Manufacturing in NSW: driving our economy

[Making it in NSW with Lisa Emerson GME video script:]

Lisa Emerson, Modern Manufacturing Commissioner, Investment NSW GME makes CB radios and emergency beacons, they’re a unique local manufacturer, I'm really excited to be here today to have a look at all their innovations. Hi, Stephen, Lisa.

Stephen Millar, Chief Executive Officer, GME Hi Lisa, pleasure to meet you. Welcome to GME.

Lisa Emerson, Modern Manufacturing Commissioner, Investment NSW Thank you.

Stephen Millar, Chief Executive Officer, GME We looked at our business and said, what do we do that can make it better for our operators and help us be more productive? And we essentially took processes that were discrete operator stations and put them into a continuous assembly line.

Lisa Emerson, Modern Manufacturing Commissioner, Investment NSW And this is a little conveyor belt.

Stephen Millar, Chief Executive Officer, GME Correct. So it’s like a big sushi train. A big part of what we're wanting to do here was about, you know, operator comfort, avoiding RSI, injuries and those sorts of things. From our perspective, that's where the productivity improvement is.

Lisa Emerson, Modern Manufacturing Commissioner, Investment NSW And then at the end we have a very special operator I can see here.

Stephen Millar, Chief Executive Officer, GME At the end we have Archie. So Archie's the robot. Archie's the mechanical part of the process, but what's really happening here is an automated testing system, which is what these jigs are.

Lisa Emerson, Modern Manufacturing Commissioner, Investment NSW What happened to the employee that used to be doing this job?

Stephen Millar, Chief Executive Officer, GME So the employees that used to be in this job are doing these jobs at the same time as we've been introducing this. Our total headcount has gone up. So they're employing more people.

Greg Adams, Process Worker/tester, GME With the new machines that we have now. We can basically punch out triple, triple the quantity, the output.

Stephen Millar, Chief Executive Officer, GME That’s an EPIRB from 1984.

Lisa Emerson, Modern Manufacturing Commissioner, Investment NSW And then from that, essentially, I know this is a personal one, to that.

Stephen Millar, Chief Executive Officer, GME It has the same capability. In fact, it has more because this is a GPS unit as well. But 100% Australian owned and has been for the entire 63 years.

Lisa Emerson, Modern Manufacturing Commissioner, Investment NSW And why NSW?

Stephen Millar, Chief Executive Officer, GME Well, that's a great question. We wouldn't want to move. You know, we've got a great labour force. The environment is very supportive to us. We've had a good association with Investment NSW as we've deliberately branched out into the defence community. So we've been with them on a number of the defence exhibitions and shows that have been around the last few years.

Lisa Emerson, Modern Manufacturing Commissioner, Investment NSW How important is modern manufacturing to GME?

Stephen Millar, Chief Executive Officer, GME Yes, look, it's been really important for us. It's enabled us to take our core asset which is people and make them more efficient, you know, make their jobs safer, make them more comfortable. So, you know, it's sort of a win win for us.