New president for peak auto engineers body

EXPERIENCED GM Holden engineering executive Adrian Feeney has been elected president of the Society of Automotive Engineers – Australasia.

Mr Feeney has spent the past nine years as a managing engineer at Holden, and leads a small team that works in areas including air induction, shifters, pedals, exhaust and driveline.

He replaces automotive engineering consultant Bill Malkoutzis, who has completed his two-year term as president and remains on the SAE-A board, which this year has seven new members and representation across four states: Victoria, New South Wales, Queensland and Western Australia.

The new full members of the board include Albury-based vehicle engineering consultant John Lyons, Melbourne University’s Kai Morganti, Toyota Technical Centre Australia’s Warrick Stapleton, Brisbane-based electrical and design engineer Lachlan Tomlin, and Conergy’s Michael Upton, who is based in Perth.

The new members also include two co-opted directors: vehicle engineering consultants Col Potts from NSW and Allen Saylav from Victoria.

As well as Mr Malkoutzis, returning board members include Tim Car (CMV Truck and Bus), Geoff Liersch (Robert Bosch Australia), Shane Richardson (DV Experts principal forensic engineer) and Frank Will (Deakin University).

Also returning after an absence of some years is Simon Watkins (RMIT).

Mr Feeney said the new board offered a broad scope of skills that would be drawn upon as the industry continues to face challenging issues, particularly with the downturn in local car and parts manufacturing.

“A steady membership and small profit in the year just ended were positive results given the contraction in the automotive industry,” he said.

“Looking to the future, we will focus on the society’s key tasks of creating opportunities to exchange information, promote education and training and support industry innovation and key industry activities.

“As our increased volunteer activity has proven in a few short months in Melbourne, Queensland and Western Australia, it is most important that individual and corporate members again become involved to help create and deliver activities and events.”

He also thanked retiring directors Max Chanter, Gerald Kent, Ernesto Sanchez, Kevin Keller, Xu Wang, Scott Wordley and long-serving Prof Harry Watson.