Success in technological innovation from onset: Tensile Structures Pty Ltd.
In 1982, Chris decided to leave academia and with his wife Anny formed their first successful company, Tensile Structures Pty Ltd.
Chris and Anny received 12 design and technology awards for their iconic tension structures such as the Leeuwin Estate winery music sound shell and the America’s Cup Village, Argyle Mines recreational facility, to name a few.
To this day some of the designs are still being produced and used.
Revolutionary and WINNING technology: Kinetic Pty Ltd
In 1990 Chris formed Kinetic Pty Ltd and lodged patents relating to ground vehicular suspension systems.
These patents provided the basis for over one hundred granted improvement patents many of which are still in force today.
Approximately 40 secret prototype vehicles were flown or shipped to Western Australia for conversion by the Kinetic team of 16 engineers and technicians.
The Kinetic technology became internationally recognised after being part of the winning technology and teams show-cased in the World Rally and Dakar campaigns for three years running.
This was before the technology and entry into these well-recognised races was banned!
From onset, the technology provided an unfair advantage and was not freely available to other competitors.
Successful uses of Suspension Technology
Currently Kinetic systems are used by:
- Toyota on several models of SUV,
- Nissan on their new Nissan Patrol, and
- McLaren’s hyper sports cars.
Kinetic was profitably sold to the American company Tenneco Ltd. in 2000.
Innovative Suspension Technology to the Next Level: Nauti-Craft
Chris went on to start Nauti-Craft Pty Ltd. in 2002 and has been instrumental in the successful building up of the Nauti-Craft team and Intellectual Property (IP) portfolio.
As an innovator and also as he is at retirement age, Chris is now more comfortable with Research and Development (R&D) and Intellectual Property (IP) development.
When Nauti-Craft entered into a commercialisation phase he confidently handed over the Managing Director’s role to Ken Johnsen who was a commercial mentor for Kinetic in the 1990s along with Nauti-Craft’s other director, Dr Richard Young, who has been closely associated with Chris’ successes in business for about 20 years.
