So there we have it - another awesome celebration of innovation in the global resources sector.
Over the past few years the Unearthed Demo Day events have come to represent one of the key touch points for innovation in the resource sector. Bringing together innovators, industry, start-ups and technologists from all over the world, these events give the industry a critical forum for discussing the big themes and big opportunities. And this year was no different.
With discussions ranging from the audacious yet pragmatic approach to mining asteroids from Daniel Faber of Deep Space Industries, the inspiring growth of workplace safety and engagement analytics off the back of productivity tools from SafetyCulture’s Luke Anear, and the formation of new start-ups and new approaches to address industry needs from wearhawk’s Quenten Thomas, the event offered a vantage into all facets and all stages of the rapidly evolving innovation space.
However it was the direct response from industry that drew the greatest insights. There was a common and mutual recognition from participants that WA with its strong yet largely unrecognized history of innovation in the mining space has the greatest opportunity to bring something unique to the global innovation equation in the resource sector. But alongside this, an acknowledgement that social perceptions of the industry will be one of the main factors framing up the manner with which the industry operates in the future. Both Dr Vanessa Guthrie from the Minerals Council of Australia and Miranda Taylor from National Energy Resources Australia touched on this point during their discussions. It’s hard not to imagine that re-framing the relationship between resource users and resource suppliers as operating in a single system, rather than as opposing groups, is part of the solution here.
Being chosen as one of the emerging start-ups with our application RPM (www.minerpm.com), Astron took the opportunity to present to industry on the advantages that remote sensing analytics can bring to the minesite rehabilitation space. During the presentation we acknowledged the essential contributions and partnerships we forged with industry to assist us with prototyping our application. Our thanks and gratitude for this assistance is once again extended to Metals X and Roy Hill.
Finally our highest commendation to the Unearthed team for putting on the event. What they offer to the innovation space in the resource industry is unrivalled on a global scale, covering events, hackathons, online challenges and a technology accelerator. With an ever expanding agenda next year and a growing team, the benefits that Unearthed continue to bring to innovation and the resource industry are so far reaching, none less than building a global signature for Perth. Very much looking forward to 2017!
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| Photos supplied courtesy of Unearthed Solutions. |