// The COVID-19 pandemic has accelerated the adoption of AI assisted real-time video surveillance technologies; good news for ASX-listed icetana.
The last time we checked in with local AI video analytics company icetana (rebranded from iCetana) they had just listed on the ASX. Since then, life has been interesting for the Perth-based tech business.
The company’s (ASX: ICE) share price climbed to 29c a share in February before settling back to 12c during March 2020. It has yet to recover to previous heights. As of April, it has reduced the salary of its board of directors and cut staff working hours.
According to Joshua Flannery, managing director of Startupbootcamp SCALE Osaka, icetana had completed projects with two Japanese household name companies back in January.
Despite cancellations and delays of orders due to the uncertainty of the current business environment, icetana is betting that movement restrictions will create a need for remote asset management. The company’s new asset management sales pitch is already reflected by its partners’ marketing material.
On 30 April, icetana reported that its software has been deployed in prison and community policing environments, alongside new orders from shopping malls and its first customer from the banking sector. While the locations of the former two are not mentioned, the firms purchasing icetana’s services (Chubb Electronic Security and Solutions Managed) are located in Australia.
On 30 June, icetana announced that Mount Royal University has extended its subscription of icetana’s software. The university noted that icetana was able to spot a water leak in a sparsely traversed area of campus. The interesting thing is that icetana was primarily used to monitor what people were doing, not the behaviour of water.
“Without the usual eyes and ears of staff and students who might otherwise report problems, asset protection and maintenance issues were among some of the more interesting use-cases for the icetana software.”
Mount Royal Director of Security Services Peter Davison
One of the first uses for icetana was to look after bike racks at Curtin University. In fact, that’s where its backbone research was developed between 2005 and 2010.
icetana spots visual anomalies in real-time pixel flows and highlights the video clip to its user, removing the need for constant human monitoring.
icetana’s ability to adapt to spotting non-human anomalies is consistent with the expected capabilities of current AI assisted video analytics. These are already widely used in the Australian mining sector and have demonstrated their ability to monitor the spread of COVID-19.
Currently, icetana has 27 major customers, the majority of whom are from the education and retail sector. Given its success in reducing the labor intensity of real-time video surveillance, its adoption by law enforcement customers is hardly surprising.
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MAIN IMAGE: icetana’s world of pixels, sourced from its 28th May investor presentation.
Disclosure: Curtin University is a sponsor of Startup News. The author of this piece does not own any shares in icetana.
