The AMT Team

The AMT Team Automated Marine Technologies team is made up of a group of marina developers that have acquired a unique wide range of knowledge through the research and development of a number of marine facilities. Now for the first time we are able to join disciplines from two separate industries.

For years the materials handling industry has pioneered in obtaining the most efficient methods for the storage and retrieval of goods. Now we can proudly say that we are able to harness these technologies and adapt them to the marine industry to provide you with the state of the art competitive advantages we offer today.

AMT has partnered with Lodige, a worldwide market leader in materials handling. Specifically Lodige has a worldwide lab our force of over 600 employees and has evolved over the past 50 years from a small business manufacturing hydraulic lifting platforms to a worldwide enterprise. Lodige has earned a reputation as a reliable partner for the whole business of handling systems.

Now from the installation of a single boat lift to a fully automated commercial marina, the Lodige and AMT partnership offers the complete solution to your boat handling needs as a one-stop solution: design and consultancy, manufacture, installation, project management and servicing.

For more information on our partners please visit www.loedige.com

Justin James —
President/Managing Director

Justin has spent the majority of his life on boats on Sydney Harbour, owned several boats and has deep contacts within the marine industry in Australia. Justin has had over 6 years experience in developing dry boat storage facilities and is the founder and a Director of Sydney Boathouse. www.sydneyboathouse.com.au

The Sydney Boathouse team is part way through building Australia’s largest dry boat storage facility which holds 670 boats up to 12m in length and boasts over 4000m2 of waterfront retail and commercial space.

Justin has researched dry boat storage facilities, marinas and slipways in Miami, Fort Lauderdale, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Arizona, Sacramento, Chicago, New York, Amsterdam, Genoa, Singapore, Auckland, Melbourne, Sydney, Perth and the Gold Coast. Justin has been intimately involved in the detailed design of a number of automated dry boat storage facilities and has a strong operational background.

In conjunction with Hartmut Hofmann, Justin has developed the integration of dry boat storage with automated materials handling systems to provide the systems we offer.

Hartmut Hofmann —
General Manager

Lödige Singapore Hartmut has 20 years experience in planning, concept development, system design, technical sales and project management of material handling systems, in particular air cargo. Hartmut is responsible for the concept development of the AMT systems, and specifically will manage much of the design and planning.

Hartmut is renowned within the materials handling industry for his lateral thinking and special engineering capabilities.

Brian James

Brian began a shipping container storage and repair business in St Peters in 1974. By 1990 this business had grown to be the largest such business in Sydney with more than 100 employees in three Sydney locations. This business operated five 30 ton forklifts, fourteen 15 ton forklifts, stored 15,000 shipping containers and had full length rail sidings at St Peters and Port Botany.

The latter stages of this business involved a joint venture with P&O, when the business became known as Sydney Haulage Containers. In response to growing demand, Brian and his team oversaw the design and construction of the 20 acre Port Botany facility, a project at the time worth $25 million. In 1980, Brian started a fuel distribution business at the St Peters site as an agent for Total and Ampol.

This business grew to include twelve delivery tankers and was sold to Shell in 1991. He still retains extensive contacts within the petroleum industry. 1992 saw an expansion of Brians interests into aircraft container repairs, with the creation of a facility which repaired most of the air freight containers owned by Qantas and Ansett. He was bought out of this business in 1998 by the Norwegian firm Nordisk Aviation Products, which is the largest manufacturer of aircraft containers worldwide.

In 1998 Brian was bought out of his St Peters operation by Sydney Airports Corporation, taking over Brian’s leases, concepts and designs for a $60 million air cargo facility adjacent to Sydney Airport. In January 2003, Brian and his business partner Tony Ellis became the successful tenderers for the R1 and W1 sites in Rozelle Bay.

In December 2006 Sydney City Marine was given Major Projects Application approval by the Minister for Planning to build a major boat maintenance and repair facility for Sydney Harbour www.sydneycitymarine.com.au Brian has comprehensively traveled around the world researching marine facilities.

He has amassed enormous amounts technical information, made extensive contacts and gained a general know how for what works when building a facility from the ground up. Brian is currently the President of the NSW Super Yacht Alliance, a joint State Government / private industry interest group started in May 2006. It represents those businesses and associations supporting the handling of very large private vessels in New South Wales.

Brian brings over 30 years of valuable industry related experience to the business, by virtue both of his boating background and also due to his storage and fuel industry ventures.

Tony Ellis —
B.Eng Civil Engineering, IEng, CP3, NSW
Builders Licence

During Tony’s early career he was employed by a number of construction companies in varying capacities and disciplines as well as being involved in the construction of the Sydney Opera House. Since early 1980, Tony has worked both as a consultant and been involved in the building and construction industry, working on the new Parliament House in the ACT, refurbishment work at the Tumut Power Station and many other projects including water treatment plants and high lift pipelines.

Tony’s ability to administer his construction background to the development of marinas is invaluable. Tony is the founder of Sydney City Marine Limited, www.sydneycitymarine.com.au securing the lease of the land at Rozelle Bay in Jan 2003 and is an Executive Director. Sydney Marine City Marine will cater for the maintenance of boats up to 500 tons. Tony has comprehensively traveled around the world researching marine facilities, and similarly has a huge amount of technical knowledge and contacts within the marine industry.

Tony has represented Australia in sailing and has a deep understanding of the intricacies of the design, development, building, working machinery and operation of a world class marine centre.