13
2017 WEL Networks
|
Annual Report
wel.co.nz
CHIEF EXECUTIVE’S REPORT
WEL Networks plays an important role in enabling communities across the Waikato
by providing essential infrastructure services. The past 12 months have certainly
provided a variety of opportunities for our team to enhance our traditional services
and grow our business.
Safety continues to be a key focus for management and
staff and a number of new initiatives to improve safety
performance have been developed and introduced.
During the year the Company successfully completed
a major transaction by purchasing the Government’s
shares in Ultrafast Fibre leaving WEL’s subsidiary Waikato
Networks Limited as the sole shareholder.
At the start of the year we launched WEL Services, our
field delivery arm, which is operating as a wholly owned
subsidiary. The change was implemented to ensure a more
efficient operation with financial transparency.
FOCUS ON SAFETY
In support of our ‘Best in Safety’ vision WEL commenced
a two year programme to significantly increase our focus
on health and safety and improve the engagement of all
staff in this vital aspect of our business. The programme
is ambitious. It contains five work streams and 40 distinct
pieces of work, some of which are quite large standalone
projects, which are to be delivered over a two year period
(2016-2018). The programme has been one of WEL’s key
strategic plan delivery streams for the two year period.
Our Public Safety Management System (PSMS) received a
successful audit result, based on our network assets being
managed efficiently to minimise risk to the public and we
again achieved tertiary accreditation in our annual ACC
Workplace Safety Management System audit.
As part of our contractor and community safety
programme we have also increased industry engagement
to promote the need for safety when working on and
around our network. Additionally we introduced the first
stage of a public safety campaign incorporating traditional
print and media channels along with the introduction of
social media messaging.
STRATEGIC INVESTMENTS
The decision to purchase the Government’s shares in
Ultrafast Fibre reinforced WEL’s position as an innovative
and future-focused investor in infrastructure.
One key initiative is WEL Smart Services; the programme
that is capitalising on our investment in smart metering
technology. Following the successful rollout of smart
meters in our region WEL has developed in-house data
analytics expertise using the smart meter data available to
us. This has now developed into a commercial opportunity
for WEL as we have started offering data analytics services
to other lines companies.
WEL is investigating the opportunity to generate onto its
own network and sell directly to customers. The trial phase
GARTH DIBLEY
Chief Executive
