The RFUANZ Awards celebrate outstanding achievement by individuals in the Radio Frequency industry.
Paul Garaway
Technical Excellence, sponsored by GME
Paul Garaway started as a Radio Serviceman’s apprentice in November 1964 with Whakatane Radio & Electrical Ltd (later to become A-One Electronics Ltd) – who were the local PYE RT agents. His 3rd day of work involved traveling to Matahina forest (Whakatane Board Mill Ltd) and assisting in a fire season check of all mobile radios in the forest operation. This included his first hands on look at a VHF repeater (all valve, mid band AM).
Paul quickly learned that valve RT’s (PYE Reporter III and Herald) did not like vibrations on rough roads. At that time the Whakatane Radio Telephone Users Association (serviced by WR&E Ltd) ran two repeaters at Manawahe. The next 20 odd years were boom times in the radio telephone market (before cellphones).Click here to read more information
Jack Frost
Project Excellence, sponsored by Hytera Communications
Jack does stand out from the crowd with his depth of knowledge on technical matters. He also has the ability to communicate across all levels of the industry complex technical matters and actively market products to the consumer. Jack is a problem solver and is able to use his imitative thinking/creative ability to achieve a smart outcome to a complex customer problem.
David Thomson
Service to the Industry, sponsored by Tait Communications
David has for many years passionately contributed his time from his business and personal life to forward the objectives of the Radio Frequency Users Association of New Zealand. This includes passionately promoting, liaising, mentoring, discussing, debating with the ministry, committee members and RFUANZ Members, and always with diplomacy.
Colin McKenzie
Service to the Industry, sponsored by Tait Communications
Colin began his career in radio by joining the New Zealand Post and Telegraph Department in 1957 and operated as a telegraphist carrying out administrative duties for the next five years, were upon he then joined the Merchant Navy as a radio operator Wellington based and then became a radio serviceman working on radio receivers, transmitters and radar equipment.
Colin then joined Plessey New Zealand as a service technician and supervisor working on both VHF and HF equipment. He became an advisor to the Auckland based RF design centre.
In 1970 Colin joined Tait Electronics as a technical designer and was with Tait for 15 years. During this period he was involved with surface mount training and machinery travelling to Houston, Milwaukee and Osaka Japan. He was project leader for new developments but also was extensively involved in the RTA21 project.
In 1985 Colin resigned from Tait and became one of the original partners in Sea Land and Air Communications or SALCOM as it is more commonly known. Colin has been responsible for the design and development of RF Transceivers, Emergency Locater Beacons, PC Board CAD design and operating in a support role for SALCOM’s current products. This has included implementation of stock register and data base systems within the Company and has also been responsible for human resource and staff recruitment. Colin has also been involved in Company liaison with Government Departments and making submissions to Government actively engaging the related Departments. Colin’s overall commitment to the Company and mentoring of colleagues is substantial and he still works extremely long hours.
Dave Parker
Outstanding Sales and Support, sponsored by Motorola Solutions
Since immigrating to NZ over 18 years ago, Dave Parker has held several management roles with Tait Communications and more recently Logic Wireless. There will not be many people within the New Zealand radio industry that have not been assisted both technically and or commercially by Dave Parker. Over the 18 years Dave has been involved with the NZ and Pacific Island radio industry he has initiated and been heavily involved with many large scale radio projects.
Tracey Julius
Excellence in Customer Service, sponsored by Vertex Standard
We deal on a day to day basis with Tracey Julius when ordering product or finding out the status of a delivery. Tracey is quite simply outstanding at customer service where nothing is a problem. In the off chance that Tracey is unable to answer your question straight away she will always quickly find the answer and email or phone back straight away. Tracey’s quick and professional response allows me to manage my customer expectations and deliver them.
