Several Western Australian companies are finding local and international markets for their innovations in the niche educational software sector.
Several Western Australian companies are finding local and international markets for their innovations in the niche educational software sector.
Among them is Myaree-based software developer ReadOn Pty Ltd, which recently won an Australian Information Industry Association iAward for its interactive reading program for people with dyslexia.
Phil and Jane Mangano founded the company after developing the software for their daughter in 2004.
They commercialised the product in August 2005.
Since then, ReadOn’s software has been rolled-out nationally, and a second version is currently being developed for distribution by the end of the year.
The changes to the program, which uses visual imagery and cues to assist people overcome reading problems associated with dyslexia, will include a homophone spellchecker to increase functionality.
ReadOn secured a distributor in the UK in January last year, followed by a contract in the US in mid-2006.
To date, the company has raised about $70,000 from its overseas sales.
Ms Mangano said she was planning to attend the international reading association forum in May next year as a vendor.
“North America would be a really good market for us, getting into the reading specialist area rather than special needs,” she said.
Also active in the remedial education space is computer games developer, K29 Edutainment.
The Dawesville-based company has developed educational games applications for mobile phones that can be downloaded from a mobile network server.
K29 Edutainment founder Jean du Buisson said the product had been developed in conjunction with research by Murdoch University, which had introduced the games at nine schools in Perth and was extending its study into a second year.
“We’re seeing that mobile phones have the same power as PCs did in the early nineties,” Mr du Buisson said.
The company’s games are used to teach numeracy skills, such as telling the time by analogue clock, exchange of money and calculating with units of one and 10.
Mr du Buisson said the advantage of a mobile phone game was its accessibility.
“The kids that have fallen behind can try and catch up without appearing to be struggling,” he said.
K29 Edutainment has about 40 games for students in years five and six, and is developing a product for years six to nine.
Mr du Buisson said the games were price competitive, with an individual game costing around $6.
The company has licensing agreements for its product with Telstra, Virgin, Optus and a Malaysian-based phone company, selling about 30,000 games per month on average.
It has also secured an agreement with Japan-based multinational, Nintendo, to convert its mobile phone games to console applications.
Mr du Buisson said the company was focusing on educational products in the areas of numeracy and literacy, with numeracy of particular interest due to its international potential.
“It made commercial sense – worldwide, no-one does multiplication or division differently to us,” he said.
“It reduces the amount of local-ising we have to do for particular markets. You’re not subject to the cultural mores of different countries.”
North Perth animated publisher Finn Cragg is also finding international distributors for its multimedia education products.
The company has developed two DVD-based animations, which can be downloaded onto a computer and separated into jpeg files, allowing children to deconstruct the stories and create their own story board.
Finn Cragg resource consultant Evelyn Twine said the company had sold its product into Singapore and Japan, and was pursuing other opportunities at present.
