Wow what a year... We can't do a write up of 2020 without talking about the impact COVID-19 has had across the world. We appreciate how fortunate we are to live in New Zealand and to be able to continue our lives with minimal disruption. We were also fortunate that during New Zealand’s lockdown, our team was able to continue working, albeit from home, as much of our work is done remotely.

Despite the challenges of 2020, we had a number of interesting projects to work on across various sectors as well as several exciting product releases. We’re pleased to also now have a senior industrial programmer on the team which will allow us to enhance our existing range of innovations as well as develop some exciting new solutions for our clients.

We welcomed three new staff to our team in 2020.

Secure ICCP
Survalent’s substation automation system StationCentral, is a cost-effective and simple-to-install solution for adding Secure ICCP functionality. StationCentral provides a resilient data acquisition engine, information aggregation and processing, and an HMI for utility operations at the substation level. StationCentral can be installed on any SCADA system or as a stand-alone system.

Quasar Control Utility
A new version of Quasar Control load management software is soon to be released that will include new utility functionality for integration with GE ADMS. Quasar Control Utility is our load control solution that is specifically designed for networks to manage their peak loads.  It is powerful enough to manage even the largest network, whilst being agile enough to be used to manage single substations.

The Quasar team has configured and implemented an energy management system for Argosy, one of New Zealand’s leading listed property companies. The energy management system provides energy consumption and efficiency data across Argosy's commercial property portfolio and is being rolled out across Argosy’s properties in stages with the first stage recently being handed over.

“We have a large number of buildings in our portfolio with several already certified and others in the process of becoming NABERSNZ and Green Star rated,” said Saatyesh Bhana, Head of Sustainability at Argosy. “As a result, we needed a system that would allow us to easily view the relevant data for each building in our portfolio. Quasar’s consolidated portal system was a perfect solution for us”.
 
The energy management system, comprising Schneider Electric EcoStruxure Power Monitoring Expert software and PowerLogic meters, was configured to Argosy’s requirements and provides for future properties to easily be added. The near real-time information is available to view via a suite of rich dashboards and comprehensive reports that categorise consumption data into a range of measures including whole building versus tenant versus base building, location, and property type. In addition, the energy information is normalised into per square metre and per workstation to allow efficiencies to be compared across the portfolio.

“Argosy’s initial focus is tracking electricity usage across the office portfolio, and we can now view and compare this data for several of our office buildings. To support our sustainability ratings Argosy is also adding meters for water and other commodities, as well as carbon reporting. Quasar’s system can also provide power quality reporting in the future if required,” said Saatyesh.

“In order for Argosy to set energy reduction targets for its buildings we needed to know how much total energy we were using. Partnering with Quasar has allowed us to measure that energy usage and know where we are using it. The system goes further to monitor and advise of abnormal usage to allow maintenance teams to investigate and rectify issues in an efficient manner”.

Thank you for your support in 2020.

This year, our office officially closes for the Christmas break at 4pm on Tuesday 22nd December and we reopen at 830am on Monday 11th January. 

Emails to sales@quasar.co.nz will continue to be monitored during this time and we will respond when possible. Our support contract clients can continue to contact us on (03) 343 9159 or support@quasar.co.nz.

We hope you have a safe and Merry Christmas, and a Happy New Year, and we look forward to working with you again in 2021.

Kind Regards from the Quasar Team.

We’re thrilled to welcome Andrea Baldin to the Quasar team, as our Industrial Programmer. Andrea is responsible for supporting and enhancing our existing range of software solutions including our dedicated load control application, Quasar Control, and our suite of add-on modules for PME. He will also be responsible for continuing to develop new complementary solutions for our customers and market, as well as overseeing the development of our project engineers to expand their database and programming skills.
 
Andrea gained his Industrial IT Diploma in Italy in 1986 and started working in the industrial automation industry as a software developer. After gaining further IT qualifications, he became a IT consultant for city councils and then moved to design and develop IT solutions as well as teaching IT at the Technical Institute. Andrea relocated to Hamilton in 2013 and held various positions before his most recent role at ASB Bank. He has recently moved to Christchurch to join our team as well as follow his dream to ski in winter and ride a motor bike to the beaches in summer.
 
On weekends, Andrea can be found tramping, skiing, riding, fishing or any other outdoor activities.

We’re excited to have welcomed another face to the Quasar team – Olivier Casalta. Olivier is our new project engineer and will be responsible for developing, designing and commissioning energy and power management systems using a range of Schneider Electric products.
 
After graduating with an Engineering Degree, specialising in mechatronics, Olivier worked for Alstom (and later GE Power & Water) in Estonia, France and Algeria, where he was responsible for power plant electrical works.  After moving to Christchurch three years ago, Olivier has gained further experience with commissioning and testing building management systems for a variety of large construction projects.

In his spare time, Olivier can be found at the top of mountains, admiring the great views or at the bottom of the ocean catching ika and koura.
 
Welcome Olivier!

Dear all,
 
With the COVID-19 alert levels in New Zealand changing, we wanted to give an update on our operations.
 
As our office is in Christchurch, we are currently at Level 2. Our team are working from our office as usual and can be contacted via the usual methods.
 
Our team are also undertaking all required safety measures including social distancing, regular cleaning and implementing a contact tracing register.
 
Visitors to Our Office
 
Visitors to our office must be pre-approved. If you wish to visit our office, please call us on +64 3 343 9150.
 
If you have been approved to visit, you will be required to sanitise your hands on arrival (sanitiser available on our reception counter), sign in (reception will instruct you on this) and maintain a two metre separation distance from our staff.
 
If you have any questions or comments, please don't hesitate to get in touch.
 
Take care,

The Quasar Team

We’re excited to welcome the newest member of the Quasar team, Leanne Chapman, who joins us as our Finance and Operations Manager. Leanne has a wealth of experience in accounting and operations and is responsible for overseeing Quasar’s day-to-day finance and operations activities and performing financial analysis, reporting and management activities. Leanne says, "I am thrilled have joined the Quasar team and to work alongside such committed and collaborative people!"
 
Leanne graduated with a Diploma in Accountancy & Management in Ireland before starting as an Assistant Accountant with In1 Solutions, a software development company. After working up to CFO, Leanne relocated to New Zealand in 2004 where she set up a New Zealand branch for In1 and become General Manager. Along with her business partner, Leanne then set up Redcow Marketing, which helped people grow their businesses online.
 
Six years ago, Leanne relocated to Christchurch and has since held GM roles in the professional services industry with Cambridge Partners and Moore Stephens Markhams.
 
On weekends, you can find Leanne spending time with family and friends and maybe rehearsing for her latest musical theatre project, as a member of CentreStage Rolleston.

Dear all,
 
With the alert level in New Zealand moving to Level 2, we will be returning to our office on Thursday 14th May.
 
We’ll be back at our desks and available via our usual contact methods - email, mobile and direct dial numbers plus via video calls. We’ll also be available via the main Quasar phone number.
 
Our team will be undertaking all required safety measures including social distancing, regular cleaning and implementing a contact tracing register.
 
Visitors to Our Office
 
All visitors to our office will be required to sanitise their hands on arrival (sanitiser available on our reception counter), sign in (reception will instruct you on this) and maintain a two meter separation distance from our staff.
 
Current Orders
Once we are back in the office, our engineers will be prioritising configuring hardware for existing orders so that these can be processed and shipped as soon as possible. If you would like to discuss an individual order then please contact us on +64 3 343 9150 or office@quasar.co.nz.

New Orders

We are processing new orders as usual. There are shipping delays on a small number of hardware items as they sent to us from international locations. However, we can provide estimates on shipping timeframes before you place an order. If you have any questions about shipping timeframes, please contact our sales team on +64 3 343 9150 or sales@quasar.co.nz.
 
Level 1

We do not know the specifics of level 1 yet but once the NZ government has announced these details, we will update our operating procedures accordingly and also update our website with this information.
 
 
We’d also like to take this opportunity to thank our team, customers and suppliers for your support and positivity during this time. We’re looking forward to returning to the office and catching up with you all.

If you have any questions or comments, please don't hesitate to get in touch.

Take care,

The Quasar Team