Feature | Australian Auto Engineers
Australians engineering a new career in automotive A hooded figure with a scythe stood in front of parliament house in Canberra in late June, it was Bob Katter bemoaning the death of the Australian car manufacturing industry, there in his black cloak he held a press conference to discuss his motion to support the re-establishment of an Australian car manufacturing industry. The SAE-A also supports the re-establishment of an Australian car manufacturing industry, but it may not be quite the same vision as Mr Katter’s, the SAE-A’s vision is spelt out very concisely in the following pages of this VTE issue. On these pages we will look at where some of our best engineering talent has gone – most recently after the departure of Holden, but before that with local manufacturing shutting at Holden, Toyota, Ford and Mitsubishi, and even before that when Nissan pulled up stumps at Clayton, Victoria. The last remnants of Holden’s globally recognised engineering and design divisions are winding up over the next weeks with the remaining 100 Holden engineers, currently employed at the Lang Lang proving ground in South Gippsland, Victoria, to depart during August. Lang Lang is currently for sale, but no one as yet has put up their hand with enough cash to buy it. It had been reported that both Lindsay Fox and VinFast had shown interest but all has gone very quiet since early June. A number of engineers have found work with other car makers and component suppliers, including several moving to the newly established VinFast technical centre (ATI2) in Melbourne, and some having made the move overseas to GM in the US.
of the Camaro, G8 and Commodore updates including the first LPG Engine. From there she moved to platform calibration then became a design release engineer. She worked in active safety specifically front camera module, side blind zone radar and park assist before making the move to US in 2015. Ms Lewis is still working with a lot of ex-Holden engineers possibly around 50 but she said it is hard to tell as GM is so big. GM is a lot bigger than Holden which means there is a lot more happening. More programs, more vehicles and the sheer number of people she said. When she first moved to GM, she started work on the new electrical architecture that was only launched this year. That meant she was seeing a side of GM that engineers at Holden were never really exposed to. The very start of an architecture rather than just the start of a vehicle program. Now Ms Lewis has ex Holden colleagues all over GM and commented that a lot of her American colleagues often say there are Aussies everywhere.
Ms Lewis said that she and her fellow exHolden engineers were chosen based on their skills in specific areas, and their experience. Additionally, Holden engineers offer a different aspect on how things are done, which really makes them stand out. To make the move to the US there had to be a team that ‘wanted’ the engineer; as you can imagine the relocation costs were significant, so GM needed to make sure the right people were chosen. Fortunately, Ms Lewis had worked a lot with people in active safety at GM and was told she was chosen for her attitude to doing things right the first time and making sure that she knew what she was doing and not relying on others to do it for her. Over in the US the car industry is vast compared with Australia, so the opportunities are there and in many fields that simply were not available here. For Ms Lewis, the most exciting thing is that she gets to work in a space that she loves and that is just moving so quickly. Active safety really is a focus at the moment so being at the
Holden engineers at General Motors Jacqui Lewis Program Engineering Manager – Active Safety, is one Australian ex-Holden engineer who moved to the US to join GM, her move came in 2015 after starting with Holden in 2006. She initially started at Holden in warranty engineering specifically in electrical right before the VE launch she told VTE magazine. And she stayed there for almost two years before joining the electrical engineering team in a group called Buyout. In this role she worked in pre-production operations overseeing the electrical aspects of pre productions builds 16 | July 2020
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