For Brooks Nunley it’s all about innovation

In the realm of lifting tool product design, development and distribution, Brooks Nunley is a known entity. For the past 20 years he has worked for two big names in rigging tools – Cortland International and Kennedy Wire Rope – selling their lifting tool product lines around the world. He recently made the full time move to take on the role of CEO of his own company, Innovative Lifting.

“It is not that expensive to be able to build a communication system so a user can interface with their lifting equipment instead of a rigger. And that’s really the idea of it. It’s designing lifting devices that are smart and that are programmable.” - Brooks Nunley, President, Innovative Lifting

“I started my career in the fiber rope industry when fiber rope was just beginning to replace steel wire rope in towing applications,” he said. “Fiber rope was a new development, and it brought new products to the industry at large.”

As the technical sales manager at Cortland International for 12 years, he played a critical role in getting high performance yarns accepted in lifting.

“Fiber rope adds so much value,” he said. “It’s lighter weight, safer to use and it floats, to name a few of its properties.”

He then went to work for one of his customers, Kennedy Wire Rope, as a sales manager and then vice president of sales. Over the next five years he built a fiber rope division at Kennedy. Now he is focused on his new passion.

“With Innovative Lifting, I’m trying to add the value that I saw being missed in traditional rigging,” he said. “The technology that’s available today, at our fingertips, is overwhelming. We are applying technology that’s been proven in other areas in the lifting and rigging format. This is something our industry has been slow to adopt.”

Nunley spoke last month at the Associated Wire Rope Fabricators meeting in Houston, addressing “From Hook to High-Tech: Mastering Below the Hook Lifting Devices.” In discussing the next generation of lifting tools, Nunley said bespoke solutions are the wave of the future. I talked to Nunley about his new business, current lifting and rigging gear products and the advent of “smart” lifting equipment. Nunley is a focused, smart and engaging person who is passionate about the industry. I think you will be interested in what he has to say.

WHAT IS THE SCOPE OF INNOVATIVE LIFTING?

We have several different pillars of what we do. We produce engineered products that use proven technology, like controls, lithium batteries and RF systems to create smart lifting tools.

I discussed this at the AWRF meeting. The idea of smart lifting tools is that you don’t need additional riggers or additional manpower or even to get into unsafe areas to make load adjustments or load corrections or center of gravity offsets. With controls and programming, we provide a package to the user, and they can now perform a dynamic lift. What we are doing is allowing a below-the-hook device to perform the function that otherwise would need multiple cranes to do. If you design the lifting tool the right way, then one crane or one hoist can do the work of multiple cranes.

We do advanced lifting, provide testing and manufacture and produce tooling equipment. Lifting, testing, and tooling. In terms of lifting, we make spreader bars and lifting beams that are smart.

Basically, Innovative lifting is a product development business. In line with that, we do a lot of testing to qualify existing products and new products. We do testing for other companies, too. We want to know what happens when you take an article and you throw it at a piece of rope at 200 miles an hour. Does it damage it? We do that level of testing.

Our tooling services are more geared towards manufacturing. Through automation, you can basically have a below-the-hook device communicate with another manufacturers’ equipment for a full integrated system. Our systems will talk with other systems so that you have a tooling system that is smart.

AT AWRF, YOU DISCUSSED THE NEXT GENERATION OF LIFTING TOOLS. HOW DO YOU CHARACTERIZE THESE TOOLS?

It was a pretty cool opportunity to get to present on that subject to that crowd – a career highlight for sure. Tools are built for a purpose. The technology at hand today compared to 15 years ago, when I was just entering business, is dramatically different. It is not that expensive to be able to build a communication system so a user can interface with their lifting equipment instead of a rigger. And that’s really the idea of it. It’s designing lifting devices that are smart and that are programmable.

If you look at lifting equipment at large, everything looks the same, and there hasn’t really been significant change in a long time. My generation is demanding change. People grew up with PlayStations and iPads and technologies that they know how to use. So why don’t they use this technology in their daily work life too?

WHAT ARE THE CHALLENGES THAT YOU FACE IN DESIGNING AND MANUFACTURING NEW LIFTING TOOLS?

Communication is the biggest challenge. The more communication between the end user and the designer, the better. You want to be able to talk to the engineers that are involved in the lift, but it’s always good to get feedback from the users too, because these are the guys that use the equipment daily.

That’s when gaps happen, when there is not enough communication. This is because we didn’t have all the information from the people using the equipment. Really listening to that level of employment and communicating is critical to the design of a lifting tool.

WHERE DOES TESTING FIT INTO THE REALM OF THE LIFTING AND RIGGING INNOVATION PROCESS? 

When you’re designing new products and you’re bringing new technology to an industry, it has to come with a lot of testing. To get really good at manufacturing equipment like this, you have to first be really good at testing it to make sure it works. And, you know, out of that, we saw the testing part of the business spin off. It’s really just putting an engineered test plan together and testing different parameters. The testing portion of our business is really just a reflection of our engineering process.

Innovative Lifting is a product development business specializing in lifting and rigging.

HOW DO YOU ENVISION STEEL AND SYNTHETIC WIRE ROPE EVOLVING? 

I think that every single day, synthetics will continue to take a larger portion of the overall market. And I’ve had that same belief for the past 18 years. Users of the product want to be able to use it safely, and a function of being safe is being lightweight. It’s like a one-for-one equivalent. So being lightweight and easy to handle is a human need.

Fiber rope has been so critical over the past 18 years. And you know, from an innovative lifting standpoint, it tries to address other needs. When something is too heavy, then why not automate that movement?

DO YOU ENVISION FIBER OR HYBRID ROPE FOR CONVENTIONAL CRANE USE?

I don’t know how to answer this, at least in the near term. The industry is so large, but there are really very few players (in hybrid rope) when you look at the macro level.

To say that a synthetic component will take over steel in a conventional crane application, I think it still could happen, but it may not be in my lifetime.

I do think far and away synthetic rope will take the lead because it’s just a better product to work with when you automate it. But for any crane that you see driving down the road doing road construction, that’s not the market that will move the quickest for sure. I will say, Innovative Lifting is currently building a specialty crane, and you better believe the rope will be fiber.

WHAT ABOUT TOWER CRANES?

Use of synthetic rope in tower cranes is happening more often, and in particular in Europe. I think a lot of that is due to industry standards not being quite aligned yet.

It will happen in tower cranes sooner. There’s really only one rope manufacturer who is actively going after this market. The level of attention to it is just not high enough to make it a priority.

WHAT IS IT ABOUT THIS INDUSTRY THAT KEEPS YOU ENGAGED?

I love rope. I love high performance anything. I love being a part of things getting better in our industry. I got to be a part of the steel to synthetic conversion as fiber slings were introduced. It was really cool because the industry was changing and adopting new technology. Everybody knows what synthetic ropes are, their values and high-performance fibers. It’s now used all over the USA.

It’s really just a shift in focus. My focus went from fiber ropes exclusively. And now, I’m really focusing on improving heavy lifting from an equipment standpoint, because of all the improvements that synthetic rope brought to the table over the past 18 years. There’s at least three to five years of solid improvements that I’m going to focus on this side of the business. I’m more excited now than I have ever been. I am very engaged at the moment.

WHAT IS YOUR BUSINESS PHILOSOPHY?

I have worked for some fantastic people. I’ve worked for fantastic businesses. I’ve seen things done the right way, and I’ve seen things done the wrong way. I’m thankful for this opportunity. At the end of the day, business is pretty simple. It is to be a solutions provider. If you can provide a solution to help people out, that’s critical. I love relationship building. I love being a part of such a critical industry. Heavy lifting is one of the most critical things that we do on earth. I think doing what you say you’re going to do is critical. You’ve got to be persistent at that. And I’m really just betting on that if I do the same thing I’ve always done, then I can be successful. In my career, surrounding myself with people smarter than me has always paid off. My team at Innovative is pretty dang smart.

WHAT DO YOU DO WHEN YOU ARE NOT WORKING?

I love spending time in the country. I love hunting, fishing and spending time with my beautiful family. I’m hopeful that one day I’ll be able to retire and have left a lasting impact on this industry. Someday, I just want to sit on my front porch and drink coffee in my rocking chair.