Olaf Diegel

Olaf Diegel’s commitment to innovation in engineering is highly commendable, particularly his dedication to improving quality of life in the health area. His creative and significant work has raised the reputation of New Zealand engineering globally.
Olaf is both an educator and a practitioner. At Massey University Auckland he teaches and publishes in the fields of product development and mechatronics.

He has developed over 40 commercialised new products, with applications including theatre lighting, security and marine purposes and home health monitoring. He has received over a dozen New Zealand and international awards.

Olaf’s latest development is the SCVL cardiovascular lab, an innovative monitoring technology that gives a comprehensive picture of a user’s cardiovascular health. It measures not only blood pressure, but also pulse pressure, mean arterial pressure, cardiac output and stroke volume, and the systolic pressure index and ankle brachial index, which indicate arterial blockages. The technology represents a paradigm shift in the detection of cardiovascular conditions.

The SCVL cardiovascular lab has been taken up by Spengler, the French company that invented the aneroid blood pressure monitor in 1907, and will be released internationally in 2007 to celebrate the company’s centenary. In May 2006 Spengler was awarded a gold medal for the SCVL cardiovascular lab at the Concours Lepine International, a prestigious inventor competition held under the patronage of French President Jacques Chirac.

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