One-time scuba diver joining world's high-flyers

By PAULA OLIVER

When Seaworks founder Bill Day reveals he has bought a new merino suit for this month's World Entrepreneur of the Year dinner in Monte Carlo, it is a good sign of how far his business has come.

The Wellington-based marine contractor jokes that he used to compete with big companies for contracts by popping into Hallensteins to pick up a new tie.

Now Mr Day, who walked away with the title of New Zealand Entrepreneur of the Year last year for his 20-year dedication to building Seaworks, finds himself in the running for the first World Entrepreneur of the Year title.

"I'm looking forward to it, but I'm realistic about it," he says. "We're really just a small gnat on the back of the world in a global award like this."

Seaworks has a specialised $35-million fleet that lays undersea cables and inspects oil rigs in locations like the Persian Gulf, Western Africa and Hawaii.

Mr Day built the company from scratch in 1979, after beginning as a scuba diving instructor. Now the company employs 140 staff - mostly New Zealanders - and has offices in the Middle East and Malaysia.

It is about to complete the big local job of laying TelstraSaturn's offshore cable from Christchurch to Auckland.

Typically modest, Mr Day says his company has been "pottering along nicely" since he won the local entrepreneur title. But he admits to haveing been surprised at the spin-offs the title provided for Seaworks.

"Overseas these titles mean a lot more than they do here - they're seen as a really big thing," he says. "It gives you a bit of mana, and helps when you're a little private operator trying to win contracts."

He says that a desire to be associated with winners also drew an influx of people wanting to work at the company. Many of them were New Zealanders filling senior roles in multinational companies, who had not previously seen working for a Kiwi company as an option.

"Now they're coming to us and saying they want to work here, which gives us tremendous expertise."

* The World Entrepreneur of the Year title will be awarded on May 19 in Monte Carlo.