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Fixing mother's car as a boy led to the drive to follow a career in engineering [Derby Evening Telegraph (England)](Derby Evening Telegraph (England) Via Acquire Media NewsEdge) Patrick Kniveton, head of engineering improvement at Rolls-Royce Marine Power, has become president of the Institution of Mechanical Engineers. Here, he tells Oliver Astley about his career and ambitions. FOLLOWING in the footsteps of engineering icons of the past such as George Stephenson, Joseph Whitworth and Sir Harry Ricardo, Patrick Kniveton is looking to the future. He is president of the Institution of Mechanical Engineers and head of engineering improvement at Rolls-Royce Marine Power, Derby. Rather than evoke the names of the great engineers of the past, though, he wants to celebrate today's. Steve Isakowitz, chief technology officer at Virgin Galactic; Jonathan Ive, senior vice-president of industrial design at Apple; and Adrian Newey, chief technical officer at Red Bull Racing, are names that spring to his mind. These are the iconic figures of engineering and design who Patrick believes could inspire the next generation of innovators and help people understand how central engineering is to everyday life. Patrick's own career has been varied, having worked on technology for deep-space exploration, air conditioning, traffic signs, nuclear power and shipping. As president of the Institution of Mechanical Engineers, he is head of an organisation that boasts 100,000 members, many of whom are hard at work developing the technologies that have the potential to change the world and improve the quality of life for its inhabitants. As a boy, Patrick would gaze up at the stars wondering at the architecture of the heavens and, when his mum's car was on the blink, he would tinker around and repair it. He has never lost that fascination in how things work. Just a few years later, after completing a degree in mechanical engineering at the University of Leeds and training at Reyrolle Parsons, he worked for Grubb Parsons on the Isaac Newton Telescope, in the Canary Islands. Patrick says: I had to learn Spanish pretty quickly, but it was a great experience. The telescope is still in operation now and is known for being the first to prove through observation the existence of black holes. Engineering is about applying all sorts of technology to help people solve problems and, while Patrick is proud of his involvement with the telescope, he is just as enthusiastic about the development of activators used in cash machines to turn power into movement. Patrick came back down to earth working for SKF Engineering Projects as a sales engineer. He says: It was a massive company and it was here that I learned about the commercial side of engineering and customer focus. There was a wide range of projects that meant using a whole range of knowledge to help solve problems. From an engineering giant, Patrick moved to a small company called Rotawing Fans, designing bespoke air conditioning systems. He says: It was a very different experience and once involved figuring out how to get a two-tonne air-conditioning unit on to the roof of a Scottish shopping centre with a 300-tonne mobile crane. In 1989, the company went bust as it missed out on a large contract and I learned a valuable lesson about cash flow. Patrick's first association with Rolls-Royce came soon afterwards, when he began working on control systems. He recalls: I started working on the Sizewell B nuclear power station which, I'm pleased to say, is quietly reliable and efficient and has plenty of life left in it. While working on the control systems side of the Rolls-Royce operation, he found himself working for a subsidiary that designed and made electronic road signs. He says: Back then, they were not that visible or reliable and the business was being wound down for closure, but I thought that there was some potential. As engineering manager, he started redeveloping the technology. He says: They needed to be seen by drivers from a long way away, in sunshine and at night, and needed to use little power. The signs he produced used LEDs. He says: We went from having 0.5% of the UK market to more than 80% virtually overnight. It used less power than a kettle. Patrick registered the patent but receives no royalties from the technology. As the road signs portion of the business was not core to Rolls- Royce's operation, it was sold off and Patrick's skills were redeployed. He says: I went into materials handling and worked on ship-to- ship refueling. At one point, I was winched down from a helicopter to work on a refueling operation. Engineering's never been about sitting at a desk. His next role brought him to Derby. In 1999, Patrick moved to the aerospace operation as head of business management, having been sponsored by the company to do a master's degree in business administration. He says: It was a role that involved load capacity and planning accommodation, which essentially meant having the right engineer in the right place on the right project. Engineers are encouraged to move around Rolls-Royce to get used to different ways of working and different technologies. It has been a significant strategy, given the potential resurgence of civil nuclear power generation in the UK and Rolls- Royce's submarine operation in Raynesway, which is seeing growth. In Derby, the most visible part of Patrick's legacy has to be his involvement in the Pounds 1.5 billion redevelopment of the Raynesway site. It was and continues to be a massive undertaking. Many of the buildings on the site had reached the end of their natural lives. Patrick says: My role was to bring everyone together. It was a question of working with planners, the Highways Agency and the Environment Agency to get approval from Derby City Council. I became the least popular person there when the car parking all got changed and people had to walk much further, though one woman was pleased that she lost weight as a result! Last year, a Pounds 39 million factory to produce components for reactors opened and, in March, Atlantic House, a Pounds 19.5 million office building where 700 engineers will be based, was opened by the Duke of Kent. The idea behind the investment is to keep Rolls-Royce at the forefront of submarine technology and ensure that it is in pole position for work in the civil nuclear market. Now, as Rolls-Royce's head of engineering improvement, Patrick's role has shifted from infrastructure to personnel. He says: The engineers here are very bright and innovative people, constantly inventing new and interesting ways to do things. It is a job that he carries out in parallel with his commitments as president of the Institution of Mechanical Engineers, a role that will involve lobbying the powers that be, promoting engineering as a career, helping small and medium-sized businesses to grow, focusing minds on infrastructure renewal and, of course, delivering speeches. He says: Since 2008, manufacturing has been seen as critical to the economy and the Government is listening to us. Roads, railways and power stations in the UK need upgrading and it will be engineers who will put those schemes in place. Today's SMEs are the multinationals of the future but they need knowledge of new innovations and programmes to develop their people - things that large companies already do. These are things that the institution can help with. Finally, I want those fantastically creative people doing physics and maths to be a lot more vocal. We should all do a lot more to give engineers much more of a voice. It is a sentiment that George Stephenson, Frank Whittle and Henry Royce would echo, alongside Steve Isakowitz, Jonathan Ive and Adrian Newey, of course. [email protected] 100,000 MEMBERS IN 139 COUNTRIES AROUND GLOBE THE Institution of Mechanical Engineers came into being on January 27, 1847, in the Queen''s Hotel, Birmingham. It was founded by a group headed by railway pioneer George Stephenson and others. Stephenson became its first president that year and was followed by his son, Robert, in 1849. The institution built its base in London at Number 1 Birdcage Walk in 1899. In the 19th and 20th centuries some of Britain's most notable engineers held the position of president, including Joseph Whitworth, Carl Wilhelm Siemens and Sir Harry Ricardo. The institution has a membership of more than 100,000 in 139 countries. ICONIC FIGURES OF ENGINEERING JONATHAN Ive, Steve Isakowitz and Adrian Newey are the people who embody engineering excellence for Patrick Kniveton. Jonathan Ive is responsible for the design of many of the Apple products that have made the firm one of the world's largest. The graduate of Newcastle Poly started with Apple in 1992, where he was responsible for the look and feel of the iMac, the iPod, the iPhone and the iPad. As chief technology officer at Richard Branson's Virgin Galactic operation, Steve Isakowitz is responsible for the advent of space travel for tourists. The first paying passengers are expected to travel on Christmas Day. Tickets for suborbital space flight cost $200,000 each. F1 car designer Adrian Newey is chief technical officer for Red Bull and responsible for the cars that won the drivers' and constructors' championships in 2010, 2011 and 2012. He has also designed championship-winning cars for Williams and McLaren. We went from having 0.5% of the UK market to more than 80% virtually overnight. PATRICK KNIVETON helicopter. Engineering's never been about sitting at a desk. PATRICK KNIVETON (c) 2013 ProQuest Information and Learning Company; All Rights Reserved. |