P O Box 72038

Lynnwoodridge 0040 RSA

Tel:  +27 (12) 996 0070

Fax: +27 866 425 484

                  e-mails:  

Personal e-mail address

consulting e-mail address

 

SUMMARY:

 

I am a Professional Engineer with extensive experience in Senior Company Management, Project Management, Situational Evaluations and System Design.

 

After graduation as I started my professional career with a well known consulting firm where I was tasked to do the electrical/ electronic design and overview the installation of large shopping centres (Tzaneen and Phalaborwa) as well as a large hotel complex (Brandwag at Golden Gate).  Due to the distances to the sites, I obtained a pilot�s license, where after the professional team  regularly joined me in flights to the sites increasing the effiency of all.  During this period I continued with further studies, post graduate in computer design as well as graduate studies in computer science.  I wrote a program to calculate the short circuit currents at electricity distribution points and compared the findings with ESCOM�s analogue simulator�s results.  The excellent and quick solutions was then offered as a service to city electrical engineers to country wide economically analyse their systems, many of whom utilised and profited from the analysis  (e.g. Van der Bijl Park).  During this period I was also involved in the electrical, mechanical and lighting (including stage lighting) designs of the State theatre in Pretoria and Nico Malan Theatre in Cape town.

 

Having acquired in-depth experience on electrical distribution and reticulation, I wished to extend my experience in the electronic and computer fields and joined a team of electronic engineers who was involved in bringing in new technologies to the electronics industry in South Africa.  I was head of projects developing e mobile communication systems for the SADF (air, man-pack, mobile and naval) and finally conceptionalised and managed the VHF frequency hopping radios (Then the first in the world).  I designed the electrical/electronic systems for the President Class attack vessels, then being built as well as for the Aviso  Class Corvettes being built in France.  I learnt French and moved with my family to France for Project Management and to oversee the installation (meetings held in French).

 

When the project was terminated due to international pressure, I moved to the UK with my family for post graduate study in system design including project management.

 

Back in South Africa I joined the Rio Tinto mining group as general manager of their Ore Sorters division where I was also involved in the design, construction and installation of the complex electronic/mechanical ore sorting machines with its supporting infrastructure.  These machines were sold and installed world wide.

 

A few years later I was contacted by the consulting engineering group, BKS, then the largest consulting engineering group in South Africa, to establish and build out their electrical and electronic divisions.  I joined them as one of only eleven group directors and managed to make the divisions profitable within a year.

 

In response to a client�s request, I did a detailed analysis and wrote an �expert system� to evaluate and respond to the question �How much security is enough/ cost effective?�  I was then tasked to evaluate most of the so called key-points and make recommendations on the security infrastructure and installations. A research Laboratory was required to evaluate and test existing technologies and �Software and Electronics Laboratories� (SEL) was started and soon had to start developing unique products to fulfil the requirements. Many patents were registered over the years, many with me as principal or only inventor.

 

Since  BKS concentrated on traditional civil, electrical and mechanical consulting, we found that the above mentioned analysis required very different fields of expertise. Two of the partners started VTR-Consulting Engineers with me, to do the detailed designs and overview of mayor facilities throughout South Africa. 

 

We started Securicor to take overall project responsibility since the required work needed many contractors to execute the many different aspects.  A typical example (one of the first) was Island View in Durban (value adjusted for 2007 values of approx US$ 75 000 000) where an existing railway and highway had to be moved to outside the secure area without disrupting traffic and where the location of existing services were unknown and could not be damaged.  This lead, amongst other things to the design and patent of the unique tunnel structure and gates. Many large designs and installations followed for airports, mines, shopping centres, universities, the defence force and even small businesses.

 

In 2002 the name etc of Securicor was sold and I have focused on specialised consulting and laboratory work with SEL since then.  This included efforts to distribute SEL�s products in the USA and expanding the facilities at an airport and contracting to build series of hangars with supporting infrastructure at the airport.

 

Summarised details of H M ver Loren van Themaat