BUSINESS: COMPANY PROFILE
The tm touch
tm st
L–R: Mark Lownds and Treva Head hand over a new system for Sydney Trains
tm stagetec systems, the Sydney-based company celebrating 10 years in business, has grown rapidly from an arm of the Salzbrenner Mediagroup into a complete infrastructure and integration provider. Caroline Moss talks to the two men who made this happen
MINUTES INTO THE ZOOM INTERVIEW WITH TREVA HEAD and Mark Lownds, it becomes apparent why their business, tm stagetec, has soared to success over the past decade. The pair, whose initials prefix the name of their venture, are in per fect harmony, answering questions in turn, sometimes finishing each other’s sentences, and always in agreement. “We have quite a different company today from the one that we started,” muses Head of the firm he and Lownds launched in 2011 as Stagetec Mediagroup Australia under the banner of the German-owned Mediagroup Consortium. “We started off working from our sofas, just Mark and myself, with some assistance from the Salzbrenner Mediagroup HQ in Germany.” Initially, the company was set up to distribute Mediagroup products in Australia, designing the systems they were deployed in. Both have backgrounds in radio broadcast. Head had spent 10 years at Klotz Digital, upgrading radio stations around the country. He first encountered Lownds – who studied audio engineering at SAE before moving into IT and then broadcasting – at Nova Network, where they designed a digital system together. “We got to respect each other’s abilities and the way we worked in our design philosophies,” Head continues. “We came up with this throwaway phrase: ‘Oh, that’s the TM touch, that’s Treva and Mark’.” The seeds of their future company were sown. When Stagetec was looking for expertise on the ground in Australia for its new on-air console, Head jumped at the opportunity, taking Lownds along with him. “I asked Mark if he felt like a new adventure,” he says. “We started without an office and went for three tenders thinking that if we got one of them, that would be great. We suddenly got all three: a digital PA system for [suburban passenger rail network operator] Sydney Trains, the replacement of radio consoles at ABC and the replacement of stage management consoles at the Sydney Opera House.”
Mark Lownds conducts factory acceptance testing at the company’s first office The pair moved into a 100m2 office, quickly relocating to premises double the size before breaking a second lease to move into the 1,200m2 facility they and their team occupy today. “Sometimes we’re full, but we’re managing,” says Lownds. “When we first started, Treva and I had to do nearly everything, from engineering to finance, and we’d bring in freelancers and contractors. Eventually, we hired two or
three more engineering staff, then some dedicated project managers, then we needed some documentation people, and we just kept expanding.” The 35 staff members today are split across engineering, logistics, sales, management, administration, support and project management. A major milestone came in 2017 when, at the SMPTE show in Sydney, the company announced a change of name
74 PRO AVL ASIA July–August 2021
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