Can a ‘hackathon’ help innovation in the mining industry? Perth is about to find out.
Throw some programmers in a room for a weekend, put up some cash prizes, give them a problem or two to solve, lock the doors and see what they come up with. Commonplace among the IT community, a ‘hackathon’ forces participants to think fast and be creative.
Applying this approach to the mining industry, ‘Unearthed’ is a brand new 54-hour event held at Spacecubed this weekend, in which mining companies such as Rio Tinto and Gold Fields, and mining services industry group Austmine will share their data with programmers from across the State.
“It’s a very powerful methodology for getting somewhere fast. In fact one of the successes of that approach is the time constraint,” Justin Strharsky, managing director of mining software company Synaptor, and Unearthed co-organiser told Business News.
“Unearthed is a very high energy event, in which we are going to build prototype solutions to mining industry problems really fast.”
Matt Edwards, CEO of software business APE Mobile, commented that “at least six months of our design lifecycle could have been cut out if I had been able to come to an Unearthed type event, as I could have met up with some technical guys, and some industry guys at the same time.”
Co organizer Paul Lucey of consulting group VCI (formerly Head of Technology and Innovation at Gold Fields) said “It’s a good safe environment to experiment, try some ad hocracy, crowd source your data and see what eventuates.”
Rio Tinto has joined as a key sponsor and will actively participate in ‘Unearthed’ by sending a team of subject matter experts to explain some key industry challenges.
The keynote speaker will be Kellie Parker, General Manager: Operations Centre at Rio Tinto, who will speak on the need for innovation in the mining industry.
She will showcase some examples from the Operations Centre, which is the primary control centre for Rio Tinto's vast network of mines, rail systems, infrastructure facilities and port operations in the Pilbara.
‘Unearthed’ has been well received by the local developer community with nearly all the available places filled. Among the participants are individuals who lead data science teams.
“Gold Fields is making two years of their production and logistics data available. In addition, both Landgate and the Department of Mines and Petroleum are contributing significant data sets”, said Mr Strharsky.
At the conclusion of the event on May 4, a panel of judges will evaluate the solutions against criteria determined by RIIT and its industry partners.
Winners will be rewarded with mining-themed prizes, which include a solid gold coin and a solid silver bar from the Perth Mint, as well as a $2000 prize from Landgate for the most innovative use of their SLIP land information platform.
Further information on ‘Unearthed’ is available at http://unearthed.riit.com.au
Charlie Gunningham is an internet entrepreneur and GM of Digital at Business News
Twitter: @chazgunningham
