Adjunct Professor Nick Tate
Biography
Dr Nick Tate is President of the Australian Computer Society (ACS) and a senior executive, with a strong background in Information Technology (IT) and Cybersecurity. He has considerable experience as a Company Director and at the level of CIO and has been a CEO. He is co-author of “A Director’s Guide to Governing Information Technology and Cybersecurity”, a book published by the Australian Institute of Company Directors (AICD) and has published over 30 columns on IT in the Australian Newspaper, Sydney Morning Herald, Information Age, Engineers Australia Magazine and elsewhere.
Nick has 20 years’ experience as a Company Director in 16 Australian and 2 US companies. He has a PhD in Cybersecurity, is an Adjunct Professor at the University of Queensland (UQ) and a member of the James Cook University (JCU) Council. From 2016 to 2017, he was CEO of BCI Technology. He is also director of an APEC project to establish an ICT Skills Framework for the Asia-Pacific region.
Nick has over 45 years’ experience in the field of IT including 16 years as a CIO/Head of IT at two London banks and at UQ, where he was also responsible for UQconnect, the University’s commercial Internet Service Provider (ISP). He holds voluntary positions as President of the South-East Asia Regional Computer Consortium (SEARCC) and President of the Australian Computer Society (ACS). He is also Chair of the Council of ICT Associations (CICTA), bringing together Queensland ICT industry associations and a faculty member of the Higher Education Information Technology South Africa (HEITSA) Annual Leadership Institute (ALI). He chaired the 2010 World Computer Congress and was National President of the (ACS) in 2012/2013.
For over a decade, he was director of the Australian Computer Emergency Response Team (AusCERT). AusCERT provided a single national point of contact for Cybersecurity Incidents within Australia as the National CERT and undertook training of CERTS and security groups in Australia, New Zealand, Asia, Europe and South America, including training the Chinese National CERT.
Nick’s career has included 20 years with investment/commercial banks, 18 years in London and 2 years at Macquarie Bank in Sydney, where he was responsible for Global IT infrastructure. He has also spent over 15 years working with universities and research organisations, 3 years working on anti-missile missile systems for the Royal Navy whilst working for Ferranti, and 2 years working on air traffic control systems at Plessey.
From 2011 to 2015, he directed the Australian Government funded Research Data Storage Infrastructure (RDSI) project, which developed and deployed one of the largest research data clouds in Australia.
Whilst Head of IT at the United Bank of Kuwait (UBK) in London, Nick was part of the senior management team that dealt with the bank’s response to the Kuwait crisis during the first Gulf War when the bank’s customers were held at gunpoint, there was a run on the bank and an abolition of the bank’s currency of account. Prior to this he designed and led the development of a complete banking system for UBK which catered for Foreign Exchange (Forex), Money Market, Bonds, Securities, Futures, Options, Retail and mortgages and developed systems for an innovative Islamic swap to address the emerging Islamic banking market. While working at UBK, Nick undertook a course on Futures and Options Trading.
From 1979 to 1984, he was a Borough Councillor (equivalent of an Australian City Councillor) in the Borough of Elmbridge near London and chaired the Council’s Health and Highways committees. From 1971 to 1973, he was a pilot in the Royal Air Force Volunteer Reserve as part of the University Air Squadron.