Kiwi designer denies helping OneWorld.

by Wayne Thompson NZHerald on 13 Feb 2002 The former lead designer of the Team New Zealand America's
Cup yachts, Laurie Davidson, has denied allegations that he
passed on the team's design secrets to his current employer, the
Seattle-based OneWorld Challenge.

Mr Davidson said he did not steal designs from other boats and
had made no use of design documents that Auckland lawyer
Sean Reeves alleges came from the 2000 campaign champions.

Mr Davidson was one of five former Team New Zealand design
experts who Mr Reeves alleges were involved in passing on
secret information to the 2003 American challenger.

Responding to the allegations at the OneWorld base in Auckland
this morning, Mr Davidson wore the shirt of his new team, with its
Seattle Yacht Club monogram, and the white belt of the Royal
New Zealand Yacht Squadron.

His team's bosses stood beside him at the press conference and
admitted 'some mistakes' in holding measurement certificates of
Team New Zealand boats.

Chief executive Gary Wright apologised 'for the disrepute' the
syndicate's court case with Mr Reeves had brought to the
America's Cup but wanted to set the record straight.

A former Team New Zealand member, Mr Reeves worked for
OneWorld in Auckland for 11 months from April 2000 as its
adviser on America's Cup rules.

He alleges Mr Davidson brought to OneWorld Challenge dozens of
colour photographs of tank towing tests and models at the
Wolfson Unit in Britain from the 2000 Team New Zealand
campaign. He said this breached America's Cup protocol. A
further breach occurred, he said, by Mr Davidson having at
OneWorld Challenge copies of the measurement certificates for
the Team New Zealand black boats, NZL-57 and NZL-60.

But Mr Davidson said there was no advantage in having either the
photo album or measurement certificates. His office was 'a hell of
a mess with documents strewn around.' After August 2000 he
found in his office an album of photographs belonging to Team
New Zealand showing models during tank testing. These gave no
useful information, he said.

While walking down the street to take the album to the Team New
Zealand office, he called in to the OneWorld office. He said he put
the album down on a coffee table for 20 minutes and that was
when Mr Reeves saw them. They were returned to Team New
Zealand a short time later.

Regarding the measurement certificates, Mr Davidson said they
were brought into the office by Mr Reeves. They played no part in
OneWorld's designs and were forgotten about. Mr Davidson said
he rejected Mr Reeves' claim that it was likely that work on Team
New Zealand yachts gave rise to hull lines plans used in the
August 2000 design package for the One World Challenge yacht.

Mr Davidson said he did not steal, would not steal, and did not
need to steal designs off other boats.

'I could produce lines drawings drawn for Team New Zealand
yachts from memory and could guarantee [their accuracy]within a
matter of centimetres.'

The lines plans were all different from that for the Team New
Zealand boats. One boat would have looked similar to a non
technical person like Mr Reeves.'But in my opinion the boats were
better than Team New Zealand's.'

Mr Wright said the syndicate stood behind its team members who
were 'men of integrity and of good standing in the America's Cup
world.'

He said the syndicate had made some mistakes but believed these
to be minor and not beneficial to its boat's design process. That
would be decided by the America's Cup Arbitration Panel in four to
six weeks.