Remembering Renishaw cofounder Sir David McMurtry

Recently passed Sir David McMurtry founded Renishaw in 1973 with John Deer, a fellow Rolls-Royce engineer, to commercialize the 3D touch-trigger probe for co-ordinate measuring machines. He had invented the probe the previous year to solve measurement problems faced in the manufacture of the Olympus engines that powered the Concorde supersonic aircraft. A brilliant engineer, he was employed at Rolls-Royce plc, Bristol, for 17 years, where he rose to become Deputy Chief Designer and their youngest ever Assistant Chief of Engine Design. He was responsible for 47 patents at Rolls-Royce and went on to be named on more than 200 patents for Renishaw innovations.

With Sir David at the helm, Renishaw revolutionized the development of co-ordinate measuring machines, shopfloor metrology and process control. Today it’s hard to imagine a machine shop of any size without tool setting and inspection probes that automate laborious and complex setting and measurement tasks, yet in the 1970s, ideas for such applications were truly visionary. Sir David also led the Company’s diversification into other areas of metrology, manufacturing and automation, from encoders and calibration systems to neurosurgery and additive manufacturing. His lateral thinking and capacity to deal with scientific concepts from multiple disciplines was truly legendary.

Today, the company that he cofounded more than 50 years ago is a globally respected business, employing more than 5,000 people in 36 countries. Sir David says that from the start he and John set out to create a company that was different to most others — different in how it applied technology to real world problems, in how it invested for the long term, in how it manufactured rather than outsourced, and in how it treated design engineers and local communities as partners. The culture that he and John created remains today and is very much present in Renishaw’s values and especially that of integrity, where the company takes decisions for the right reasons and not just because that is what is expected.

Despite everything that he had achieved, Sir David was a reserved man who avoided publicity, and who was more comfortable sharing his insights with young engineers than making public speeches. He did however receive huge recognition from around the world for his achievements, including Japan and the USA, where he received awards that had historically only been presented to citizens of those countries. His Knighthood was awarded “for services to Design and Innovation” and he was appointed a Royal Designer for Industry (RDI) in 1989. He was also a Fellow of the Institute of Mechanical Engineers, a Fellow of the American Society of Manufacturing Engineers, a Fellow of the Royal Academy of Engineering and a Fellow of the Royal Society.

His list of awards is too numerous to list individually, but some of the most noteworthy were from outside the UK, including the 7th ND Marketing Award in 1990, where Sir David was the first non-Japanese winner of this prestigious award given to outstanding executives in the metal forming industry. In 2008, the official magazine of the US Society of Manufacturing Engineers also honored him as a ‘Master of Manufacturing’, the first time that this recognition had been given to a non-US citizen.

In 2013 he was awarded a Lifetime Achievement Award for his contribution to the economy of the Bristol city region and at the National Business Awards he was honoured with The Telegraph award for a Decade of Business Achievement, the first head of an engineering business to be granted this award. The Institute of Physics jointly awarded its 2012 Swan Medal to Sir David and John Deer for their role in founding Renishaw and leading it to become one of the world’s principal manufacturers of metrology equipment. In April 2014, during the MACH exhibition, Sir David was also awarded the inaugural MWP Lifetime Achievement Award which honours an individual who has made a significant contribution to the UK’s manufacturing industry. In 2019, The Institution of Mechanical Engineers (IMechE) awarded Sir David the James Watt International Gold Medal for his outstanding contribution to mechanical engineering, the highest award that the industry can bestow and that a mechanical engineer can receive.

Sir David will be greatly missed by so many, including the generations of Renishaw engineers who he inspired and mentored.

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