Ideas, Inspiration and Innovation in WA

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Kevin’s saw is a cut above the rest
You could safely describe Kevin Inkster’s brick and mortar saw – the Allsaw – as a cutting edge product.
It’s a revolutionary saw that can cut
bricks and wood – but not a person’s
arm. Which is just one of the reasons
the petrol version of it was the overall
winner at the 2008 Inventor of the
Year Awards.
Inkster’s Perth-based company
Arbortech has developed and made
numerous successful woodworking
and power tools over the past 25 years.
The electric version of the Allsaw –
sold as the AS170 brick and mortar
saw – runs off mains power and utilises
the company’s patented cutting
technology of two blades moving in a
small elliptical orbit at high frequency.
Inkster came up with the idea for a
safer saw after he cut his hand with a
chainsaw nearly 30 years ago.
It’s proving popular around the globe.
“We make the electric version here
and distribute it around the world,”
Inkster says.
“The major markets for us are the
United States, England and Europe and
Australia. Australia is extremely good
for us.
“We’ve also developed a new cutting
technology, called the Hammersaw,
which uses a single blade and is capable
of cutting concrete as well as rebar
(the reinforcing steel) not just brick
and masonry – which is raising the bar
even more.
“And it looks like we will be able to do
the concrete version ourselves.”
But it’s not all plain sailing. One thing
that’s proving elusive for the moment
is producing a petrol version of the
Allsaw.
Ideas, inspiration and innovation in WA
Disruptive technology
Inkster and his team have run into
what you could called the innovator’s
Catch 22 – they’ve come up with a
disruptive technology that is perhaps
just too threatening for the global
manufacturers of chainsaws.
Inkster says he’s been told informally
that coming up with a safer saw
means that manufacturers’
inventories of normal chainsaws
would, in effect, be regarded as
‘unsafe’ – and a legal nightmare if using
them resulted in injuries.
Inkster and his team is now facing
the challenge of trying to source an
appropriate high-end petrol motor for
the petrol Allsaw, one that would meet
European emissions standards and
include special filtration to cope with
masonry dust.
Current off-the-shelf motors are too
big and powerful and to customise
motors from scratch would be
prohibitively expensive without the
help of major manufacturers.
“I decided to develop the technology
further and tackle the even greater
problem of cutting concrete and rebar
with a safe and effective alternative,”
he says.
“This has resulted in the Hammersaw
which has huge advantages of safety
and performance and is more easily
adapted to regular rotary driven tools.
This means that it is far easier for us
to produce locally or license to other
companies as it is less threatening to
their existing markets.”
Inkster is philosophical about the
setback with the petrol Allsaw, which
he sees as part of the problem-solving
process.
“I’ve come to understand one thing
about innovations,” he explains.
“I’ve heard many other inventors talk
like this and they’re totally focused
on all the reasons they can’t get
something up and going because they
encounter all kinds of resistance,
and the resistance isn’t necessarily
intentional.
“If you’re in an industry and you’re
the leader of that industry and you’re
making a lot of money out of that
industry, why do you want to invest
millions of dollars in something that
is going to ruin your income from that
leading industry?
Improvement
“That’s very much the dilemma for
them.
“Sometimes it’s better to have an
incremental improvement than to have
something radically different.
“What we’ve discovered is that with
disruptive technology, you have to go
all the way yourself.
“So if we can get the petrol Allsaw up
and going, then they have no choice but
to follow suit.”
Inkster says entering the WA Innovator
of the Year Awards can provide a
good reality check for inventors and
innovators.
“One of the best things that came out
of it, believe it or not, was the video
featuring us that was produced as part
of the awards,” he explains.
“That video served us so well in our
negotiations with major companies.”
With disruptive technology,
you have to go all the way
yourself.
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Big names of high-tech queue for
the sequel to Fusion Books
When Melanie Perkins and Cliff Obrecht started their online company Fusion Books and became finalists in
the 2008 WA Inventor of the Year Award while still university students, little did they realise where it would lead.
Now, five years later, they have
some of the biggest names from the
technology world — Google Maps,
Yahoo! and Facebook — lining up to
invest $3 million in seed funding for
their newest online business.
Melanie and Cliff founded Fusion
Books as an easy-to-use online service
that lets schools design and print
eye-catching yearbooks. Melanie says
hundreds of Australian high schools
now use the service.
“We’ve become the largest year
book company in Australia and we’ve
recently launched in France and New
Zealand,” Melanie says.
Building on that success, Melanie and
her team are starting a new company,
Canva, which is due to launch this year.
“Canva takes the concept behind
Fusion Books and applies it to a
broader market,” says Melanie.
She says being part of the Inventor
of the Year Awards has opened more
doors than she could have dreamed of.
“At an IOTY lunch, Larry Lopez
introduced us to an investor from
Silicon Valley, Bill Tai. We only had
a brief conversation, but I stayed in
touch with him and kept him posted on
our milestones,” she says.
Fast-forward two years, and Tai
invited Melanie and Cliff to MaiTai,
an entrepreneur and kite boarding
conference in Hawaii.
Ideas, inspiration and innovation in WA
“We met a number of investors and
entrepreneurs at MaiTai, not only was
their advice invaluable, a number have
also become investors,” Melanie says.
“One benefit has been the connections
we made, that short chat with Bill Tai
has had an incredible domino effect,”
she says.
Top Australian and US investors
have invested in Canva including
Matrix Partners, Blackbird Ventures,
InterWest Partners and 500 Startups.
“Also getting great advice in the early
stages of our business had a huge
impact on our strategies and success.
Fledgling venture
Other investors include Bill Tai; the
director of engineering at Facebook,
Lars Rasmussen; Yahoo! CFO
Ken Goldman; and Seek co-founder
Paul Bassat.
As well as that, the fledgling
venture has attracted a grant from
Commercialisation Australia through
its Early Stage Commercialisation
program.
Melanie was completing her
Communications and Commerce
degree at The University of Western
Australia and teaching people how to
use design programs when she came up
with the idea for Fusion Books.
“Students were struggling with the
basics of how to use these programs
– they were difficult to learn and
complex to use. I realised that, in the
future, design was going to be much,
much easier,” she recalls.
Melanie says her Inventor of the Year
experience was invaluable.
“My favourite quote is: ‘Persistence
isn’t using the same tactic over and
over, persistence is having the same
goal over and over’.
“I think that’s really applied to our
story: know where you want to go and
every day work towards that vision.”
And her tip for people thinking of
entering the Innovator of the Year
Awards?
“Network as much as you can, gather as
much knowledge as you can, and then
apply it all to your company,” she says.
“It’s a fantastic program that’s
had a huge impact on us – absolutely
go for it.”
Network as much as
you can, gather as much
knowledge as you can, and
then apply it all to your
company.
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‘If you believe in your idea, they believe’
Hayley Warren was a determined second-year physiotherapy student when she came up with a new way
to measure the angles of patients’ joints.
Now, after five years of R&D and
having won the Start Up category of
the WA Innovator of the Year Awards
in 2010, her invention is taking on the
world.
The HALO digital goniometer she
developed uses laser technology to
help physiotherapists and other health
and sports professionals measure
the angle of patients’ joints to assist
recovery.
Warren, who is now the CEO of Halo
Medical Devices, says winning the
IOTY award had an effect almost
immediately.
“The Innovator of the Year Award really
brought about recognition for myself
as an inventor and company owner
and brought forward opportunities in
terms of investors,” says Warren.
“As a result of the awards, I met my
first mentor who’s become an investor
in the company, Nathan Buzza, who
is heavily involved in the innovation
medical
device space.
“And from winning the award, we also
went on to win the Electronic News
Future Award last year, the 40 Under
40 Award for entrepreneurs in WA, and
we also won the People’s Choice award
on the ABC’s New Inventors.”
IOTY also helped Warren realise her
goal of going global. In mid-March,
her company HALO Medical Devices
launched HALO in the United States.
“We used the money from the award to
progress to the stage now where we’re
selling,” says Warren.
Ideas, inspiration and innovation in WA
“It boosted us through the development
stage, making sure the foundations
were set correctly – and what I mean
by that is we had an opportunity to
set up and protect the intellectual
property because that was part of the
award prize.
“So it really laid the foundations to set
us up for where we are today, which is
launching the product globally.”
HALO already has a healthy following
locally.
Strategically
“It’s well recognised over here already,”
she says.
“It’s being used in the AFL by people
such as the Eagles and some of the top
hospitals in Perth as well.”
The push into bigger markets is being
tackled strategically.
“We’re focused on Australia and the US
for the time being,” she says.
“Given the economic climate in Europe
at the moment, the US makes more
sense for us.
“Having said that, we recently launched
an email campaign in the United
Kingdom, so we are branching into
there but our focus is on the US and
Australia.”
Warren says HALO has been sent out
to 15 leading universities and private
companies worldwide for further
product validation. Among them is the
world-renowned Mayo Clinic based in
the US.
Entering the IOTY in 2010 meant
that Warren had to acquire new skills
quickly.
“Coming from the small country town
of Manypeaks near Albany, growing up
on a farm and physio all had common
ground, they all needed a practical
approach,” she says.
“That I do well. Getting up to do pitches
and learning about financials, was very
new to me, and had to be learnt.
“That process of going through pitches
and panels as part of the awards really
did assist me.
‘Back yourself’
“It even shaped how I pitch to investors
now and gave me the foundation to
do that correctly and successfully
bring in more money as the company’s
needed it.”
Warren’s advice for fellow inventors
and innovators thinking of entering
the Innovator of the Year Awards is to
“back yourself”.
“Unless you strongly believe in your
idea, you’re not going to get anywhere,”
she says.
“It comes back to knowing why you’re
doing it, knowing it’s a good idea – and
following it through.
“People tend to follow: if you believe,
they believe.”
Even if you don’t win the award, she
says you’ll still come out in front in
terms of the experience and contacts
you make.
“That’s one of the things I’ve found that
works,” says Warren. “If you truly
believe in what you’re doing and it’s
a good idea, just follow it through no
matter what it takes. There will be
many hurdles; just tackle them one by
one and you will get there.”
‘IOTY … really laid the
foundations to set us up
for where we are today,
which is launching the
product globally.
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Smartphone apps come to the aid of
shoppers and drivers
Consumers and retailers are getting smarter in the way they do things, partly due to technologies
developed by Clinton House and his team at Inhouse Group.
Clinton and Inhouse were finalists
in the Start Up category of the 2011
WA Innovator of the Year Awards for
having developed the hardware and
software technologies.
The first is Chirp Deals, a smartphone
app that alerts people to discounts
and special offers available at local
shops and shopping centres. It might
have started at the local level but it’s
growing.
“We are in the process of licensing
the underlying technology of that
application to a significant national
organisation,” House says.
The second technology, Inhouse
Insights, monitors shoppers’
behaviour in retail centres and other
environments, allowing centre
managers real-time data on consumer
behaviour.
Since the IOTY awards, the company
has also developed and launched a
smartphone parking app for the City
of Perth that lets drivers know which
car parks in Perth have bays available,
along with exactly how many they have.
The relationship with the City of Perth
has continued and House says the
company is now seen as an innovation
partner to the city.
“When we launched that app, it was
an Australian first for offering live
bay availability, and we have other
innovative projects with them that will
be launched over the next few months,”
House says.
“But when you talk about technology of
the sort that we entered in the awards,
we got a lot of surprised looks that
we came from Perth, because they
assumed if you were an Australian into
tech, you were in Sydney.
There’s even international attention.
“It was an interesting observation for
us, that we were starting to get on the
map for tech.”
“We’re looking at partnerships to
expand that with different hardware
partners and different local
governments and applications around
the world now,” he says.
Regional start
House says the awards added to the
company’s profile and credibility and
has helped to attract investors.
“It helped us raise our Series A funding
so we didn’t have to sell too big a stake
in the company to raise the required
finances,” he says.
“The process involving mentoring,
pitch coaching and getting in front
of judges was a baptism of fire for
me. Being confident enough in your
product and leaving the judging panel
comfortable that you know what you’re
talking about was a great experience,”
he says.
Inhouse is now based in King Street,
Perth, but it started life as a regional
business in Mandurah.
“Being in front of those judges and
answering their questions prepared me
for pitching to investors where I raised
our Series A funding.
And a recent trip to the US to pursue
opportunities in software technologies
for the mining industry indicates
it might just be helping to change
perceptions.
“You have to stand there on the spot
and answer all the really difficult
questions, and know your product and
market better than the back of your
hand.
“When we mentioned we were from
Perth they almost bow before you
because Perth – or WA – is regarded
as the centre for mining and resources
in the world for some people,”
House says.
“Just for that alone, it was well worth
entering.”
“That was acknowledged and
respected.
Ideas, inspiration and innovation in WA
House says if you have an innovation
you want to pursue, it’s worth looking
into entering the IOTY awards.
You have to know your
product like the back of
your hand.
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Solving a well-known problem attracts
miners’ attention
Since winning the overall Innovator of the Year Award in 2011, Tim Jones and his colleagues at Intium Solutions
have been fielding calls from all over.
“We’ve had enquiries all around the
world, from South America, Russia,
North America, various parts of western
Europe, and Indonesia,” says Jones,
Intium’s managing director.
“So word certainly gets around,
particularly when the problem is well
known and people are looking for a
solution.”
The ‘problem’ he’s referring to is how
to detect conveyor belt rollers that are
worn, wonky or likely to break down.
“There’s a risk that when a roller fails it
can turn into a ‘pizza cutter’, where the
inner shell collapses and leaves sharp
edges that can tear the belt up,” explains
Jones.
“Also, the bearings can seize and the
roller stops and rubs on the belt, and
that can damage the belt.”
The problem’s bigger than you might
think. In fact, it’s a real headache around
the world.
For instance, Australia’s mining industry
uses an estimated 55,000 kilometres of
conveyor belts to transport ores.
“The belts can be up to 20 kilometres
long in a single flight and companies put
several flights together so there can
be 20, 30 or 40 kilometres of conveyor,”
explains Jones.
Million-dollar delays
Breakdowns can be incredibly expensive
in terms of million-dollar delays, days of
downtime and missed shipments.
Intium’s solution was to come up
with an innovative wireless sensor
system – known as the Roller Condition
Ideas, inspiration and innovation in WA
Monitoring (RCM) system – to monitor
the condition of rollers.
“We have a wireless sensor that sits
on every frame of a conveyor belt and
takes a reading every two minutes,” says
Jones. “It then sends this information
off to a collector station which compiles
information from about 400 sensors
and then sends it back to us for
processing.
“What the customer ends up with is a
real-time monitoring system that allows
them to see what’s going on with any of
their belts, automatically and remotely.”
Since winning the Innovator of the Year
Award, Intium Solutions has continued
to refine the sensor system.
“We were in a development trial with
Alcoa, since then we’ve progressed to a
commercial trial with a larger system,”
Jones says.
“We’ve also engaged with another major
mining company in a commercial trial.
“There are some very good results
coming out of those trials and as a result
we’re in the process of going to market.
“We’ve also been in discussion with
various potential partners in the market,
such as large conveyor companies. They’ve
been pretty receptive to the product.”
Accolade
The roller monitoring system has also
picked up another accolade.
“It was an Australian Bulk Handling
award that came from the conveyor belt
industry so we’re quite happy with that
one. That was the icing on the cake after
the Innovator of the Year award,” says
Jones.
“To us, that was validation from industry
that we’re on the right track.”
He says winning the Innovator of the
Year Award helped give the project
extra credibility in dealing with large
companies.
“So instead of being a little company
that no one really knows about, we’re a
little company that has received a major
award and has been judged by a panel of
industry experts. That’s given us quite a
bit of credibility,” Jones says.
“We’ve also had a lot of support and
introductions from the WA Government
and we’ve also had a lot of support from
the major sponsor, Mitsubishi.”
So what advice does he have for
innovators thinking of entering the
awards?
“Obviously we think it’s well worth
doing,” Jones says. “We got a lot out
of it. But I think just going through the
process is a benefit in itself.
“What it forced us to do was really
define what the innovation is and why
it is of commercial benefit not just of
technical benefit.”
There is also another ongoing, perhaps
less tangible, benefit.
“There is a networking group called the
Innovators’ Circle which is designed to
bring together the winners and finalists
from previous years, so that’s been
of benefit to swap stories and share
contacts and so on,” Jones says.
“I think it’s a good way of building an
‘innovation alumni’.”
What it forced us to do
was really define what the
innovation is and why it is of
commercial benefit not just
of technical benefit.
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Online video play idea pays off
Some innovations seem so simple, you wonder how the commercial opportunities they offer weren’t
spotted earlier.
That’s basically the case with Olivia
Humphrey and Kanopy, the DVD
and online video streaming service
that now caters for universities and
colleges around the world.
“I was surprised that despite students
being the highest consumers of online
video, online video was not used in the
higher education curriculum at all,”
Humphrey says.
“So we set out to fill that gap.”
Now her Subiaco-based business is the
leading DVD and online video provider
for the Australian tertiary sector.
“There are 39 universities in Australia
and we also work with the TAFE sector
and we’ve also expanded into the AsiaPacific region,” Humphrey says.
The company is also making inroads
into the US and Kanopy counts Harvard
Business School among its clients.
“Kanopy now has more customers –
colleges and universities – in the US
than in the rest of the world combined,”
Humphrey says.
“But in the US there are about 4,500
universities and colleges so we’ve still
got a long way to go, and our US office is
opening in San Francisco in June.”
Humphrey, the founder and managing
director of Kanopy, won the Growth
category of the 2012 WA Innovator
of the Year Awards for its video
streaming service.
Think of it almost as a ‘Netflix for
the education sector’ subscription
service and you’ve just about got it,
with Kanopy taking care of copyright
clearances and being a one-stop
service tying up all the admin details
for librarians and administrators.
Disruptive model
It also keeps track of how many people
view each title and even the number of
minutes played.
“I think one of the reasons we won the
award is that the business model is
quite innovative – we really disrupted
the two industries, the media and
entertainment industry in terms of
getting all the filmmakers onboard,
and the library vendor model as well,”
she says.
“Another reason is the sophisticated
video platform that hosts and streams
the videos to the end user. Our in-house
IT team developed the platform which
offers a suite of apps designed to
increase user-engagement.”
Kanopy has now grown to employ a
dozen people, and expects that its US
operations will eventually double this
number.
Its video collection is also fast growing.
It has a library of some 15,000 videos –
the largest of its kind in the world – and
it utilises huge backup servers in the
cloud.
Humphrey says winning the IOTY
award helped the fledgling company
advance to the next level.
“It’s really helped us grow,” she says.
“We’ve had some significant investor
interest since the awards and it’s also
really helped with networking.
Ideas, inspiration and innovation in WA
Inspiring
“We have a lot of contacts who have
helped with understanding the
landscape of government grants and
assistance that can help Kanopy grow
internationally.
“It’s also been interesting and inspiring
meeting the other applicants and
previous winners and being involved in
those networking functions.
“But I think for me the two major
things are that it was an excellent,
excellent experience in terms of the
presentations skills and workshops
– which really helped me develop and
refine my elevator pitch that has been
used very extensively since!
“The experience of presenting to a
panel was fantastic and of course
really helped with understanding the
financing options for the development
of our platform to facilitate our global
growth.
“That was probably the most helpful
part. By the time I actually presented
to the judges I felt so confident.”
She says one of the other benefits
was going through a process that
enabled Kanopy to objectively review
what it had achieved in its short life
and have it assessed by experts in the
innovation field.
“Winning the award was great
recognition from the industry that
what we were achieving was not only
important, but pretty amazing,” she
says.
“It was a very proud moment for all of
us and very motivating for the team.”
Online video was not
used in the higher
education curriculum
at all. So we set out to
fill that gap.
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The high-tech minnow that became a
global mining services leader
For Peter Clarke and the team at Scanalyse, the last few years since winning the 2007 WA Inventor of the Year
Award have been a bit of a blur.
It now has some 30 mining clients
across Australia representing about
25 per cent of the market and another
20 clients internationally. It has
customers in more than 20 countries,
employs 36 people, and has a turnover
of some $10 million.
Because it only takes minutes to scan
the inside of a mill, the device can help
improve safety and save the global
mining industry millions of dollars in
downtime.
To cap it off, the company is set to
expand into many more countries
after it was purchased in early 2013 by
the large international Finnish mining
technology company Outotec.
Clarke says that while winning the
IOTY award was rewarding, even
entering the awards had its benefits as
it helped the Scanalyse team sharpen
up its act prior to going to market.
Clarke says he was pleasantly
surprised when Scanalyse won the
IOTY award in 2007, mainly because it
was still early days for the company.
But the win helped catapult Scanalyse
to a new level.
“In preparing for the competition, you
need to distil your value proposition,
your message to clients and
customers, so it helped us to refine
that,” he says.
“It certainly benefited us as a company
immediately in the 12 months after
winning the award by raising our
profile,” he says.
Invaluable
“The process we went through with
the various training and information
sessions was invaluable.”
And the lessons learnt are still handy.
“It also contributed to us being able to
successfully raise some investment
funds of $1 million in 2008.
“Once we had been selected as
a finalist, we went through the
entrepreneurship unit of the MBA
course run at UWA,” Clarke says.
“That really enabled us to finish off
some of our product development
and also helped us to start that
international expansion as well.”
“I personally found that extremely
useful. I’m still using the lessons that
I learnt through that process.”
The company’s first product,
MillMapper, was the result of a
collaboration between Curtin
University and the Cooperative
Research Centre for Spatial
Information (CRCSI).
MillMapper is a 3-D laser scanner that
can quickly and accurately measure
wear in the metal linings of the giant
mills used to grind ores in the precious
metals industry.
Ideas, inspiration and innovation in WA
He says the awards process can be
especially helpful for researchers
and innovators who might be experts
in their field but are relatively
inexperienced in key areas such as
business and marketing plans.
“I strongly support the IOTY process
because it delivers an enormous
amount of value to all the participants
through the training they get,”
Clarke says.
“It’s very difficult to get that training
elsewhere in such a concentrated
time.”
“I think the whole program has
enormous flow-on benefits
throughout the scientific-research
engineering community because the
people who go into the program come
out of it a lot better informed – and a
lot more capable in those areas than
they would have been before.”
World-first
Scanalyse has since gone on to develop
a related product, CrusherMapper,
which uses applies 3-D modelling
to forecast wear rates of gyratory
crushers.
The company says its laser scanner
can collect some 10 million data points
in less than five minutes and, like
MillMapper, is a world-first product.
Clarke says the purchase of Scanalyse
by Outotec will help the company
expand further, quicker.
“I’m looking forward to some new
challenges,” he says.
“We’ve got the technology right,
we’ve got the value propositions and
everything is right – it’s just now the
big challenge for the company is the
distribution network – and trying to
develop your own is a costly exercise.
“So now that we’re linked up to a
company that has those distribution
networks there’s a lot of expansion
that’s going to be coming up.”
People who go into the
program come out of it a
lot better informed – and a
lot more capable in those
areas than they would
have been before.
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Developing innovative ear gear for rock
miners – and even rock bands
Justin Miller says he continues to be surprised at how Sensear’s innovative communication headsets are used
around the world.
“The uses and applications are
enormous and it never ceases to amaze
me where some of our headsets pop
up and how they’re being used,” says
Miller, the CEO of Sensear.
“The main focus has been in mining, oil
and gas industries. But they’re used
in all sorts of different environments,
from AC/DC rock concerts to working
with aircraft in Antarctica. Even police
in the US use them at NFL football
games in San Diego.”
The fledgling company was a finalist
in the 2006 WA Inventor of the
Year Awards for its revolutionary
technology which utilises algorithms to
suppress noise and enhance speech.
The company has since developed a
range of headsets that allows people
to communicate more effectively in
noisy workplaces.
“We’ve built a big distribution base
globally and ultimately sell to Fortune
500 companies around the world,”
Miller says.
“The Americas now represent most of
our market – from Canada and North
America right down to South America,
with Brazil one of our bigger markets.”
Sensear is based in Perth and has
established its global sales and
marketing headquarters in San
Francisco.
Earlier this year, the company
announced it had developed an
innovative wireless Bluetooth headset
– the XBT – in partnership with the
technology giant Motorola.
Ideas, inspiration and innovation in WA
Miller says the deal arose from a
growing trend in the two-way radio
market.
“Our success was born off the back of
the resources sector – mining, oil and
gas,” he says.
“Some 75% of people who buy our sets
are patching them through a two-way
radio,” he says.
“We did all our prototyping with big
miners out of Western Australia and
we were able to leverage that.
“At the same time, there’s this shift
across the two-way industry from
analogue to digital solutions.
“That’s where we were born, but now
we’re used in all facets of high-noise
communications.”
“As part of that change, Motorola
have integrated Bluetooth and a lot
of different things into their two-way
radios.
Miller says he believes Sensear is not
the only R&D success to spin out of the
resources sector.
It also gives Sensear a foot in the door
to a huge market.
“I think there are a lot of companies in
WA that have developed technology,
like Sensear, that’s utlised in mining
and is then used in other industries and
other parts of the world to everyone’s
benefit, really,” he says.
“There are some 40 million plus
two-way radios globally, of which two
million
have already been converted to
digital,” he says.
When Sensear entered the WA
Inventor of the Year Awards, it was still
in its infancy.
“I don’t think we had made any sales at
that point,” he recalls.
“So it’s a massive opportunity for us,
especially with Motorola having some
60-70% of that market share.”
“We were after local recognition that
was going to help us build credibility
and awareness among the mining
community – and it certainly did that
for us.”
“It created an opportunity for us to
provide a solution to Motorola that
they didn’t have.”
The technology behind Sensear
was developed by Professor
Sven Nordholm, the company’s
chief scientist. It was further
developed at the Western Australian
Telecommunications Research
Institute (WATRI), a joint facility
involving Curtin University of
Technology and the University of WA.
The company’s original focus was on
servicing the resources sector. Miller
says, in that respect, being located in
WA gave Sensear a competitive edge.
His advice to would-be innovators
thinking of entering the awards?
“Do it. I think it’s great that WA is
promoting a cause such as this,”
Miller says.
“Globally, I think the awards would
rank up there with some of the better
funded awards.
“To commercialise any invention, you
need exposure and the IOTY is an ideal
opportunity to help make that happen.”
WE DID ALL OUR PROTOTYPING
WITH BIG MINERS OUT OF
WESTERN AUSTRALIA AND WE
WERE ABLE TO LEVERAGE THAT.
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Targeting the faulty genes that can
kill kids
On the wall above his office desk, Professor Steve Wilton has pinned dozens of photos of boys afflicted with a
cruel muscle-wasting disease that will eventually kill them.
“I get these sent to me from the
parents,” he says.
“It’s easy to keep motivated when
you’ve got this in your face all the time
and you know these families are out
there and they’re really desperate (for
a treatment).”
That motivation helped Wilton and
colleague Professor Sue Fletcher
come up an innovative treatment for
Duchenne muscular dystrophy which
won the overall WA Innovator of the
Year Award in 2012.
Duchenne muscular dystrophy is a
genetic disorder that affects about
one in 3,500 boys worldwide.
The researchers have devised a way to
bypass the defect in a faulty gene that
is responsible for the disease.
“It’s like molecular surgery, where we
snip out the gangrenous part when the
gene is being expressed,” Prof. Wilton
says. “So in effect, we’re snipping out
the mutations.”
The results so far are encouraging.
“From data released to date, the boys
being treated have stabilised, and are
not getting worse,” he says
“If not treated, some of them probably
would be in wheelchairs by now.”
Prof. Wilton and his team recently
signed a deal with the US drug
company Sarepta Therapeutics to
commercialise their research. Under
the deal, the team will get up to US$7.1
million in upfront and milestone
payments, as well as a royalty on net
sales of all medicines developed and
approved.
Ideas, inspiration and innovation in WA
The team is now looking at extending
its work to help fight other diseases.
Spotlight
“If you know what the gene defect is
– for say, asthma, stroke, Alzheimer’s
or heart disease or multiple sclerosis
– you have a gene target where we
may be able to modify its expression.
Depending on the specific problem,
we have the potential to develop
treatments for some of these
conditions,” he says.
Prof. Wilton says winning the IOTY
award helped put his and Prof.
Fletcher’s research in the spotlight.
“I think we’ve got a lot more credibility,
people are taking a lot more notice of
us,” he says.
“There’s some excellent research being
done in Western Australia and around
the world, but this lifts you a little
above the pack and gives you gives you
a bit of a leg up.”
The pair has already extended their
work to another disease, spinal
muscular atrophy.
“Most people haven’t heard of it but it’s
the leading cause of death for children
under the age of two,” Prof. Wilton
says.
“They don’t have enough of a particular
gene product to keep their motor
nerves alive. Their muscles are fine, but
the nerves that control the muscles are
dying. So the muscles don’t get a signal
from the brain and they’re paralysed.
Carriers
“It’s a truly hideous disease and the
carrier rate for this disease is one in 40.
“If you consider a footy match at
Subiaco with 40,000 people there, in
the crowd there would be a thousand
carriers of this disease.”
Professors Wilton and Fletcher were
carrying out their award-winning
research at The University of WA.
Since winning the IOTY, Prof. Wilton
has been appointed Foundation Chair
in Molecular Therapies at the Centre
for Comparative Genomics and moved
to Murdoch University. He will continue
in an adjunct position at UWA and
has also been appointed Director of
Australian Neuromuscular Research
Institute
“The research will continue to expand,
some of it will be at Murdoch and some
carried out on the QE II campus,” he
says.
One of the first diseases in the team’s
sights is multiple sclerosis, or MS.
“The MS Society doesn’t even regard
MS as a rare disease, the condition is
so prevalent,” he says.
“So far, we’ve been using a rare disease
as proof of concept, and now we’re
in the phase of expanding it to other
conditions such as MS. We already
have several targets in our sights and
the research has started.”
If you consider a footy
match at Subiaco with
40,000 people there,
in the crowd there would
be a thousand carriers
of this disease.