Dr Chris Westinghouse is a strategic scientist by training, an ex-politician, public servant, businessman and professional communications practitioner with almost 30 years of experience in strategic and policy level corporate communications.

GOVERNMENT AND POLITICS

Chris was closely associated with the democratic transition in South Africa during the 1980s and 1990s and held senior political positions in the years leading to the 1994 elections. He served as Joint Chairman of the Communications Working Group in the Office of the President, Deputy Director of the South African Communication Service responsible for both media and for communications projects, Director of Communications in the National Operations Centre in the Office of the President, and Director of Communications in the Ministry of Defence. He was a key player in the process leading to the release of Nelson Mandela from prison, and he was charged with project management of the National Communications Policy and Strategy of the De Klerk cabinet.

CORPORATE

He joined the Chamber of Mines of South Africa in 1992, with responsibility for the provision of strategic insights aimed at the transformation of the mining industry into the new political dispensation.

In 1997 he established Westinghouse Consulting Pty Ltd. The Company served a select group of leading international business in the aviation, financial services, healthcare and social development fields. He was retained as spokesperson by the top ten companies on the Johannesburg Stock Exchange.

He served as Executive Director of the Southern African Marketing Research Association in 1998, before joining the BoE financial services group as General Manager: Communications and Marketing.

He served on the boards of companies globally, including Westinghouse Consulting Pty Ltd (South Africa), Christian Westinghouse Associates Pty Ltd (South Africa and Ireland), and Westinghouse Communications Ltd (New Zealand). He has also served on the Board of Colthurst Ltd and Edenland Ltd, pharmaceuticals research houses in Dublin. He was a senior member of the Public Affairs and Policy team at Pfizer.

He has been a Member of the Institute of Directors in New Zealand, the Australian Institute of Company Directors and is a Chartered PR Practitioner (South Africa). He is a Member of the International Association of Business Communicators, a member of the Gerson Lehrman Group Council (USA) and organisations including the Law Society of New South Wales.

PHOTOCOMMUNICATIONS & PHOTOGRAPHY

Chris has a passion for corporate photocommunication. After many years as a corporate communicator he realised the inefficiency of word-based communications, especially in the internet age, where there is a growing expectation that images and pictures should communicate.

Wikus Hartzenberg, originally trained as an industrial chemist. He is a software developer with his roots firmly set during the invasion of 8-bit home computers.

In 1996, responding to a Newsgroup posting, he began his career as a web developer at a small internet company in Johannesburg that was eventually absorbed into the VWV Group, trading as VWV Interactive.

In 2001 he stepped into a roll as software developer at Greenwood Technologies in Auckland, developing bespoke solutions, most notably an insurance client called IBT Swift. In 2003 moved to IBT to develop their insurance product. IBT was the first software company in New Zealand to offer a fully integrated web enabled business solution for Insurance Broker Intermediaries giving a single view of the client and offering data exchange with its suppliers. In 2005 he was appointed as a Software Engineer at Unisys NZ in Wellington, working in an R&D team developing a telecommunications messaging platform.

He joined Fairfax Digital in Sydney in 2006 as a Technical Leader (The Sydney Morning Herald, The Age, etc.), developing web applications using Java and cutting edge open-source technologies. At Fairfax Digital he is responsible for leading a small team of developers overseeing product development from first requirements through to architecting, solution development, testing, deployment and support. He helps to produce mobile products for Fairfax Digital, most successfully an off-deck version of Business Day (Business & Finance) that has also been rolled out to Optus and Hutchison. Other projects involve various SMS subscription integrations.

He has been associated with the Westinghouse Group of companies internationally since 1997.