From defence to sport, the fascinating world of technology transfer

Henry White is BAE UK Sport Partnership Engineering Lead at BAE Systems. He is talking at The Engineer Conference at Subcon on 7 June. We have interviewed him ahead of the event about everything from technology transfer to badly designed hand driers. You can register for free to hear from speak at www.subconshow.co.uk/register 

How can technology from defence be transferred to the world of sport?

Technology can be transferred from defence to many adjacent areas and elite sport is certainly one of these. The 10 year-long Engineering Partnership between BAE Systems and UK Sport has seen many examples of successful technology transfers.

Advanced materials, high precision sensing systems and specific display technologies are three areas where there are many applications within both sport and defence.

The partnership has been so successful in no small part because of the wide range of expertise that exists within BAE Systems.

What applications can it be used for? 

Sport is by necessity governed by rules which in many cases restrict the extent that technology can be utilised in competition. However, there is much more freedom to use technology in training.

One challenge when introducing technology into training is making sure that athletes feel the same way as they would during competition. For example, having a bicycle with integrated sensors and feedback to the cyclist would not be allowed in competition, so if such a system was useful during training, the feel of the bike would need to be the same as competition bike.

Despite this, there are very few sports where technology can’t help athletes train to perform at their best. Through our partnership with UK Sport, so far we have assisted about 30 sports and over 250 athletes.

Where sports equipment can be made by national teams within the governing rules, aerospace materials knowledge can quickly be adapted and applied to the various sports. Skeleton sleds and racing wheelchairs are two such examples.

We have also applied to a number of sports our knowledge on visualisation techniques that we are developing for aircraft design and maintenance. This is where understanding the correct level of information to be relayed to athletes is important.

Additionally, sensor systems are a major part of aerospace equipment that also feature in a range of sports equipment such as vests used in Taekwondo.

What will delegates take from your presentation?

Delegates will gain an understanding of the mechanism of the BAE Systems and UK Sport partnership and the mutual benefits of applying technology to an adjacent area. As well as technology developments, the partnership has proved to be an excellent way of communicating how rewarding careers in both engineering and sport can be.

The presentation will also include some specific examples of completed projects and give an insight into where we at BAE Systems see future interaction between aerospace and sport.

What would you put in Engineering Room 101?

I would put some of the modern hand-driers in Engineering Room 101! Whilst these are excellently engineered products that dry hands very efficiently, in a number of cases that is all that has been considered. The water drips onto the floor and I have also seen some rather impressive stalagmites begin in some cases. My main bugbear though is that I often want to freshen up by washing my face and then what do you do? You could get a nasty injury from trying to get your head into one of those! So as in most cases, it is not the engineering that is at fault, it is the design that stops the technology being as useable at it could be. Understanding the human interaction is vital.

Don't be bamboozled by Blockchain

Still bamboozled by Blockchain and what it means for manufacturing? Don't be says Fujitsu's Graeme Wright. We interviewed him ahead of his presentation at The Engineer Conference, which takes place 5-7 June as part of Subcon. 

1.              Isn't Blockchain just a fad?

Put simply – No.   Blockchain is all too often confused with crypto-currencies; they just are one solution built on the technology.  Blockchain offers a fundamentally new approach to sharing information between people and organisations – one that is built on trust and by sharing the ledger (list of records) enforces an immutable statement of truth that can be therefore be used to ensure security.   On top of that, with the ideas of smart contracts allows machine to machine transaction (contracts) to be executed automatically.

2.              How can Blockchain be used in manufacturing? 

There are so many ways – but for just one example - think of the costs involved in managing the supply chain and ensuring provenance – Blockchains with smart contracts can automate these processes, reduce the cost to marginal levels and ensure that a company’s resources are focused on the value-added tasks so increasing productivity at lower cost.

3.              What are the benefits? 

The benefits will depend on the exact use case as per the one described above.   However, the key benefits of Blockchains can probably be summarised ultimately as reductions in cost, increased provenance across complex supply chains, and increased security especially for connected products,   

4.              What are the risks for people who ignore it?

Without being flippant – it would be not to have the benefits mentioned – but what that means is not having full traceability and provenance – which may lead to inferior products.  E.g. imagine if a supplier of components used NFC or RFID tags that were registered in a Blockchain on each component.  A business would know that every component was genuine and the trust would be part of the shared ledger so fake products could not be added to the ledger.  If a product recall was needed or a customer needed a replacement then this could be done simply and at low cost whilst also ensuring consumer continued to get the product quality they bought.  The spare/replacement parts market is often very large and ensuring consumers get the right replacement parts that keep warranties valid is a massive challenge.    I also believe this could be used to overcome certain tax – import/export issues.

5.              How important is it for engineering/manufacturing to have a diverse workforce and what can Industry/Government do to help? 

There are so many facets to that question – I think from a socio-political perspective it is very important – however, I also think that from an innovation perspective it is very important.   The last thing business need is everyone having the same type of background, gender, cultural, etc. as this limits the ability to new ideas.   This is well documented as a way in which good businesses fail.   How can Industry/Government help?  - Keep pushing the diversity and inclusion agenda – but be careful not to discriminate against those to have experience as well.   Whilst we all know that the next generation bring great insight by challenging the status quo and asking the question ‘why wouldn’t we do it this way?’ or something similar; whilst not accepting answer ‘we have always done it this way’.   However, experience has a lot of value as well – mistake we have all made are lessons we can all learn from.   The point here is to ensure people are treated equally – but putting hard metrics that must be met out of context can be less than optimal if not dangerous.  

6.              What would you put in Engineering Room 101?

A difficult one. I think connector leads, particularly HiFi/TV leads.   They just create a mess of wires, you never have the right ones or the right length and working out what goes where can be a challenge for many.   I think with the wireless technologies we have today; it is the start of the end for wired connectors and not before time.