Last year Rio Tinto, the multinational miner with head offices in Australia and the UK, rolled out fully automated driverless truck fleets at two of its iron ore mines in the Pilbara Western Australia, in what it said was a world first. Recently a convoy of self-driving trucks drove across Europe and arrived at the Port of Rotterdam. While robot replacement of human labour is still being discussed, it's already happening with driverless trucks. With labor representing an estimated 75 percent of trucking costs the cost savings are potentially huge. While drivers are restricted by law from driving more than set hours per day without a break, a driverless truck can drive nearly 24 hours per day. It's been estimated that the technology could double the output of a transportation network at 25 percent of the cost. And the savings become even more significant fuel efficiency gains are included. In times of low growth these productivity gains are particularly significant.
Springboard Enterprises Australia (SBE Australia) announced the 10 business leaders who will take part in its fourth annual Accelerator program designed exclusively for women entrepreneurs. The 2016 program features women from a broad range of professional and industry backgrounds across the technology sector, united in their ambition to expand into international markets. Participants in the 2016 SBE Accelerator program are: Renee Welsh - Booking Boss; Catherine Resnick - Kinchip Systems; Jenny O'Neill - EpiSoft; Anne Moore - PlanDo; Julie Bray - Konnective; Kimberley Turner - Aerosafe; Tania Walter - Observr; Lucy Lloyd - Mentorloop; Tori Bowman - Social.Folio and Michelle Ridgway - Victus Health
An Australian invented the black box recorder and Australia became the first country in the world to make cockpit voice-recording mandatory. Since then, refined and upgraded, voice-plus-data recording has become mandatory in all major aircraft throughout the world. http://www.dsto.defence.gov.au/innovation/black-box-flight-recorder/
Go Reception replaces traditional pen and paper visitor sign-in processes with digital. It's made for offices and reception areas in any industry where you need visitors to register their arrival and is designed to make business processes easier and faster as well as look more professional. A separate device can be arranged for name badges if needed. You can sign up for a free trial on their website www.goreception.co
Members of Readers Ink, a book club in Sydney, offered to act as a focus group for Idea Spies to help refine the concept. They each have professional backgrounds related to innovation and their advice was very helpful- watch this space! Thanks to new Idea Spies- Christine Pitt, Janet Sayer, Rebecca (Bec) Murray, Jan Land, Babette Bensoussan and Clare Loewenthal.
