Abbey Systems Ltd: The Beginnings
Lester Abbey, Founder
Founded by Lester Abbey in 1978, Abbey Systems Ltd is a privately owned New Zealand company based in Wellington specialising in the design and development of SCADA and Telemetry products, for water, power, energy and broadcasting customers worldwide.
Lester Abbey graduated from the University of Utah with a degree in Mathematics at the age of 20 and joined the Utah State Highway Dept as a bicycle-track Engineer. After securing funding for a study trip from the department he embarked on his first cycling tour from Washington State to Nevada, having a look at the urban bike paths of Portland and the Willamette cycle trail on the way. This 'research' got Lester hooked on bicycle touring and further research followed in Utah and Arizona, touring from Salt Lake City to the north rim of the Grand Canyon.
In 1974 Lester embarked on a two month solo cycling tour on his Raleigh around New Zealand and eastern Australia. On this tour he was very attracted to Wellington, so much so that he stopped at a local bank and asked them if they would cash a traveller's cheque and give him a job. They did both.
Settling in Wellington he took a programming job for Databank Systems which was just starting out and in 1975 he joined the TAB as a systems programmer. After a course on microprocessors (which were in their infancy in 1976) Lester became excited with the possibilities that this new technology offered. Neil Scott, the Head of the Electronics department, asked him for help with a private project; New Zealand's first commercial microcomputer. They worked on this project after-hours and delivered the first one, the Millbrook 781, to College Mercantile. During his day job at the TAB Lester saw the chance to start up on his own; he resigned from the TAB and signed a contract with them to assist in the programming and development of a new betting terminal based on a microcontroller. He then visited the US to learn all the latest on microcontrollers, and came back to New Zealand to find the project he signed up for had been cancelled. Not one to waste an opportunity Lester could see other uses for this new technology and decided to strike out on his own, embarking on a series of projects using his new found skills.
Lester's first solo project was computerising the Waiouru Army museum audio visual show. He developed a microcontroller for Wallace Grey Studios which allowed them to develop a show synchronising music and dialog to the images shown by 12 slide projectors. A different version was used to actually run the show for tourists.
Lester Abbey graduated from the University of Utah with a degree in Mathematics at the age of 20 and joined the Utah State Highway Dept as a bicycle-track Engineer. After securing funding for a study trip from the department he embarked on his first cycling tour from Washington State to Nevada, having a look at the urban bike paths of Portland and the Willamette cycle trail on the way. This 'research' got Lester hooked on bicycle touring and further research followed in Utah and Arizona, touring from Salt Lake City to the north rim of the Grand Canyon.
In 1974 Lester embarked on a two month solo cycling tour on his Raleigh around New Zealand and eastern Australia. On this tour he was very attracted to Wellington, so much so that he stopped at a local bank and asked them if they would cash a traveller's cheque and give him a job. They did both.
Settling in Wellington he took a programming job for Databank Systems which was just starting out and in 1975 he joined the TAB as a systems programmer. After a course on microprocessors (which were in their infancy in 1976) Lester became excited with the possibilities that this new technology offered. Neil Scott, the Head of the Electronics department, asked him for help with a private project; New Zealand's first commercial microcomputer. They worked on this project after-hours and delivered the first one, the Millbrook 781, to College Mercantile. During his day job at the TAB Lester saw the chance to start up on his own; he resigned from the TAB and signed a contract with them to assist in the programming and development of a new betting terminal based on a microcontroller. He then visited the US to learn all the latest on microcontrollers, and came back to New Zealand to find the project he signed up for had been cancelled. Not one to waste an opportunity Lester could see other uses for this new technology and decided to strike out on his own, embarking on a series of projects using his new found skills.
Lester's first solo project was computerising the Waiouru Army museum audio visual show. He developed a microcontroller for Wallace Grey Studios which allowed them to develop a show synchronising music and dialog to the images shown by 12 slide projectors. A different version was used to actually run the show for tourists.
In 1978 he formed Lester Abbey & Associates and two other Directors soon joined; Barry Watson, Contracts & Manufacturing Director and
Tim Naylor as Technical Director. They worked on various projects using microcontrollers - protocol converters, embedded products in washing machines and fruit drying machines, audio visual controllers, and then came a significant project - Alarm Monitoring. Answer Services contracted them to develop a replacement for their Answerscan system and a new concept was introduced: the alarms system in each premise was polled from a central station. Previously all alarm systems had a direct and unique connection via Post Office circuits to the monitoring service. A polled service could have many premises all sharing a single circuit, achieving great savings in line costs. Essentially the Alarm monitoring device was the first Abbey RTU.
Tim Naylor as Technical Director. They worked on various projects using microcontrollers - protocol converters, embedded products in washing machines and fruit drying machines, audio visual controllers, and then came a significant project - Alarm Monitoring. Answer Services contracted them to develop a replacement for their Answerscan system and a new concept was introduced: the alarms system in each premise was polled from a central station. Previously all alarm systems had a direct and unique connection via Post Office circuits to the monitoring service. A polled service could have many premises all sharing a single circuit, achieving great savings in line costs. Essentially the Alarm monitoring device was the first Abbey RTU.
MicroAlert II RTU
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The Wellington City council then asked if this system could be adapted to monitor alarms on all their sewage pumps. Of course they could and Wellington City Council adopted the system in 1982 - MicroAlert I. Waitemata Electric Power Board and Marlborough Electric Power Board also adopted this system soon after.
Development on this type of monitoring system progressed rapidly as new markets opened up; the RTU was adapted to run on radio - MicroAlert II. Masterton was the first customer for MicroAlert II in 1984 and is still a customer to this day. |
MicroAlert III RTU
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Significant Abbey Systems milestones
1978 Registered as Lester Abbey & Associates Ltd
1982 MicroAlert I - first Water & Wastewater system sold to Wellington City Council
1984 MicroAlert II RTU system developed
1988 MicroAlert III launched - first modular system
1992 Modulink RTU systems launched
1993 Microlink and Minilink integrated RTUs launched
1993 Company renamed Abbey Systems Ltd
1996 Powerlink substation RTU developed
1998 Topcat RTU launched
1999 Powerlink software launched
2000 First IP Powerlink RTU developed for Central Power
2005 Swampfox RTU launched
2006 Aspex HMI software launched
2008 Topcat RTU v2 launched
2009 IP SCADA Gateway developed
2009 Cellular Network software released for all current RTU models
2009 Abbey Systems wins Chittagong SCADA Project for 34 substations - US5M
2011 Powerlink Sequence Of Events released
2015 Powerlink 3.8.0 software launched
2016 Lester Abbey sadly passes
2017 Arthur D Riley & Co Ltd purchases Abbey Systems
1978 Registered as Lester Abbey & Associates Ltd
1982 MicroAlert I - first Water & Wastewater system sold to Wellington City Council
1984 MicroAlert II RTU system developed
1988 MicroAlert III launched - first modular system
1992 Modulink RTU systems launched
1993 Microlink and Minilink integrated RTUs launched
1993 Company renamed Abbey Systems Ltd
1996 Powerlink substation RTU developed
1998 Topcat RTU launched
1999 Powerlink software launched
2000 First IP Powerlink RTU developed for Central Power
2005 Swampfox RTU launched
2006 Aspex HMI software launched
2008 Topcat RTU v2 launched
2009 IP SCADA Gateway developed
2009 Cellular Network software released for all current RTU models
2009 Abbey Systems wins Chittagong SCADA Project for 34 substations - US5M
2011 Powerlink Sequence Of Events released
2015 Powerlink 3.8.0 software launched
2016 Lester Abbey sadly passes
2017 Arthur D Riley & Co Ltd purchases Abbey Systems
