Source : Perth Now news
An Australian-made roadside system that uses artificial intelligence and cameras to detect drivers using mobile phones is expanding as its technology sparks international interest.
Stock exchange-listed Acusensus on Monday will officially open a new manufacturing facility in Ingleburn, NSW.
It is three times the size of its previous plant in the southwestern Sydney suburb.
The company’s fixed and portable roadside camera systems are used across Australia and New Zealand, along with in parts of the US and UK, to detect motorists using smartphones.
Chief executive Alexander Jannink founded the company in 2018, five years after losing a close friend to a distracted driver in Los Angeles. It was listed on the Australian Securities Exchange in 2023.
In August, the Melbourne-based company reported a full-year revenue jump of 45 per cent to $86.2 million, with its revenue from international sources climbing to $22.9 million, up from $4.2 million a year earlier.
While its net loss for the year widened to $24.3 million, from $2.6 million a year earlier, most of that was due to a one-off legal settlement involving an intellectual property dispute with a competitor.
Transport for NSW was Acusensus’s first customer when the state became the world’s first jurisdiction to launch a mobile phone detection camera enforcement system in December 2019.
When first deployed, the firm’s 10 transportable and 11 fixed cameras detected mobile phone use by about one in 100 motorists, according to the company.
The rate fell to one driver in 1208 using a mobile phone by 2025/26.
“It’s quite a shift in driver behaviour and we’ve seen that in the other jurisdictions as well,” Mr Jannink told AAP.
“Each of the programs has also coincided with some pretty strong fatality reductions.”
Transport for NSW also has a mobile speed camera contract with the firm, which it extended in June through the end of 2026 at a cost of $16 million.
Acusensus’s phone-detecting system uses radar and high-resolution cameras taken at a very steep angle to peer into vehicles with an AI system then analysing each image for signs of mobile phone use.
Images are automatically cropped to show only the driver before being presented to humans for multiple rounds of review.
In addition to Transport for NSW, Acusensus has contracts with authorities in multiple other Australian states and territories, as well as NZ and 12 US jurisdictions.
Its cameras are deployed under a services contract, costing agencies between $5 million and $10 million annually.
Acusensus deploys and maintains its equipment, and conducts the first level of human review.
It has about 400 employees globally, including about 80 based in NSW, and is working on a new system to detect motorists impaired by drugs, alcohol or dangerous levels of fatigue.
“For example, random breath tests, everybody gets pulled over, but what if we could inform the police ahead?” Mr Jannink said.
Deployed ahead of roadside sobriety tests, Acusensus’s cameras might be able to tell police which drivers are likely to test positive, letting them leave the sober, attentive drivers alone, he added.
