Hills Limited

Hills Limited (formerly Hills Holdings Limited) is a technology product and services business delivering integrated security and surveillance, audio visual, lighting, communications and mobility, alert devices and services into trusted environments such as hospitals, aged care, transport, education, banking and the corporate sector.

The company has been described as an Australian legend and was initially built upon the invention of the Hills Rotary Hoist.

About

Hills Limited is a technology product and services business delivering integrated security and surveillance, audio visual, lighting, communications and mobility, alert devices and services into trusted environments such as hospitals, aged care, transport, education, banking and the corporate sector. Hills Limited's registered office address is Level 7, 130 Pitt St, Sydney, NSW 2000.

History

Lance Hill began to manufacture a lever-style Hills rotary clothes hoist in his backyard in 1945.

Lance Hill's brother-in-law Harold Ling returned from the war and joined him to form a partnership in 1946. Ling became the key figure in expanding the production and marketing of the Hills hoist. In 1947 Hills Hoists began manufacturing a wind-up clothes hoist. This design, often incorrectly credited to Lance Hill, had been patented by Gilbert Toyne in 1925. It was an all-metal model (Australian Patent No. 24553/25) with its enclosed crown wheel-and-pinion winding mechanism. Toyne had established manufacturing sites in Adelaide, Melbourne and Sydney and his Toyne hoist was available for purchase nationwide by the 1930s. However it was Hills entry into the market place at the end of World War II which saw them gain dominance of the rotary clothes hoist market.