Parkburn Precision Handling Systems was established in 2002, but it’s experience dates back much further. In 1968 a small team of Dowty Boulton & Paul engineers was tasked by the British Post Office, to develop a high speed & highly controllable machine for laying analogue telephone cables on the sea bed. In 1970, the Linear Cable Engine was born and from this market 1st technology the creation of Dowty Precision Handling Systems soon followed and became the world’s leading provider of marine telecoms handling systems and equipment.

The story now moves to the late 1980’s with the emergence of electrically driven systems and the beginning of the Parkburn / Dowty relationship. This culminated in the development and supply of another market 1st – the AC electric drive linear cable engine in 1999. This moved the entire marine telecom cable lay market from hydraulic to electric drive, as the demand for new high capacity digital subsea (internet) cables gained momentum.

Parkburn’s leading edge drive and control technology provided the heartbeat of these new electric, PLC-controlled high specification systems, and so most of the world’s leading subsea cable owners, operators and installers, benefited from the previously unseen levels of control, performance and reliability provided and continue to do so today.