Assessment Panel

Robin, born in 1956 and raised in Sweden, studied Industrial Design at Rhode Island School of Design in Providence, USA. After graduating in 1981, he started as an Industrial Designer and later advanced to Assistant Director of Industrial Design at AB Electrolux in Stockholm.

In 1989, Robin moved to Columbus, Ohio, USA, as Vice President of Industrial Design for Frigidaire Company, where he also initiated and ran the Electrolux Global Concept Design Team for future forecasting of user needs. In 1997, Edman moved back to Stockholm as Vice President of Electrolux Global Design and was appointed Chief Executive of the Swedish Industrial Design Foundation (SVID) in 2001.

From 2003 to 2007, Robin was a board member of the International Council of Societies of Industrial Design (ICSID), and from 2005 to 2007, he served as its Treasurer. As of 2012, Robin serves on the board of the Bureau of European Design Associations (BEDA).

Robert has been directly involved with the design, development and manufacturing of communication, scientific and consumer products for more than 30 years. He has held senior design positions in several major companies including Philips, ACI and Beco Lighting, prior to establishing Robert Pataki Design which later evolved into PA Design/PA Technology.

Following this, Robert co-established NeoTechnics, a leading multidisciplinary Industrial Design and Product Development consulting business with offices in Melbourne, Sydney and Singapore. NeoTechnics carried out design projects in Australia, Singapore, Malaysia, Hong Kong, New Zealand and India.

Subsequently, NeoProducts was formed as a subsidiary to provide contract manufacturing services to clients for low to medium volume electronic products, including telecommunication products, interactive terminals and gaming equipment. Later the company developed and marketed its own range of products.

Past clients include Ericsson, Britax Safe-n-Sound, Varian, Electrolux, Motorola, Philips, Black and Decker, Fisher and Paykel, Hoover and Kambrook. Robert’s company has won many awards including the Prince Philip Design Award.

Robert has been a guest lecturer and speaker at many local and overseas universities as well as professional organisations, and has been on several university course advisory boards. Robert has now retired from design consulting but is involved with the Design Institute of Australia as its Company Secretary and was recently inducted into the DIA's Hall of Fame.

Ged is one of Australia’s most experienced and respected motoring journalists. In a career spanning more than two decades, Ged has edited some of the country’s leading motoring publications including Wheels, Motor, 4Wheeler and Overlander magazines.

Most recently Ged was Managing Editor of News Limited’s Carsguide website and national automotive supplement. He is now a freelance journalist and media consultant working across a range of electronic and print media including Carsales.com, Cathay Pacific’s Discovery magazine, RACV’s RoyalAuto magazine, VACC’s Australian Automotive magazine, Wheels, Motor and other magazines.

Ged holds a Bachelor of Arts majoring in Journalism from the Darling Downs Institute of Advanced Education, now known as the University of South-East Queensland. He lives in Melbourne with his wife Lisa and daughters Scarlett-Rose and Isabella. A well-cared-for 1978 Mercedes-Benz 280CE holds pride of place in his garage.

Michael was born into a motor racing family: his father and mother were both racing drivers. After an early childhood trawled around motor racing circuits by father Max, a career in automotive journalism was perhaps inevitable.

Michael’s 30 years’ testing and reporting on new models and automotive industry trends have taken him from frozen lakes in Sweden’s arctic circle to the first crossing of Australia’s Simpson Desert by sports car, to high-speed testing at a sustained 300km/h in South Africa.

At just 21 years of age, Michael was named deputy editor of Motor magazine. His innate understanding of cars, driving and the automotive industry, combined with a distinctly off-beat humour, marked him as one of Australian motoring journalism’s talents. In 1987 he joined Wheels, a relationship that continues to this day.

Freelance since 1990, Michael served as Motoring Editor of The Australian Financial Review for 10 years. His feature stories have appeared in several international publications, including Car (UK), Motor Sport (UK), Motor Trend (USA) and Sport Auto (France). He also presented three seasons of motoring programs on the Ten Network.

Michael has raced and rallied cars with success and won several awards for his writing. These include 1998 Motoring Journalist of the Year and most recently, 2011 Journalist of the Year from the magazine association, Publishers Australia.

Alexander was born in Buenos Aires, Argentina in 1977 and graduated from Design at Griffith University QCA in 2000. He is now Director of derlot, a multi-disciplinary studio focusing on projects including product, furniture, branding, hotel design, interior design and art direction with clients both nationally and internationally.

Clients include IDEE-Sputnik/Japan, Planex/Australia, SIGG/Switzerland, COVO/Italy, Asahi/Japan, Mizuno/Japan UFL/New Zealand, Escofet/Spain, S&G/Australia, Nestle/Switzerland, Queensland Art Gallery and the design of the first Design Hotels, Hotel in Australia; The Limes Hotel in Brisbane.

Derlot Editions is co-brand of derlot and produces a range of Australian made furniture and lighting for the contract and domestic markets, and is distributed worldwide.

Alexander has participated in international exhibitions with Sputnik, Designers Block London, Tokyo, Milan, New York, San Francisco, Berlin, Moscow and one of his products is part of the Design Collection at the Pompidou Museum in Paris.

Alexander won the Inaugural Queensland Premier's Smart State Designer of the Year Fellowship Award 2010, and recently returned to judge the Award for 2011. He was named one of the 100 most influential top designers worldwide by Phaidon, top 10 most influential faces in Design by Scene Design Quarterly 2007 and top 10 of 100 Young Brightest Australian Achievers Bayer/Bulletin Award. Alexander has won many awards in both product and interior design and his work has appeared in design journals around the world. Alexander is also part of the “Smart State Design Council” for the Queensland Government in Australia, drafting the Smart State Design Strategy for 2020.

Arriving in Sydney in 1990 from the hospitality and fashion scene in Queensland, Raj completed a Bachelor of Commerce – Marketing from Charles Sturt University in 1998. He purchased his first magazine at age 22 in 1993 and, after launching various magazines in the design and architecture sector in the 90s, launched his own boutique publishing house in 2000.

Indesign Media Asia Pacific (IMAP) found instant success with Indesign magazine, which now circulates in 41 countries worldwide. Today, IMAP produces a stable of well-respected design, architecture and product-based titles including Indesign, DQ (Design Quarterly), The Collection and Habitus. Raj also founded emerging design program Launch Pad in 2003, a prototype-to-production mentoring program now in its tenth year.

IMAP launched the first of its websites, Indesignlive, in 2007, and now their nine sites attract over 100,000 unique visits a month. Nandan has since been invited onto several boards including the Strategic Advisory Board of the International Federation of Interior Architects / Designers, and is also an Ambassador for Unlimited: Designing for the Asia Pacific, a judge for the International Design Awards – Los Angeles, and a regular judge for the Australian International Design Awards.

Graham began his career in the manufacturing industry and moved into Industrial Design through degrees in Resource Utilisation and Environmental Design.

His work has received several patents and a number of awards including The Prince Philip Prize, an Australian Design Award and The Institution of Engineers, Australia Award for Engineering Excellence.

Graham has recently concluded several years as Head of Industrial Design at the University of Newcastle where he had research interests in the energy efficiency of domestic appliances.

Bob is a design engineer with over 30 years' experience in a variety of areas, including computer typesetting, industrial control and monitoring systems and telecommunications. He was the project manager and principal engineer responsible for the design of the Siemens MP-20 Payphone, a finalist in the 2006 Australian Design Awards.

Bob has been involved in the design and development of many high-tech engineering systems. His area of expertise ensures that products not only satisfy customers' expectations but also have sufficient diagnostic capabilities for maintenance, support and compliance with all relevant standards.

Bob has been a contributor and active participant in several telecommunications standards bodies, most recently being the chairman of the ACIF working committee reviewing safety standards for telecommunications equipment. Bob has also participated as a judge for the Australian International Design Awards for the past 5 years.

As Co-Founder and Director of Research and Strategy, Rod blends an extensive background in Sociology, Engineering and Human-Computer Interaction to help organizations evaluate business objectives and opportunities, and recommend appropriate mobile strategies and design solutions that achieve outstanding mobile experiences.

With a career focus on Mobile and User Experience, Rod has consulted to many of Australia's best known brands and organizations, such as 3 Mobile, ANZ, Westpac, Jetstar, Optus, Telstra, FetchTV, FoxSports, and NBNCo. He has researched, designed and delivered hundreds of services across all major platforms and collaborated on several of Australia's most successful products across mobile, tablet, desktop and Multi-platform TV.

Rod is a judge, author, and international speaker on mobile user experience. He previously co-chaired the Australian Research Council committee on Interactive Interfaces and the Australian Human-Computer Integration group. Rod specializes in product innovation, mobile and experience strategy, user research and product design, service design, multi-screen/multi-device design and has a passion for making things simple, usable and valuable.

Andrew has been a consulting Industrial Designer for more than 25 years including a nine months as Senior Designer with Continuum Design in Milan and four years as Co-President of the South Australian Branch of the Design Institute of Australia.

Andrew is Co-Founder and Partner of Fingo, an Adelaide based Industrial Design consultancy located in Henley Beach. Fingo works closely with industry and the manufacturing sector. Their extensive customer base includes manufacturers of consumer electronics, safety, automotive, medical, sporting, agriculture and aquaculture products. As recipients of several design awards, numerous patents and design registrations, Fingo is a respected design consultancy within South Australian industry.

In 2011, Andrew was trained as an auditor with the Design Integration Pilot program run by the Creative Industry Innovation Centre (CIIC) and currently has a role mentoring South Australian manufacturing businesses.

Over the past 10 years, Andrew has also been working as a contract Lecturer in Industrial Design with the University of South Australia and curated a several design based exhibitions staged at venues including the South Australian Museum and the University of South Australia.

Lester has several years' experience as a mechanical design engineer, designing products as wide ranging as locomotives, passenger trains, home heaters and fans, garage doors and steel fabrication.

He is now a registered patent attorney in Australia and New Zealand, and a registered trade marks attorney. His clients are spread across the globe and have included innovators who develop new medical devices and prosthetics, underwater tidal turbines, saucepans, hardware, smartphone apps, thermal energy storage, surfboards and off road gear.

In his spare time Lester kitesurfs and scuba dives, and will be an official observer in the upcoming World Solar Challenge. He has sailed in a yachting world championships on the Oslofjord in Norway and keeps his old cars tuned.