Aussie early warning system could have 'protected' Texas flood victims

Could an Australian-made early warning technology have lessened the impact of the recent Texas floods?

That’s the belief of Kerry Plowright who heads up tiny ASX-listed Aeeris — a $2 million microcap that just completed a trial of its Early Warning Network with Melbourne’s water authority.

“If you take the recent flooding in Texas as an example, there were people waking up surprised to the flooding,” Mr Plowright told Stockhead.

“If this system was set up in the US, those residents would have been protected. It automatically monitors gauges around an area and alerts residents directly when certain thresholds are met.”

Aeeris’s (ASX:AER) early warning system automates the process of monitoring live data on weather, fires, traffic and other hazards from hundreds of remote sensors.

Data is pushed through AER’s Geographic Notification Information System in real-time to trigger alerts about the likelihood of a threat such as a flood event, and alerts residents in the affected area via an app, SMS, email or phone.

Aeeris reported a 38 per cent wider loss of $2 million last year, and a 27 per cent drop in revenue to $1.1 million. At the end of June, Aeeris had about $750,000 in the bank.

Now that the functionalities have been tested Mr Plowright says there’s no stopping the potential applications — even monitoring for the threat of nuclear missiles.

“The matrix that drives it decides what sorts of things will be of threat and it all comes down to location,” he said.

“For instance, if we needed to look for rockets from North Korea we could drill down on those parameters.”

Before protecting the world from Kim Jong-un, however, Aeeris has to get its own finance in order.

The company raised $3.5 million in an initial public offering in 2015 — but burned through most of the funds had to reign in spending.

“This heavy expenditure was aimed at growing revenues quickly with the objective of creating substantial earnings in the medium term,” the company told shareholders in July.

“But it became clear in mid-2016 that the expected revenue growth curve was slower to appear, and that heavy spending for growth and R&D investment was rapidly diminishing the company’s available cash.”

With the Melbourne Water pilot complete, Aeeris now has its sights set on Australia’s 100 water and flood management authorities and 550 councils, starting with State Water in NSW, south-east Queensland and Newcastle City Council.

Similar geospacial technology has already been implemented for contracts with Australian freight provider Linfox, Tasmanian cruise liner Spirt of Tasmania and Australian Rail Track Corporation.

AER’s shares closed at 4c on Monday.