in that fortunate position in 2015
when he was awarded the Design
Engineer of the Year. He joined
Navtech Radar (which also won
Design Team of the Year) in 2008
as the company’s only hardware
engineer and has played a central
role in its success, helping to
expand the hardware engineering
team, providing induction and
internal training, as well as making
a signi cant contribution to their
professional development. The
company says his skills and
experience are ‘pivotal’ to its
success.
Poulton’s role in Navtech is
described as ‘all encompassing’;
handling product lifecycles from
concept to product maintenance.
He is also responsible for
legacy designs and dealing with
obsolescence issues, as well as
consulting on non-standard repairs.
His project management
and leadership skills were
demonstrated during the
development of the company’s
ClearWay traf c management
radar. During development, it
became obvious it had to be much
smaller than Navtech’s previous
Mike Lawton, founder and CEO
of Oxford Space Systems, says:
“At that point we had just secured
our initial seed funding which
basically gave us the ability to keep
the lights on for about a year. To
have those two prestigious awards
was phenomenal collateral to put
in front of potential investors and
customers.
“Saying we’ve got a signi cant
technology award really endorses
a company they’ve never heard of
and the technical pro ciency of the
team as well.”
Since winning the award OSS
has doubled its revenue each year
and its technology has been put
into orbit. Now other companies
and organisations are seeking
to work with the team, which
has grown from 10 in 2015 to
55-strong. These include
NASA and the UK
Ministry of Defence,
the latter awarded
OSS £1m – its
largest ever rsttime
contract
– to mature its
technology as
well as develop
a ‘Wrapped-Rib’
antenna using
Synthetic Aperture
Radar for Earth
observation. It is hoped
this will be used in orbit
in 2021.
Lawton says that any company
thinking about applying should
just do it: “The application process
isn’t onerous, it’s actually a useful
exercise for the business. It makes
you think long and hard about why
you’re doing what you’re doing
and where the bene ts are for the
product.
“There’s no excuse not to
apply, what’s the worst that could
happen? You’ve gone through a
great internal review exercise, and
you could win, then you’ve got a
fantastic bit of promotional material
that hasn’t cost you anything.”
We will be covering the 2016
Awards in the August issue.
Entries for the ‘10th anniversary’
awards will open soon, so why
not visit www.beeas.co.uk to pick
up some top tips on entering your
submissions. !
Above: Mike Lawton
with trophies for
Start Up of the Year
and the Grand Prix
for Oxford Space
Systems.
devices. As
project manager,
Richard ensured
the complex project
was nished ahead
of schedule and with
a bill of materials cost
that made it commercially
attractive.
Poulton has worked in
collaboration with the Knowledge
Transfer Partnership and the
University of Bath, sponsoring and
supervising two young engineers’
programmes, and took an active
interest in furthering their skills
and knowledge. He also takes a
personal interest in encouraging
young people into engineering and
regularly attends events at local
schools.
Oxford Space Systems won both
Start Up of the Year and the Grand
Prix at the 2015 ceremony for its
lightweight, simple deployable
structures for micro and nano
satellites. At the heart of its
technology is AstroTube, a rolled
composite material that unfurls
like a tape measure. Requiring a
fraction of the volume needed by a
conventional system.
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