Mobile work safety app casts wider net
Technology
A South Australian mobile app designed to monitor the welfare of solo workers is expanding to new industries and global markets.
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WorkSafe Guardian launched in 2015 and is now working with more than 150 companies in Australasia.
Co-founder Greg Lindner said the company would trial the safety app in the United States in August following strong growth in Australia and New Zealand.
He said the United State’s had a population more than 10 times that of Australia and New Zealand, making it an obvious target to further the company’s growth.
“This year we’re looking at the third year in a row of double growth,” Lindner said.
“The United States is a big part of our expansion.”
The WorkSafe Guardian safety app was founded in Adelaide by Greg Lindner and Adam Whittaker and is Australia’s first 24/7 monitored smartphone security app.
WorkSafe Guardian works by a user setting a timer on the app when they enter a workplace situation if there are risks involved. If the timer expires and the employee hasn’t checked-in, an alert with GPS coordinates or a pre-set location is sent to a monitoring centre.
Lindner said there were three monitoring centres in the United States interested in trialling the software before commercially rolling-out the product nationally.
“Our first step to market is to use an existing monitoring centre over there to test the product,” he said.
“But it is very much a symbiotic relationship with the app and the platform, and it’s the back-end monitoring platform that needs to fit their environment.”
The app’s user-base is predominantly solo health care workers such as home-visit nurses. Its largest customers include Siemens Healthineers and Medibank’s CareComplete programs.
WorkSafe Guardian is also looking to move into other markets including the trucking industry.
“We’ve got a massive push from the trucking industry to make trucking safer,” Lindner said.
“I think from what I understand there’s insurance incentives so we’ll be looking in that direction.
“Overall we’ve got people in quarries working by themselves in South Australia using it, people in warehouses, construction, we’ve got a lady in a library by herself using it, we’ve got the Quorn Visitors Centre, and there’s a guy who’s cutting grass in the middle of the bush.
“It’s everywhere.”
Clients pay a monthly fee per user for the program, which is available for Apple and Android devices.
WorkSafe Guardian rolled-out an update this week, which included a new interface, a welfare timer, satellite mapping and voice tools.
Lindner said the voice tool update was important because it was prompted by user feedback and was unparalleled by WorkSafe Guardian’s competitors.
“70 per cent of the app’s users were in-home health workers and they can’t touch their phone because they’re sterile and have their gloves on,” he said.
“If the timer comes up and it says ‘are you OK?’ They can actually say ‘hey Siri restart timer’ without even touching the phone.
“There’s nothing like it.”
Lindner said WorkSafe Guardian was continuing to look for investment from private sectors to help fund its expansion.
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