In 2007, Canberra businessmen Shaun Moore and Bruce Power were well placed to identify a gap in the defence market.

After both serving 22 years in the Australian Army and Air Force respectively, their idea of shipping containers modified as deployable shelters took off.

Their business, ECLIPS, is a systems engineering company that has evolved to produce other purpose-built deployable capabilities and custom modules.

The ECLIPS team has completed a number of projects over the years, including developing ‘mock-up’ cities for Australian Defence Force training, deployable laboratories and command posts, and a suite of integrated military logistics products, which is attracting significant interest from the UK and USA.

ECLIPS has also built a range of facilities in Western Australia to support the mining, oil and gas industries, including an 850 person kitchen and dining facility.

For the past five years, ECLIPS’ core business has been the development of purpose-built logistics platforms to safely transport cargo that is challenging to package and secure, such as ammunition and explosives.

The team also designed a niche product called the Container Roll-Out Warehousing System which recently earned them first prize in the ACT division of the ACT Chief Minsters Export Awards for Manufacturing and Advanced Materials.

“As we try to expand our brand reputation, this recognition is extremely beneficial,” said Shaun.

“It is fantastic for the whole team to get some recognition for their remarkable efforts – the marketing and business development team that facilitated the export sales, the engineering team for designing and manufacturing the products, and the logistics team for coordinating the movement of the equipment.”

ECLIPS is lucky to have access to different but complementary markets such as the military sector and the Australian resources sector. This has enabled them to converge best practice and innovations between the sectors.

ECLIPS prides itself on designing solutions that are reliable, energy efficient and innovative.

“A key part of our design process is deep thinking in regard to the sustainment and maintenance of the equipment we engineer, until its eventual disposal,” said Shaun.

“We are fortunate our engineering processes are born from the military domain where integrated logistics support is a fundamental requirement to defence acquisition.

“In terms of energy efficiency, we look to find efficiencies in both the performance of the equipment and how the equipment can deliver better sustainable practices in the supply chain.”

In 2018, ECLIPS won the ACT Excellence in Engineering Award for a joint project with the Australian Renewable Energy Agency, for the Container Roll-Out Solar System (CROSS) – a mobile solar array designed to fit inside a shipping container which can be stacked seven units high.

“A key part of the ECLIPS success formulae is the integration of young Australian engineers with military veterans. This mixture provides a unique framework to think ‘outside the box’ and also provides a discipline and commitment to the key principles of systems engineering and project management,” said Shaun.

“Success is also about meeting, and where possible, exceeding customer expectations. This means ensuring the key functional requirements defined by the customer at the start of the project are met through the design, prototyping and testing phases.”

Looking to the future, Shaun and Bruce are very optimistic with some exceptional export opportunities emerging for the company and they have recently bid for a prime contract with the Australian Defence Force.

“At the moment, prime contracting is the exclusive territory of the huge overseas corporations. The time has never been better for Australian companies to step up and have a go, and we are getting strong support from the government. The Minister for Defence Industry took the time to come and visit us, and genuinely listened to what we feel are the roadblocks for Australian businesses looking to prime contract in Australia,” said Shaun.

“We have established a small office in Mexico City to try and open up the oil and gas markets in the region and we are looking to further expand our market presence in the UK and the USA. And in the short term, we are working on increasing our profile in Australia.”

ECLIPS' Container Roll Out Solar System (CROSS), a project with the
Australian Renewable Energy Agency that won the ACT Excellence in
Engineering Award in 2018.