Anybody who worked in an Australian office of the ‘70s and ‘80s would know about the IBM Selectric golf ball typewriter, a formidable-looking machine known for the metal ball that rotated and pivoted when the keys were struck. It enabled typists to work at double their previous speed, a testament to IBM’s ingenuity.
In 1975, IBM built a typewriter plant on the outskirts of Wangaratta in Victoria. Three hours away, students were attending Ballarat University. No one realised it yet, but the proximity of the two was to drive a new wave of regional prosperity, and open up new pathways for private and public collaboration.
Rise and fall
The Wangaratta plant, sitting between Melbourne and Sydney, was so sophisticated that when the computer revolution arrived it could re-tool to become one of only three IBM personal computer plants in the world. Eventually, it made build-to-order computers.
But as the Asian-Pacific markets emerged in the 1990s, executives found that distance, plus Australian wages, made the Wangaratta plant uncompetitive.
They made heroic efforts to stay in business, from re-jigged supply lines to innovative logistics, to a sale to a group of investors. For a while it worked: the plant attracted customers including Hewlett-Packard, Lucent and Philips. And in 2000 it was bought by Selectron Corporation, a global company.
Yet it could not survive the tech crash. The Wangaratta plant closed, marking the end of IBM Australia’s manufacturing exports – and devastation for a regional town.
Paradoxically, a widespread IT skills shortage was emerging at the same time, as IT companies moved from hardware to services. IBM understood this, and delayed the inevitable move to South-East Asia, so they could work with the Australian Government to try something novel.
“This was a time of great industry cooperation and government/private sector partnership at the state and federal level,” said then managing director of IBM Australia/New Zealand David Thodey, according to the book Transition, written by John Harvey about IBM’s history in Australia. “Our infrastructure, culture, language and skills made Australia an attractive choice.”
IBM chose to take advantage of the fact that regional Victoria’s real estate and living costs were lower than in the cities. But how would they attract the 200 to 500 highly skilled professionals they needed to the region? The internet boom had begun, and IT professionals were already in high demand.
A brilliant collaboration
Federation University – originally the University of Ballarat – is Australia’s third-oldest Advanced Education Institution. Founded in 1870, it benefited from the wealth of the gold rush. By the 1990s, however, that vibrancy was long gone.
“It’s an old manufacturing town, and it needed something new to invigorate it,” Steve Davies, Service Line Leader at IBM in Melbourne. told The Brilliant. The Vice Chancellor of the University of Ballarat had hit on the idea of a technology park – and IBM had signed on to be the anchor tenant when it opened in 1995.
The State of Victoria helped fund a data centre and the Ballarat Technology Park began to attract other businesses. But there were growing pains.
One problem was a mismatch between what Australian university IT departments were teaching, and what industry needed. The result? Graduates weren’t ready for the job market – and they weren’t happy when they got there. In 2000, 47% of them quit within 12 months of graduating.
IBM realised that one way to realise its plan to stay in the region was to help the university build up its IT department. This was delicate territory: while industry–university research partnerships had a well-established track record, teaching belonged firmly to universities.
“It was clear that we would need to partner with the [then] University of Ballarat to ensure that graduates had the correct skills and technical capabilities when they graduated,” says Thodey.
The idea was to give students practical experience while they were still undergraduates, partly so the students would be ready for the work force, but also to show them IBM was an attractive place to work. Students signed on to work on the service desk, or in the call centre.
“The students demonstrated that they had a fantastic capability,” says Davies. “It was proving to be very productive, both ways. And out of that came our flagship program.”
In 2001, the University established a Bachelor of IT (Professional Practice), with IBM helping to shape the curriculum and providing lecturers. The academic work was paired with 1,600 hours of work at IBM, so the students experienced real projects, and real clients – and they were paid.
Students flocked to the course. Today it’s one of Australia’s most prestigious in the IT field. The children of some IBM employees have even enrolled, making it a multi-generational experience. “There’s one family where we’ve got the husband, the wife, and the son who are working for us now,” says Davies.
The two decades since the partnership began have seen an expansion of the degree, a graduate certificate, and joint IBM–Federation PhD scholarships. In 2016, Federation College launched Australia’s first Pathways In Technology Early College High School (P-TECH) program for students from diverse and disadvantaged backgrounds.
It encourages youth who have become disengaged from traditional education,” says Davies, telling the story of a visually impaired student who is a sole carer for his mother, who started the program at age 16. “It’s brought them back to the school environment. They say, for the first time in their lives – I feel a bit emotional talking about it – they feel respected and valued.” The first P-TECH cohort are now about to graduate. “They’ve had industry experience,” says Davies. “We do try to encourage them to go on and do a bachelor’s degree.”
Another IBM initiative run out of the Ballarat Technology Park, the Neurodiversity employment program, began in 2019 and provides opportunities for students with autism, whose specialised skillsets offer the company a competitive advantage. “We found young folk have been challenged because traditional interview techniques don’t sit comfortably with people on the spectrum,” says Davies. “With the help of a company called Specialisterne, we hired 11 people last year into Ballarat and they’re kicking goals.” One student did so well that she won the University Medal.
The wider benefits
IBM invests a large number of staff hours and significant funds each year in scholarships. And it’s clear that students are reaping the rewards in a range of ways.
Today, 30% of the IT students at Federation University are women, which is double the national average. Academic performance is strong, with 80% of students achieving a Distinction average, and employment prospects are bright. In 2001, fewer than 40% of Federation University IT graduates found work in the sector. Today, it’s almost 70%; IBM has employed more than 300 out of 400 graduates to date.
As for the Victorian Government’s investment of $41 million to 2020 – that’s paid off handsomely.
Today, the three Ballarat Technology Park sites host 64 enterprises, which collectively adds $476 million to the Ballarat economy, $628.8M to the Victorian economy and $700.5M to the Australian economy.
The partnership between Federation University and IBM has also opened the way for other collaborations. One is the Internet Commerce Security Lab (ICSL), founded in 2008 as a four-way partnership between the state government, the University, IBM and Westpac.
Today, the ICSL has multiple partners – including the Australian Federal Police and the Defence Sciences Institute, plus other universities – on projects as significant as cybersecurity, fraud detection, and identity theft.
Steve Davies says that the “world is starting to catch up,” as many educational institutions realise they need to offer industry placements.
It’s a long way from the days when local workers put together the components for a typewriter. But IBM still plays a key role in modern companies – except this time, it’s not the hardware that’s driving productivity, but the many talented IT professionals that the Federation University collaboration has launched into Australia.
Article by Felicity Carter
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