Helen Evans (00:36)
Hello, I’m Helen Evans. Head of Market Development for Safetytech Accelerator, welcoming you to our latest insight, where I’ll be discussing Emesent, their drone technology with Mike Workman. Mike, hello. Yeah, not too bad. Could you just introduce yourself for our audience, please?

 

Mike Workman (00:42)

Hello, how are you?

I can certainly. my name is Mike Workman. I’m the sales director for Emesent. I’ve been with Emesent for around about three and a half years. I’ll give you a little bit of background. Prior to that, I’ve worked for a couple of other geospatial providers. And then prior to that, I was actually in the industry as a chief surveyor for a tunneling company in the UK.

 

Helen Evans (01:25)
Okay,

so surveying tunnels isn’t a safe job, shall we say?

 

Mike Workman (01:33)
No, and

that’s that’s really why I spanned across into the tech side of things because I’d seen how much of a difference even the smallest leap forward in technology can make actually especially in that kind of industry definitely

 

Helen Evans (01:47)
Yeah, great. So tell us a little bit about Emesent. What do you do? just from the technology side, first of all, what Emesent provide?

 

Mike Workman (02:00)
Good question. we basically map the inaccessible. That’s what we do. We help businesses map the unknown to minimise operational downtime and improve worker safety.

 

Helen Evans (02:13)
Okay, and how do you do that? you mentioned GS spatial. So you know, how are you doing that currently?

 

Mike Workman (02:16)
Thanks

So basically we have a system, it’s a LiDAR scanner effectively that can operate in a variety of, it’s very versatile, so it can operate in a variety of different functions. It can be handheld, it can be vehicle mounted, it can be on a backpack, it can be on a drone, which we can focus on a little bit more. It can be put in a cage and lowered down certain things such as shafts or manholes, et cetera, et cetera. And…

Basically what that happens is that’s using LiDAR to collect information. There’s an IMU on board as well, and we’re using an algorithm to put that together to map the environment effectively. then used Hovermap users advanced algorithms combining that autonomy, that slam and that LiDAR technology to deliver what we call smart navigation or survey grade results, whichever you require.

 

Helen Evans (03:06)
So

is this, just for our non-techies, so is this a way of creating a digital replication of the environment? So in those confined spaces where you’d have to send somebody, it’s quite dangerous, it’s quite claustrophobic, what we’re saying is you can send down this LiDAR capture and it will recreate the digital image.

 

Mike Workman (03:39)
Yeah, it

creates a point cloud effectively. And then how you, or what you do with that point cloud is, so the collection is just one aspect of it. That’s what we do. And then from that, we take that information and you can create digital twins. You can look at volumes, you can look at analysis of a space. You can do lots of different things with our data, you know, analysis afterwards. Yeah, absolutely.

 

Helen Evans (03:58)
Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah, great. So, in that respect, a lot of our clients have, you know, what we call confined spaces and confined space can be a small space, or it can be a large space, but you know, once you’re in it, you know, it’s confined. Using this technology, which isn’t new, it LiDAR technology itself isn’t new, but making it available.

 

Mike Workman (04:15)
Okay.

Exactly.

 

Helen Evans (04:26)
in these kind of areas is really where we’re breaking ground here. So what kind of clients, you know, or what kind of problems do your clients have other than me just saying confined spaces where they it’s worth doing these?

 

Mike Workman (04:44)
It’s taking you on a little bit a journey of why we were created effectively or why Emesent exists. So we were founded by Stefan and Farid back in 2018 and they worked for a company called CSIRO which is a research division of the Australian government. They worked on this SLAM algorithm in 2016-2017 they saw an opportunity.

to create a system with one specific golden mine that was to map what we call mining stops, which is a void effectively, a method of mining, highly volatile, highly dangerous areas to work as you can appreciate. So Hovermap originally was created to go in and map that space autonomously. So no need for workers to go in there, no need to access that environment, completely eliminate the risk, if you like, from

from a workforce perspective and also with the mind additional deliverables. They were doing it in a way that was incomplete data that didn’t give them a full understanding of what efficiencies they can gain by using, you know, by maximizing the space. So Hovermap was created for that specific role and we did with that autonomously. We obviously we need a drone to do that. So we mounted to a drone our advanced algorithms and enabled us to fly into that store fully autonomously.

There’s no pilot, no hands on sticks. All he needs to do is literally get it above the ground, tell it where it needs to go, use something called tap to fly. You tap on a screen and the drone will enter that and start exploring that space and then come back with the data six, seven minutes later. So that’s really why we’ve created in 2018 and then.

We had a lot of success initially with that particular product. And like anything else, our customers really pushed the boundaries of where we ended up going and what we ended up doing and almost helped us develop really a platform. You know, we’re big in the AEC space now. So we were a mining focused company to start with 2018, 2019, probably 2020.

As the mines had access to this tech, they were using it for other things. They were using it for above ground surface operations, for volumetrics, for doing digital twins, analysis on their plant, if you like. And then that opened up other spaces for us in the AEC, for instance, the architecture engineering construction industry, where again,

We switch from drones to a handheld solution. We always had the handheld solution, but you know, we were primarily focused on autonomy and then turning the autonomy off and then just using it as a handheld. But also having the ability to switch back on the autonomy for such things as gas rig inspections and oil rig inspections and even industrial inspections. Now, you know, we were talking to somebody last week who’s measuring industrial ovens and flying into these. So there’s lots of different applications that we can go into.

 

Helen Evans (07:45)
Yeah, mean, a couple of things that really kind of brought and came to mind there was the autonomy. You know, lot of a lot of robotics, if you like, still require somebody to be with them, you know, quite close to them, controlling them. So we still got the hazard of the person, you know, controlling the robotics. So, you know, the autonomy is really important in those in those areas.

And then you mentioned kind of bringing it out of those confined areas then into construction. And then I suppose that’s where you come up with difficulties with the aviation regulations. And then, yeah, putting it onto a different device or handheld is what’s required.

 

Mike Workman (08:30)
Yes.

Yeah, exactly.

You’ve got the versatility. you know, if you’re working construction, like if you’re doing a large warehouse, for instance, then we can still fly safely with all the regulations. It’s when we take it outside that we have to have the CAA approvals.

And again, you’ve got the versatility. You can vehicle mount it. So if it’s a large area rapid collection that you need, then you vehicle mount it. You can pop it on a backpack as well. So it’s nice and comfortable. That works well in the construction environment as well. So you’re walking around with your hands free. So you’re perfectly safe from that perspective and you can arrest your falls, et cetera, et cetera, if you do. But more importantly, you’ve got it on the back and you collect all the data as well. And again.

 

Helen Evans (09:13)
Mm.

 

Mike Workman (09:16)
We are only one small element of that. The capture side is a very small element of it. And what you do with that, you’re getting a lot of data that can be consumed by lots of different people. Whether that’s in a construction, might be quantity surveys, that might be looking at clash detection, that might be looking at design planning. There’s lots of things you could do with the data.

 

Helen Evans (09:35)
Yeah. And is it only LiDAR that your system collects? Or are there other areas, kind of, don’t know, high image videography?

 

Mike Workman (09:48)
So yeah,

are now, we have colour attached to the unit. So we have a colour option as well. And we’re advancing that. That’s becoming more and more important for people. It’s great having a LiDAR point cloud. That means a lot to a geospatial professional, but actually the non-educated would like to see a colourised point cloud. So yeah, absolutely. So we’ve got cameras available that can be mounted onto the system.

We can use that data to either colourise the point cloud or now we can have what we call extracted and embedded images. So you can do a, like a virtual walkthrough effectively is, is yeah, it’s a big demand for that at the moment.

 

Helen Evans (10:27)
Yeah, yeah, I can imagine. tell us a little bit more about your clients. obviously mining is your original client. and construction is another area that you’ve talked about. Do you work in any other industries currently?

 

Mike Workman (10:45)
Wow,

it always amazes me just where Hovermap does actually get deployed. know, we’re pretty much every facet of geospatial collection is where we can work effectively. You know, that might be we do a lot with research and education, obviously. We do a lot with mining clients.

was our biggest market. We’ve certainly seen a growth in AEC. Industrial as well, so we’ve seen a lot regards warehousing, understanding spaces and from that perspective as well. We also, construction is another big focus area for us and that as we just discussed about there can be a number of different applications. Geospatial as well as you know, land surveying companies, engineering firms.

I’m quite surprised from a day to day, whether it’s mapping pyramids in Egypt to measuring a warehouse in Milton Keynes. It’s ultimately flexible.

 

Helen Evans (11:44)
Yeah.

So essentially, what problems are your customers coming to you with? What are they trying to do initially? Are they kind of saying, we just need to map this area? Or are they saying, we need to take this person out of this environment? Which angle are they kind of coming to you to discuss?

 

Mike Workman (12:07)
The mining

one originally was to take out that equation. You if you’ve got a risk, what do you try and do? You’re trying to eradicate that risk straight away. You you look at ways to, to minimize that. And the first one you say is, I actually need to go in there? And that’s what effectively Hovermap did for mining. Now, beyond that, it really, you know, for instance, this example I gave earlier about an oven, there’s no other way of accessing that, that kind of environment.

than what we presented to the client a couple of weeks ago. They have to bear in mind that after switching this oven off, it’s got to cool down. It would actually be, it would have to be switched off fully to be able to cool down to allow.

human access, but with a drone we can go in at 50 degrees or 45 degrees. So that’s minimizing operational downtime for them. And again, so we do a lot of that. We do minimize operational downtime. That’s one thing we do. We also give greater insights. That’s the other thing to bear in mind that the data we collect is concise and complete.

And that can be, as I said before, I’ve intimated to that, that can be used by a number of third parties, to understand space, sizes, what can we fit in there, what can we do with that information. There’s lots we can do from an analytic point of view.

 

Helen Evans (13:27)
Great. And so when a client kind of comes to you and they want to see how it will help, what barriers are they coming across to adopt this technology? Because that’s what we find at Safetytech Accelerator, a lot of our clients, they’re running successful trials, pilots, and this is great. This can do wonders for us. And then when they want to implement it into business as usual. Is where they’ll come across the challenges.

 

Mike Workman (14:01)
Good question. Mining was, I’ll use mining as an example to start with, know, putting a drone into a mine is not something you genuinely think about. It’s quite a, and if you see Hovermap actually deployed in that environment, you kind of, the first time I ever saw it, when it took off and went into a dark deep hole, you’re like, that’s not coming back. Why are we doing this? It’s crazy, but it does. And the autonomy is superb on our systems.

But again, it’s getting that there’s an awareness that needs to be out there that people don’t understand what we’re capable of doing these days. And we’re trying as hard as to make people aware that, okay, we can’t tick every single box. We can’t solve every single problem, but there’s quite a few where we can actually deploy Hovermap where you wouldn’t think it can be deployed. There’s always

a barrier around costs, but we are skilled now in showing the efficiencies. So we always do prior to any sales, we do a proof of concept. We try to understand what the client wants to achieve. And then we can basically talk them through the potential games, obviously. And well, you know, when we get to that stage and we are doing proof of concepts and we are showing what’s capable, then typically the clients do proceed because they do see the advantages. It’s an education thing. It’s our job to try and educate the industry, what is possible.

Like I said, we can’t tick every box, but we do try.

 

Helen Evans (15:23)
Yeah, so essentially, when you do your pilot, you’re not just looking necessarily at the safety case, you’re saying that there are other gains that you’re looking to capture. And because that is what’s going to make the business case easier is if we talk

 

Mike Workman (15:37)
with the sufficiencies here.

Yeah, it’s a

double-edged sword. If we can cover the safety aspect and eradicate that risk and then also give greater insights and greater analytics into whatever the client’s measuring, then that’s a double win for everything.

 

Helen Evans (15:59)
Totally I’m totally with you. Should safety be enough to, should it be enough of a driver to, yeah, yeah, me too.

 

Mike Workman (16:06)
I would say yes definitely.

It should stand alone be the priority thing. If we can, as I said earlier, what’s the biggest, do I need to go into that space? Do I actually need to do that? Do I need to put my personnel at risk when there’s other technology out there that will do it? Okay admittedly at a cost, but yeah it should be front and centre every time really.

 

Helen Evans (16:28)
Yeah, yeah, but it’s going to cost if human has an accident, but it’s very difficult, isn’t it, to build a business case against prevention, preventative cost, you know. So yeah, so do we, do you think we need to be talking, educating our leaders more on the benefits of safety that don’t have an efficiency cost so that we’re not trying to put safety through on the same business case that we would put any technology?

 

Mike Workman (16:58)
Good question.

That’s a difficult one to answer. Yeah.

 

Helen Evans (17:02)
because you’ve got other gains. Yeah, you’re finding other gains.

It’s probably not as, but I do think there is probably an educational piece for the boardroom or to educate our functional leaders, you know, to feel that, empower them for safety should be enough of a reason. yeah. Should, you know, cost is cost, but know, safety is.

 

Mike Workman (17:24)
Yeah.

 

Helen Evans (17:31)
cost ultimately.

 

Mike Workman (17:33)
That’s

the advantage with the system that we have, you’re ticking both boxes. So you are doing the safety aspect, but you’re also gaining greater insights into the data that is captured. it’s like to say it’s a win-win really.

 

Helen Evans (17:47)
And just back to that point, how are clients or users, not necessarily your clients, but the ultimate consumers, how are they accepting the data rather than the physical presence? I certainly know

in my previous life where we’ve said, you know what, we’re going to collect data and we’re going to look at that data rather than go out and physically, you know, survey the tunnels like you were saying. And the appetite was very low to trust the data, you know, is that changing? Are we getting more used to it?

 

Mike Workman (18:26)
know, 3D

data is front and center now. Absolutely. And, and, know, the data that’s captured is, leave us if you were like, it’s represented by different software platforms in different ways, but it’s like being there. It’s like watching, you know, you can do virtual walkthroughs. You can analyze the data in great detail. You can see more, you know, from walking through an environment to actually capturing it with a laser scanner, with a colourised camera on it and taking that information, you know,

and analysing that data, it’s surprising what you can uncover really. So I’d say it’s the norm now that people do operate in that virtual space. Yeah, definitely.

 

Helen Evans (18:58)
Yeah.

Yeah, so picking up virtual data and examining it in different ways, be it, you know, in a virtual environment. So could even be using headsets or.

 

Mike Workman (19:12)
It is, yeah, there’s

a lot of people doing that is using headsets now to, to get situational awareness, understand the data and looking a little bit more. You’ve got, this is kind of 3d data that can be shared quite easily via the internet. So you might have a.

a plant room in Germany that you want to place a piece of plant in and manufacture in America, you send them the point cloud. You can look at that virtually online. You can see whether the fit works, what piping looks like. It’s so much more than somebody taking a sketch pad or trying to take some images. You know, they’re operating in that environment, which can lead to not only safety gains as well, know, considerations when you’re doing the risk assessment, when you’re doing that install, but also

Does it actually fit? Can we, you know, how can we maximize revenue on this and what’s the efficiencies that we can gain by doing it in a particular way, for instance?

 

Helen Evans (20:02)
Yeah.

your data, so the data, not your data, the data that your clients collect comes into your platform. And then from your platform, you make it shareable to other environments. If they don’t have, a lot of corporate clients are kind of locked down and bringing data in is quite difficult or having the right software to view, can they keep it within your platform and share it from there?

 

Mike Workman (20:13)
Yeah.

Yeah,

 

Helen Evans (20:31)
View it from the…

 

Mike Workman (20:32)
absolutely. So we don’t cloud host. We can cloud host, but we don’t as a standard rule. And that’s for integrity and security for the clients as well. So typically it can be processed on a single machine and shared either within their own network, if you like, but it can be kept off the cloud. Absolutely. But there is cloud sharing, Pat Mons. We do a standard. So in the point cloud or in the 3D reality capture space, there’s a certain

 

Helen Evans (20:42)
Yeah.

 

Mike Workman (20:59)
formats like E57, LAZ, LAS that are common to be shared between different platforms so we can export into all those different options and then you can consume the data as you feel necessary in your own platforms.

 

Helen Evans (21:13)
And I think that’s key, isn’t it? You know, is the data. You know, walk it once, share it many times. You know, whereas a lot of processes these days are different people going out to look at exactly the same thing or entering the same area several times for several different reasons. Yeah. And send the drone in once, have it once, share it many times.

 

Mike Workman (21:23)
Yeah.

 

Helen Evans (21:42)
is definitely a philosophy I’m down with. I I’ve really enjoyed our chat today, Mike, is there anything that you want to get out to our community regarding Emesent, anything that you got upcoming or?

 

Mike Workman (21:50)
Thanks. I mean, we’re always evolving. We’re a tech company. That’s what we’ve got to do. We can’t sit still. You know, we’ve come a long way since 2018. There’s new products on the horizon for us. There’s new verticals to go into as well.

Yeah, spend a bit of time looking at the website, looking what we do. Don’t dispel it. Don’t be scared of it. It is the future. It really is. know, with the AI and everything that we’re looking at at the moment, there’s a lot of potential out there for these systems.

 

Helen Evans (22:32)
Excellent. Well, Mike, that’s a wrap for today. yeah, so thank you for being our latest insight. I think there’s a lot there for our customers and our technology companies to unpack, around not just capturing the data, not just.

 

Mike Workman (22:40)
That’s the lab.

 

Helen Evans (23:00)
safety but business cases and you know the new trusting data and everybody yeah it’s got to be the way to to go and and if we cut enough safety’s not enough we’ve still got productivity gains to win on so thanks ever so much for your time Mike.

 

Mike Workman (23:13)
Exactly, yeah, thank you. Thanks Helen. Thank you, cheers, bye bye, thank you.