Manufacturing news briefs – stories you might have missed

Aboriginal business forum kicks off in WA

The Mid-West of Western Australia’s first-ever Aboriginal Business Forum kicked off this week to harness opportunities and celebrate recent successes. State government ministers launched the Geraldton event, and more than 200 people from local aboriginal businesses, state agency buyers, head contractors and local industry attended. The event supports the further implementation of the Aboriginal Procurement Policy by creating potential contracting opportunities for aboriginal businesses with state agencies, and delivers on broader economic development opportunities with the local building industry. Under state policies agencies and contractors are required to meet employment and subcontracting targets. Over the first three years of the policy, a total of 692 contracts have been awarded to Aboriginal businesses, at a total value of more than $475 million. Of those, 92 contracts have been awarded to aboriginal businesses in the Mid-West, valued at over $68 million.

Xtek ships first tranche of massive body armour order

Xtek’s HighCom Armor Solutions Inc. has dispatched a tranche representing 23.3 per cent of specialist ballistic products from a US$33.21m order from an undisclosed international customer, and manufactured at the company’s Columbus Ohio facility. The group anticipates the second shipment of a further 20 per cent of the order, worth US$6.642m, will be dispatched before 30 June, and the remainder delivered through Q1 FY2023. Following the announcement on June 6 of an $8.1 million order from the Department of Defence for SUAS drone spares, the group’s total new order bookings since March 1 are more than A$77.6 million. Xtek group CEO Scott Basham said: “Our HighCom Armor team has been working absolutely tirelessly to manufacture, prepare, and now ship, this first tranche of the transformational order.”

EOS appoints inaugural CIO

Australian technology company Electro Optic Systems (EOS) announced the appointment of Shane Geisler as its inaugural Chief Information Officer (CIO) this week. Geisler (pictured) was described as an innovative, cloud-native IT executive, bringing over 15 years of experience in leading the end-to-end delivery of secure, scalable, cost-effective ICT systems to EOS’ executive leadership team. Geisler joined the company in 2020 and has previously acted as IT Program Manager and Head of Global ICT. “I am honoured to become the inaugural CIO of a growing multinational business,” he said. “It’s an exciting time to be part of EOS, and I’m looking forward to leading the technology transformation of our company into an agile, cloud-first market leader with operations across four continents.”

Nova names new CFO
Nova Systems has appointed Peter Arambatzis as its Chief Financial Officer. Nova said in an announcement on Thursday that Arambatzis brought a strong background in government, healthcare, and financial services sectors to the role, and was relocating to the company’s Adelaide head office from Sydney this month. The new CFO was most recently at document and digital solutions supplier Law In Order. “I am looking forward to joining Nova Systems, a growing sovereign Australian company with vast potential,” said Arambatzis.

UOW-based Women’s Research Engineers Network expands into ASEAN

The Women Research Engineer’s Network (WREN), founded in 2021 by early career researchers from the University of Wollongong and with membership of over 250 researchers, will expand to Malaysia, Thailand, Indonesia and Vietnam through a webinar and podcast series. The group was launched by Dr Marcella Bernardo Papini, Dr Mainã Portella Garcia, Ms Grace Kennedy, Dr Emily Yap and Dr Ashley Ansari and aims to narrow the gender gap in engineering research careers. It was awarded a grant from the Australia-ASEAN Council, which supports projects that address the needs of Southeast Asian countries following the COVID-19 pandemic, with a particular focus on women’s empowerment in the region.

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