Holden Guru says goodbye

It is fitting that GM-Holden's engineering guru, Tony Hyde, drives the car that best represents his work; a 2006 Holden Monaro CV8.

Hyde and his department were responsible for the modern reincarnation of the venerable Monaro coupe, the modern version of which started as a concept car at the 1998 Australian International Motor Show.

As GM-Holden's executive director, engineering, for the past seven years, Hyde has been responsible for some of Holden's most exciting products; Monaro among them.

Now, after 39 years' service he will vacate his engineering role to retire at the end of the year.

“It was an outstanding project and experience,” he says of the Monaro.

Boasting an annual engineering budget of more than $300 million and counting 1250 people on the engineering staff, Hyde hopes he'll be remembered most for allowing his staff the freedom to push the boundaries.

“From a management point or leadership point of view, I think I've tried to let the team push the boundaries and, to a certain extent, the Monaro was a bit of that,” he says.

“I think that the people who have worked for me have hopefully enjoyed the amount of freedom I've given them."

“From a project point of view, I'd say the work I've done on the original disc brakes for Holdens back in the mid-1970s ranks as a piece of work as an engineer that I remember fondly.”

Hyde's brake work actually appeared on the Torana A9X concept car from the 1970s.

With the new VE Commodore and WM Statesman and Caprice models now bedding in and the arrival of the just-launched VE Ute, Hyde says it's time to go.

“I'm 60 in February and I just really think it's about time,” he says. “We're getting to the point of saddling up for the next all-new products and I'm certainly not going to be here for that so I think it's appropriate for new leadership for the team.”

The quietly spoken Hyde started with Holden in July 1968; as a technical report writer in experimental engineering.

His most favourite Holden is, perhaps not surprisingly, the latest VE Commodore and WM Statesman.

“It's perhaps trite to say that but I would, on the basis it is 100 per cent Australian,” he says. “They are our technical tour de force."

“However, the VM (Commodore) enabled us to break away from the copies of European vehicles and we were able to get back to the large cars we previously did.”

Hyde has held several positions with the company within its engineering organisation, including three overseas postings.

Early in his career he had a two-year scholarship to General Motors' Institute in Michigan in 1971; where he was subsequently awarded an overseas fellowship with GM.

This was followed a few years later by a two-year assignment with Opel in Germany.

After a brief interlude in 1984 in the role of manager, technical services, Hyde was promoted to chassis transmission and drivetrain engineer, which led to the role of manager, mechanical engineering in 1986.

In recent years Hyde has expanded the breadth of his portfolio within Holden in other engineering and planning roles.

In August 1997 he was promoted to the position of director, engineering and design, at GM Holden before taking on his current position as executive director, engineering, in 2000.

One of his tasks has been to take Holden engineering to the GM world, by making Holden responsible for rear-drive platforms for GM.

In 2002, he was also appointed to the Holden Special Vehicles board.

Apart from his jet-black Monaro, Hyde also has a 1976 Chevrolet Corvette in his garage to tinker with in retirement.

When he's not driving on the road, he'll be on the golf course trying to better his 3.5 handicap.

Hyde will be replaced by Greg Tyus, who is currently general director, engineering and product planning, at GM Canada.

Tyus will begin transitioning into his new position next month.