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By Lindy Brophy

A hundred thousand people cheering would normally make it impossible to hear what the person next to you was saying.

But officials at the London Olympics kept on top of their game with hearing technology invented and developed at UWA.

Sensear is a system that eliminates background noise but allows the users to talk to each other. The core product is a headset worn by people in noisy work environments. It was developed by electronic engineers at WATRI, the WA Telecommunication Research Institute, a collaboration between UWA and Curtin University, based at UWA .

Just a few years ago, it was a research project without a name. Then a prototype was produced, a brand created and today, Sensear has identified market opportunities worth $100 million.

UWA's Office of Industry and Innovation helped WATRI to develop the product and a company and its inaugural CEO , Justin Miller, took off around the world demonstrating it.

Three years later, Mr Miller moved to San Francisco to support the global expansion of the business. The headset was originally developed as an industrial safety product: factory workers could protect their hearing while listening to their foreman; bar staff could hear patrons' drink orders without being deafened by the band. Now about 70 per cent of Sensear's work is in the petrochemical and gas sectors.

At the Olympics, stadium staff in high noise environments such as beach volleyball, used a version with built-in two-way radios.

While Mr Miller is immersed in technology innovation in the US, Sensear's operations are still run from Perth, with the manufacturing of the electronics and software done here.

"This is where our research is done and we still have good relationships with the universities, and we're committed to being a good Australian-made product," he said.

The device is promoted now as an advantage to workplace productivity, as well as a safety product. Earlier this year, Sensear won a prestigious international Frost & Sullivan excellence award for its devices, which now have the capacity to upload software and enable two-way radio and wireless Bluetooth communication.

Most of the market opportunities are in the mining sector, as an ‘intrinsically safe' product.

It is used in mining operations in Peru enabling workers who are grinding copper ore to communicate in a noisy environment without removing their hearing protection. In Singapore, workers in an oil rig engine room can also communicate effectively in an environment where ‘intrinsically safe' protection is required.

In the US, tree surgeons are using the hearing protection with Bluetooth capability; road workers rely on it in their highly noisy and dangerous environment; and maintenance workers in the heating ventilation and air conditioning industry ensure they don't miss important calls on their mobile phones while protecting their hearing.

Another significant Sensear milestone in 2012 was the granting of a US patent to the company by the US Patent and Trademark Office, based on the original patent applications filed here in Perth in 2005.

"It is fantastic to see UWA technologies having significant societal and economic impact," said Dr Andy Sierakowski, Director of UWA's Office of Industry and Innovation. "That is why we do technology transfer from the university to the private sector in the first place."

Published in UWA News , 20 August 2012