Business News

Women in Engineering: Insa Errey

Insa Errey is a female engineer originally from Sydney who now calls Auckland home. She currently operates as an independent consultant under Curios Sustainability. How long have you been an engineer? Almost 10 years. I was a late bloomer into engineering. What field of engineering do you specialise in? I specialise in Industrial sustainability. My background is in Chemical biomolecular engineering, with my past experiences being in beverage manufacturing. What projects are you most proud of? It is always rewarding to complete large-scale implementations such as fuel switching projects and wastewater recycling projects. But I think my proudest project is more subtle. In my previous company I mobilised employee awareness toward the issues of sustainability and energy efficiency. My campaign drove awareness through cultural change and started a larger shift toward collaboration on energy efficiency. This has seen year on year energy efficiency improvements driving down operational costs, increasing competitive advantage and most of all reducing emissions from their major manufacturing sites across Australia and NZ. Is there scope for creativity, creative thinking? Absolutely. Creativity is the foundation on innovation. I actually went to a performing arts high school, now a long time ago, and I think that is what dew me to engineering was the ability to still be creative and think outside the box but also make significant impact toward system pressures facing us today. What challenges do engineers face in today’s business world? I think that the main challenge facing engineers is that which we are all facing, climate change, and how this is impacting all areas of how we do business. Businesses and, in particular, manufacturing, are facing and experiencing risks associated with operational disruption, impacts of market forces and future stranded assets with the changing energy market. Here I see engineers having the important role […]

The value of materials and manufacturing in a circular economy

Part 1 of 2 of thinkstep-anz’s circular economy series By Dr. Jim Goddin Circular products are built to last. The materials that make them up stay in use for as long as possible. When they can no longer be used in their original form, they contribute to other products. A circular economy is based on three principles: designing out waste, keeping products and materials in use, and regenerating natural systems. Circular economy thinking is gaining traction in New Zealand and Australia but focuses predominantly on avoiding or minimising waste through recycling. In New Zealand, waste — especially single-use packaging and plastic waste — has enjoyed the spotlight as a high-priority environmental issue for quite some time. In the latest Better Futures report by Colmar Brunton, two of the top ten concerns for New Zealanders were not enough waste being recycled and, overpackaging, non-recyclable packaging and the amount of waste going to landfill. Yet, waste remains a stubborn issue to tackle. Waste avoidance through recycling is a prominent component of the circular economy and is, from a practical perspective, where most products will need to end up. Recycling is, however, the outermost ‘loop’ in the circular economy model, with materials typically representing a tiny portion of the economic value of products. Recovering the more substantial value added to materials through manufacturing is a more significant portion of the prize at stake. The inner loops of the circular economy model Dig a little deeper into the circular economy model and you get to the inner ‘loops’ where the systems-level change happens. Strategies in the inner loops of the circular economy include product life extension, enhanced product utilisation (through leasing models for example), reuse, repair and remanufacturing. The inner loops address the root causes of waste: overproduction and overconsumption. A key economic advantage […]

Problem solving the next frontier

-Ian Walsh, Managing Director, Intent Group Over the last few years, I have run several courses and seminars for business leaders, wanting to improve their business performance and productivity. One of the questions I typically ask is how much time a week they invest in problem solving? The answers vary, but many suggest they do a fair amount of problem solving. I then ask how many of them dedicate a set amount of time each week to structured problem solving as opposed to reactive, during the event, problem solving. After some muttering and reflection, for most of the group, the answer is none. Less than 10% invest structured time with their teams to solve problems! It was Einstein who defined insanity as doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result. Surely you can’t expect your business to improve if you don’t invest any time in solving problems to root cause? Improvement itself is defined as solving the right (more impactful) problems at a faster rate than the ones that are occurring. If all you are doing is reacting to what occurs then you are treading water and in today’s competitive landscape, I believe going backwards. The question I have is why do we do this? Or why don’t we invest in structured problem solving? Here are the top 5 great myths: It takes too long, and we don’t have time. But we have time to react to the failure and lose production while we fix it. We are too busy. This is because we are reacting to all the problems that we haven’t fixed. We don’t need to do this as we have engineers who solve the problems, thus placing all responsibility on one group for this activity. This is ‘I operate, you fix’ mentality and […]

Unlikely alliance formed to combat supermarket power

It’s an unlikely pairing, but Consumer NZ and The NZ Food & Grocery Council have published a joint open letter to parliament today calling for a shake-up of the supermarket industry. “We are not always allies, but we both agree the concentration of market power in our supermarket sector is producing poor outcomes and putting strain on New Zealand households. Both consumers and suppliers are being held to ransom by the duopoly of Foodstuffs and Woolworths NZ,” Consumer NZ chief executive Jon Duffy said. Analysis of Stats NZ data show the cost of an average shop for a typical household equates to 15-20% of income for median or lower income earners. “The general consensus is that grocery expenditure should sit between 5-15% of total household income. What we’re hearing from many New Zealanders is that they’re having to spend too much of their weekly pay packet to keep themselves fed. Whatever way you slice it, the cost of groceries keeps going up and the duopoly’s profits are persistently high. Each year households are getting squeezed further,” Duffy said. Consumer NZ’s Sentiment Tracker found concerns about the cost of food and groceries have climbed in the past few months with grocery cost concerns ahead of those about fuel, healthcare, energy, insurance and phone bills. Concerns about food prices come in second to rent and mortgage costs. “Supermarkets are crucial to our communities and economy – but the duopoly are bullying suppliers, even large ones, and consumers are worse off in terms of price paid at the checkout, choice and innovation. With the lack of any real competition between the two supermarket chains, they’ve been able to maintain staggering profit margins which are not enjoyed anywhere else in the world,” New Zealand Food & Grocery Council chief executive Katherine Rich said. […]

New appointments at TMX

TMX, Asia-Pacific business transformation consultancy, has consolidated its position as independent automation advisors in New Zealand by announcing two significant appointments to its supply chain division. TMX has appointed Mark Rummins, former Logistics Network Manager at Fonterra, as Associate Director – Supply Chain and Francis Umali, as Senior Project Manager – Automation. These appointments build TMX’s supply chain advisory offering in New Zealand and support the firm’s full end-to-end integrated consulting services in supply chain, automation, freight and logistics, property and construction project management. The appointments also highlight TMX’s focus on growing their automation offering as more businesses in New Zealand take up the chance to automate aspects of their supply chain. TMX is currently working on automation projects with New Zealand Post, GPC and Coolpak in addition to several other major clients. Mark brings over 15 years of experience in New Zealand’s supply chain and logistics sector to TMX. Prior to his career at Fonterra, Mark was Director of Operations at DHL. An automation expert, Francis has over 15 years of industry experience and expertise in delivering global projects in fresh produce grading/packaging, warehouse storage solutions, machine safety, and semiconductor manufacturing.

EECA building energy use picture amongst NZ food and beverage businesses

The Energy Efficiency and Conservation Authority (EECA) is building a picture of energy use in the NZ Food and Beverage sector (not including dairy, meat and seafood). Importantly, the findings of this project will help EECA to design effective programmes to support energy efficiency and decarbonisation for the Food and Beverage sector. To participate in the study – a simple survey, which is due in by the end of October – should take 15-20 minutes and can be completed online at: https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/MTPVXPP

igus heavy-duty rol e-chain for maximum service life

The new generations of cranes demand increasingly more from energy supply systems. Now an energy chain meets precisely these requirements for longer travels, higher accelerations and speeds as well as reliability. The new heavy-duty P4HD rol e-chain from Treotham is made of highly abrasion-resistant materials. Special side parts, newly designed joining links, roller links as well as a triple stop-dog system minimise wear and reduce the drive energy even further. All parts can be replaced in case of maintenance. To monitor the service life, smart plastics sensors can be integrated into the pin/bore connection. They are getting faster, longer and have to carry heavier fill weights: the energy chains in the new generations of ship-to-shore cranes. “Especially for these emerging trends in the world of cranes, we have already developed a new rol e-chain with the longest service life”, says Jörg Ottersbach, e-chains Business Unit Manager at igus GmbH. This is why igus has launched a heavy-duty version based on its P4 rol e-chain range. The chain is said to have a service life – depending on the application – of up to 15 years. For this purpose, igus relies on tribologically optimised high-performance polymers. In order to further reduce abrasion at all points of the chain, igus has come up with a few design refinements. Amongst other things, a triple stop-dog system and a symmetrical design. The integrated rollers reduce the required drive energy by 57 per cent compared to a gliding chain. The rollers run on top of each other in a staggered manner. The comb-like autoglide crossbars keep the chain in its track, increasing the safety of the system and reducing costly unplanned downtime. In the new pin/bore connection, igus uses its expertise from polymer plain bearing technology and relies on a proven iglidur material, which also […]

Reimagining manufacturing in New Zealand: turning adversity into opportunity

As the world grappled with supply chain disruptions and delays as a result of Covid-19 lockdowns and restrictions, manufacturers found themselves dealing with long delays and shortages of critical goods and products. Peter Jones, Managing Director and Founder at Prological says this revealed a vulnerability in just in time principles, which has presented an opportunity to re-imagine manufacturing in New Zealand. Manufacturers around the world have been following a just in time principle for their operations. Simply speaking, just in time is an inventory management method in which goods are received only as they are needed. This method gained significant traction during Global Financial Crisis (GFC). Out of necessity, businesses learned how to run on a much leaner inventory as budgets were tightened and expenses cut. After the GFC, many organisations throughout the world continued to follow the principles of just in time – largely because it worked. However, just in time only works on the assumption that everything is working perfectly all the time. As soon as Covid-19 started to rip through China, Europe and the US – many manufacturers in New Zealand were faced with long delays and significant shortages of critical goods. As the global aviation industry reached a near standstill, there was no air freight capacity into the country. With 60 to 65 per cent of air cargo usually carried on passenger aircraft – the price of air freight started to rise exponentially. At the same time, the global shipping industry was also facing significant delays alongside freight costs growing exponentially. These delays and disruptions not only impacted manufacturers in New Zealand, but also retailers – as New Zealand is an importer of finished goods. There are many stories across the industry of major manufacturing companies’ entire global operation coming to a standstill because of […]

D-Link launches new, sleek and discreet home security cameras

D-Link has launched its new DCS-6500LH Compact Full HD Pan & Tilt and DCS-6100LH Compact Full HD Sleek and Discreet Wi-Fi Home Security Cameras. DCS-6100LH Compact Full HD Wi-Fi Camera Sleek and discreet, the Compact DCS-6100LH Full HD Wi-Fi Camera blends enhanced Smart Home Surveillance features with a stylish, subtle design. IR Night Vision together with Sound and Motion Detection alerts you instantly when something unexpected happens, giving you extra peace of mind with the latest in home security camera technology. The DCS-6100LH brings crystal clear surveillance as it allows you to monitor your home in Full HD 1080p resolution with a wide-angle 110-degree Field of View (FOV), day or night, making it the perfect 24/7 home security companion. Designed to be stylish, subtle and simple to use, it’s ideal for discreet placement anywhere throughout your home. The DCS-6100LH’s built-in Sound and Motion Detection enables you to trigger alerts that are automatically sent to your mobile device and the video clip recordings let you stay aware of what’s going on at all times in your home – and yes, it’s ideal as a baby monitor or office camera as well. If you’re worried that you’ll lose all your camera footage the DCS-6100LH Compact Full HD Wi-Fi Camera lets you record snapshots and video clips to the cloud for anytime access. You can also play back recordings from the cloud or download footage to your mobile device from anywhere, anytime through the Internet. DCS-6500LH Compact Full HD Pan & Tilt Wi-Fi Camera The DCS-6500LH Compact Full HD Pan & Tilt Wi-Fi Camera gives you 340° views as its Pan & Tilt technology allows you to see virtually every angle of any room. With Motion and Sound Detection as well as Night Vision that provides up to five metres of monitoring in complete […]

Advanced NZ-made filter media kills coronavirus

A New Zealand company has developed and launched an innovative filter media for face masks and air filtration systems that kills bacteria and viruses, including the Human coronavirus 229E. Auckland based NanoLayr, a deep tech manufacturer specialising in nanofibre production at scale, has added manuka oil to its patented nanofibre filter product FilterLayr, to create a N95 rated filter media. The properties of the manuka as well as the high surface area of the nanofibres, means that FilterLayr is one of the most effective filter media in the market. NanoLayr testing has shown FilterLayr with manuka infused nanofibres kills >99% of bacteria as well as bacteriophage. Independent testing has also shown FilterLayr to be effective in killing/inhibiting the Covid-19 surrogate virus, Human coronavirus 229E and further testing on similar viruses such as Covid-19 is underway. NanoLayr CEO Ray Connor says the development is a breakthrough in the fight against future pandemics, as FilterLayr can be produced at large scale to help meet global demand for face masks. “The pandemic has highlighted the importance of providing effective protection for workers on the front line and the large numbers of people who wear masks daily. The beauty of this product is that it provides highly effective protection against infectious bacteria, viruses and airborne particles,” he says. NanoLayr is the first manufacturer to use manuka oil as a microbial agent in air filtration applications. The bioactive manuka oil is contained within a nanofibre fabric that stops viruses and bacteria from passing through it, meaning any bacteria or virus trapped in the nanofibre fabric are deactivated and killed. This delivers a far superior result to filters coated with bactericidal actives, where the active coatings can wear off and risk entering the users body. Connor says the bioactive nanofibre filters can be used in facemasks […]

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