

The announcement that the world’s largest lithium ion battery will be installed in South Australia by the end of 2017, will transform and fast track reliable renewable energy in Australia, as well as globally, according to a leading energy industry authority Dr Alex Wonhas, Managing Director, Energy, Resources & Manufacturing of global engineering and infrastructure advisory company Aurecon. Under an agreement with the South Australian Government, billionaire entrepreneur Elon Musk’s Tesla, and the French renewable energy group Neoen, the battery, three times more powerful than any other system in the world, will be designed to provide power to the grid at times of generation shortfall, as well as providing stability to the network, day and night. “The coupling of renewable energy with large scale battery storage is a fundamental requirement for an affordable, reliable and sustainable energy future for Australia,” said Dr Wonhas, who was previously Executive Director for CSIRO’s environment, energy and resources sector. “South Australia is now set to lead the charge in battery storage that will, in turn, revolutionise the way in which renewable energy is integrated into electricity networks. Aurecon is the Specialist and Technical Engineering Advisor to the Government of South Australia for the implementation of its Energy Plan. The company is providing advice across the entire programme, including the 100 MW battery, emergency gas generator and power supply contracts. The announcement of the world’s largest lithium ion grid connected battery system at 100 MW/129 MWh is the culmination of three months of intensive work by Aurecon. This included evaluation and shortlisting of expression of interest submissions, development of the technical and functional requirements of the system and invitation to supply documents, evaluation of respondent proposals and negotiations to enable the final contract to be signed. Aurecon also supported the Government to engage with various […]

Exploring new opportunities for export

Andrew Watson, Executive Director, Efic A new financial year is an opportunity for new beginnings for small businesses. This could involve exploring a new source of revenue, a new growth channel or a new market. For manufacturers, international markets offer a number of exciting opportunities for growth across a range of industries. Export is an opportunity to penetrate new markets, magnify the scale of your business operations and gain global exposure for high quality Australian products and services. In the course of my job, I work with many Australian manufacturers that are achieving success overseas, and it’s inspiring to see. Whether your business is in wine, food, engineering, healthcare or fashion, export can be the chance to take your domestic business to the next level. Many manufacturing businesses are navigating these challenges and achieving great success overseas. One such company is Jet Engineering, an Australian business that specialises in the design, manufacture and installation of custom-built machinery for the mining and construction industries. “Our flagship product is our hydraulic tyre handler, which we developed for the Australian underground coal mining sector,” explains co-founder Shayne Ritchings. Recently, Jet Engineering won a large export contract for a modified version of its hydraulic tyre handler, which will be installed in an underground platinum mine in South Africa. “We’d done a little bit of exporting, having previously sent a crane to a mine in Papua New Guinea a few years ago,” said Shayne, “however this was nowhere near the scale of this South African project.” “The contract is for just the one attachment initially, and a critical spares kit for repairs,” said Shayne, “with possibly a second one down the track.” “Off the back of that, we’re now talking to a mine in Mongolia about the same tyre handler product as well, and we’re […]

Tomcar-

David and Michael Brim started Tomcar in 2005.They make small, but tough, off-road vehicles. They make a car every four days. Tomcar came from outside the industry and this is a real good example of disruptive technology. As a start-up Tomcar didn’t have the resources of large car companies but they had access to cloud computing so it allowed them to disrupt the industry. Tomcar bypasses car dealers and sells direct through its small sales team and website. Selling cars on the internet, people thought they were crazy. The company doesn’t have the margins there and put all that back into the product which is a very expensive handmade piece of machinery. David Brim estimates the pair have funded the business to the tune of $15 million with “very small” amounts of shares sold over the years to family and friends. “We are getting there, it’s an expensive business,” he says. “You need to not know anything about the car industry because you wouldn’t do it otherwise. But if it’s done correctly, it’s very profitable. Just look at Tesla, Elon [Musk] and his team are much better funded than we are but they have a very similar model.”‘ Also of note: they do not actually assemble their cars, outsourcing production to MTM. Like Apple, they handle all of the seven steps of manufacturing besides production.