0:00

Tired of ads barging into your favorite

0:02

news podcasts? Good news! Ad-free

0:04

listening is available on Amazon Music, for

0:06

all the music plus top podcasts included

0:08

with your Prime membership. Stay

0:11

up to date on everything Newsworthy by

0:13

downloading the Amazon Music app for free. Or

0:15

go to amazon.com/news ad free.

0:18

That's amazon.com/news ad free to catch

0:20

up on the latest episodes without

0:22

the ads. My

0:28

name is Mark Boorst and I've teamed

0:30

up with Steak, one of Australia's top

0:32

investing platforms to talk about going public.

0:37

IPOs are exciting milestones that

0:39

unlock new capital, draw more

0:41

attention and open up opportunities.

0:44

But a lot happens before and after the

0:46

trading bill rings, and it's not all glamour.

0:49

Join me in candid conversations with

0:51

prominent business leaders as we reveal

0:54

all the ups and downs of

0:56

getting a private company listed.

1:02

Mike Veegan, welcome to Going Public, mate. Thanks

1:04

for having me, Mark. So you're

1:06

the co-founder and managing director of

1:08

HITIQ. That's H-I-T-I-Q.

1:12

But what's your ticker? H-I-Q. H-I-Q.

1:15

Right. Listen on the Australian ASX. What

1:18

are they? Australian Stock Exchange, ASX. Let's

1:21

get into it a little bit here. Maybe

1:24

tell me a little bit about your

1:26

tech company, effectively a tech company. Absolutely.

1:30

What do you guys do? Where does your

1:32

technology sit? What platforms? And

1:34

what is your thesis

1:37

around your technology? Yeah, good

1:39

question. So our core

1:41

technology is a sensor-based mouth guard.

1:43

So effectively, we instrument

1:45

a general mouth guard with some

1:48

high-level technology. We just have one

1:50

here. Correct. And what we're able to do

1:53

with that tech is capture and quantify

1:56

head trauma, Brain Trauma. That

2:00

and in an acute sense

2:02

so can I've man how

2:04

my biggest impact the location

2:06

of the impacted direction that

2:09

impact I also have on

2:11

which side capturing and crack

2:13

athletes traits run and your

2:15

your background is that your

2:17

of sports scientist directors am

2:19

A you have. No,

2:22

no. Entice becomes more satisfying isolate. I

2:24

guess it's a. A Masters

2:26

right? Something I guess Our thoughts:

2:28

Master and Sauce. On it for

2:31

scientists are men. Your your. Experience

2:34

in terms of athletes is

2:37

with so. More.

2:40

Back. Rampone goes right back to the amateur

2:42

thousands in on in the Us likely boss.

2:45

And alone exposure. During that period

2:48

American Football came home So working

2:50

away sport and they were transition

2:52

into a hot Farmington with a

2:54

D I S C Shrine in

2:57

Institute of Sport Absolutely and. In

2:59

a bunch consultancy work on saw,

3:01

that's. An.

3:04

Effect Li moral was an

3:06

injury rehabilitation conditioning non. Data.

3:09

Management, data, science and sites.

3:11

yeah, was pre will grounded

3:13

in the spice tossing. A

3:15

different view. Trailer.

3:20

As sports injuries and or rehab

3:22

from Sports injury covers a lot

3:24

of territory. particular if you look

3:27

at grandma's or. To. Be

3:29

the basketballs good do or. A

3:32

rugby league play Arabian new

3:34

players that are like desserts.

3:36

a broad range of sports

3:38

injuries or this your of

3:40

this business specialize in one

3:42

area them as more bit

3:44

head injury or head trauma

3:46

and which will come back

3:48

to that dumb in that

3:50

process consulting, contracting doing software

3:52

yes having experienced the U

3:54

S Com what did you.

3:57

Learn bad head for up.

4:00

relative to sports people. By

4:02

the way, head trauma can happen

4:04

to anybody if it's a sports person. Head trauma

4:06

relative to a sports person. And

4:09

what's the difference between a head

4:11

injury and say, you know,

4:14

a bicep tear? Well,

4:17

this is why we exist. So the

4:20

opportunity really presented itself because there's

4:22

just no data. There's

4:24

no ground source or truth

4:27

to what we know about impacts

4:31

that lead to trauma versus

4:34

the traditional injuries or, you know,

4:36

that have a background in the

4:38

longevity of research and science and

4:42

empirical evidence. We

4:47

are bringing data to

4:49

fast track the knowledge base and

4:52

the management protocols of brain injury.

4:54

And we're doing that through our mouth guard

4:56

data. So

4:58

that's, you know, when you look at

5:00

traditional injuries versus if you were to

5:03

segment out brain injuries, the

5:05

big limitation at the moment with brain injury

5:07

is sport is data and the lack there

5:09

of it. So that's

5:12

purely why we exist and that's the opportunity

5:14

that we're chasing. The

5:16

brain's an unusual part

5:18

of our anatomy. It's, of

5:21

course, underexplored. Relative

5:24

to the rest of our body and we can

5:26

do heart surgery. We can do all sorts of things,

5:28

you know, like in pretty much sorting

5:31

everything out, most things.

5:33

Brain injury in

5:35

itself is not a massive problem if

5:37

there's a rehab program. Diagnosis

5:41

is not that difficult because, you know,

5:43

you can diagnose some

5:45

of the falls on the ground with a good hit on the chin. That's

5:47

pretty obvious he's got concussion or

5:50

she. What

5:53

is the issue though is, does

5:57

that express itself down the track in

5:59

20... five years time post retirement

6:02

into, I don't want to start a

6:04

scare campaign, but dementia,

6:07

CTE, those

6:10

types of things, any

6:13

type of brain disease

6:15

as opposed to the trauma, the question becomes

6:17

and that's a big game at the moment.

6:21

Particularly all the contact spots are confronting this at the moment

6:23

and we heard what happened in the US when the NFL

6:25

getting sued and they've cost a billion dollars or whatever, Aussie

6:29

it is, I think there are

6:31

some of the codes here currently either

6:33

being sued or about to be sued. How

6:38

important is it

6:41

for a club and

6:43

we're just looking at sports field for a club to gather data

6:50

on their players.

6:54

In terms of just defending for example, what

6:57

would be considered the duty of

6:59

care? Is

7:01

that a thing? We

7:04

think it is and it comes

7:06

down to identifying a cause and effect

7:08

relationship. There's

7:11

enough emerging evidence now

7:13

that head impacts

7:17

cause or too many head impacts

7:19

and I'll come back to too many cause

7:22

long term neurodegenerative issues. So

7:27

now if you reverse engineer that equation and you

7:29

say well if you're trying

7:31

to establish a cause and effect relationship you have to measure

7:34

the cause. You have to be able to

7:37

quantify. to. You

7:39

can't measure it, you can't manage it. It's simple age, you're old

7:41

age. So for us we say well there's a tool now that's

7:43

been validated. Extremely

7:52

accurate. Easy to

7:54

use. That

7:57

can help the clinician identify.

8:00

potential issues. So

8:03

when you look at the data, only 5 to

8:05

10 percent of concussions result in unconsciousness. So

8:08

visibly it's a really difficult

8:12

injury to identify from the thiamine,

8:15

even the most experienced of doctors. So

8:17

90% of the time

8:19

these guys are running around who do have a

8:21

concussion, undetected,

8:25

undiagnosed, they're continuing to run around

8:27

and compound that injury. So

8:30

this tool that we have and the technology

8:32

that we have is a effectively

8:34

an intervention tool to be able to

8:36

help the doctors identify this injury before

8:39

it gets to the point where these

8:41

guys are having to retire because they've

8:43

had you know multiple or ongoing unmanaged

8:45

and undiagnosed head injuries. As in mini-concussion

8:47

so to speak, training

8:49

or whatever. So because

8:52

obviously there are diagnostic tools that

8:55

exist today whether they're complete

8:57

inaccurate or objective

9:00

on life is another issue. We have

9:03

things like SCAT-6, we've now got SCAT-5,

9:05

we've now got the VOMS. There

9:07

are some other devices

9:11

that are being developed by various organizations.

9:14

I've noticed you guys have one on your website,

9:17

outside of this mouth gun. But

9:20

I think this is

9:22

more, this is

9:24

your mouth gun, we'll have to look at it in a second but as

9:27

I understand it your mouth

9:29

guards more a predictive tool

9:31

in that I guess

9:35

you use AI but your mouth guard

9:37

for anyone individual can say people

9:39

who have experienced this impact measured

9:42

by your mouth guard, that's

9:45

in my mouth when I'm playing footy whatever I'm doing, the

9:49

level of that impact ordinarily

9:52

would suggest that someone's had... Has

9:56

received a concussion. Concussion is

9:59

a weird word. A company

10:01

that and comes everything in an inner like

10:03

just too many things. And

10:05

as such as really cute concussion

10:07

as is about not a little

10:09

concussions to so I'm Michelle just

10:11

saying even accusing us neither knocked

10:13

out. You can apply for eleven

10:15

days. Maybe. Even

10:17

ten. Many concussions I was

10:19

the last. For training sessions you can

10:22

play eleven does the as that's probably

10:24

equally as important outcome for the play

10:26

if the players warfare is at the

10:28

front of our screen and true know

10:30

and if we got a Judy a

10:33

key exists. As you said earlier, measurement

10:35

is chemistry com manager so you can

10:37

just say ah so you might get

10:39

knocked out because you're a mini stood

10:42

up your saliva roy of the legs

10:44

went on you is suffering from dizziness

10:46

one of the case my be or.

10:48

You vomiting Shaw's as pretty

10:50

obvious ones that come off

10:52

live in dice. The.

10:55

Your point, I see a sink. Your point is

10:57

if if I suffer in a game. For

11:00

five. Heavy

11:03

impacts am honored a me to

11:05

the hid It could be to

11:07

my body and I get whiplash.

11:09

I'm missing missing he miss that.

11:11

And how am I correct?

11:14

right? So. I.

11:16

Would ask you this. I.

11:20

Rematch in this is

11:22

individualize because whilst. In.

11:24

Our honor Gordon Dallas. Play in

11:27

Rl Mobility Go Yard Hi guys

11:29

more take. Much

11:32

more. Impact.

11:37

Than. Say Luke Keary. Or

11:40

semi walker places city's biggest

11:42

by the sheer size. Next

11:44

eyes for example could play

11:46

important on of the things

11:48

skull size sickness, bodyweight relative

11:50

to the body white the

11:52

relative to the massive forces

11:54

just teach you forces be

11:56

possible. This issue with oath

11:58

forces the. That was. wait.

12:01

So. This

12:03

I presume this a during.for

12:05

each individual send then cross

12:08

referencing against the whole. Of

12:11

the universe of.of chess. And

12:15

as by chance. To

12:18

the point I'm a rat to be able

12:20

to do these wonderful things with and his

12:22

colleagues a tremendous amount of Diana. Ross

12:24

and over up at one

12:26

Fraud is what? License? So.

12:30

It does the does a lot of different variables

12:32

we have to control boom and all those ones

12:34

that you mention Detroit Box. Can teach

12:36

us. What

12:40

when? We

12:45

can make celebration. At ease

12:47

Taught to say anything because they

12:49

have accelerometers interest in them some

12:52

way. Correct Yes, Romanian in the

12:54

mouth got itself in America. So

12:56

at the end up and maybe

12:58

you disease by with accelerometer is

13:01

is that images effectively that the

13:03

speed of of movement is in

13:05

layman's terms. But

13:09

we also measure the the linear. And

13:12

the rotational acceleration. Of.

13:18

So. The rotational acceleration

13:20

is when you say guys get

13:22

i sort of like clips to

13:24

the jewel an. Impact

13:27

on Us. It's not a

13:29

man versus the linear impact. Which

13:32

is you know, a traditional jackson and

13:34

in a boxing environment for example, They

13:38

both have very different. outcomes

13:40

so yeah next streets at all those

13:42

different variables are important but we measure

13:45

this basically meant upon a can have

13:47

announced the head what happens to the

13:49

head with or he to the ground

13:51

heats a shower head to head impact

13:53

wherever my happens when measuring the bomb

13:56

mechanics of that in in in using

13:58

that data to in fear basically

14:01

the force that goes through the center of the

14:03

brain. And therefore we use algorithms and so forth.

14:05

And therefore predict something. And

14:07

that's where we do not

14:10

currently predict because we're not

14:12

a medical device. Okay, that's important.

14:14

This is not a medical device. It's not a medical device.

14:16

So you didn't need to get TGA approval or anything like

14:18

that. Correct. So that's important to know. But what

14:20

is it then? What do you call it then? It's

14:23

just not a medical device. It's just effectively a

14:25

low level measurement device. Yeah, yeah, right. So

14:28

but where we are at now

14:30

with the volume of data that we have, we can

14:32

start to apply these AI ML

14:34

methodologies to

14:38

move into that arena. And

14:42

we've done a bunch of

14:44

work internally with R&D team where

14:46

we've got some promising sort of product

14:49

roadmap that will emerge, but

14:52

the focus has been just on collecting the data. So

14:55

did you guys, you or your team

14:57

developed this actual HIT

15:00

IQ mouth guard? Yeah, from going away,

15:02

we've developed it from scratch. And in

15:04

terms of this particular mouth guard or

15:07

your product, because I understand

15:09

it's one or two others around, I've

15:12

heard of, your

15:15

one prior to getting listed

15:17

on ASX, did

15:22

you have to go out and get, or was

15:24

it mission critical to get patents, et cetera? There's

15:28

a tremendous amount of prior art in

15:31

the literature. We do have

15:33

a number of patents in application at

15:35

the moment. Yep, so patent spending. Yep,

15:37

patent spending. We've

15:40

got two strain innovation patents as well. So

15:44

they cover design utility, a

15:46

variety of different areas

15:50

of the IP. But

15:54

it was a consideration and we obviously

15:56

comply it

15:58

as a business, but... Yeah,

16:00

it's been sort of just build

16:03

and iterate, build and iterate and work

16:06

within the parameters that we have to work within. So

16:08

like, so when you're listing whoever was your

16:10

sponsoring broker in terms of listing process and

16:12

the organization that do the DD on you

16:14

to talk to their clients, all that sort

16:16

of stuff. Correct. They didn't, they were happy

16:18

with that. They didn't sort of say, look, patent's a big deal because for

16:21

the rest you just mentioned, they didn't, they didn't sort

16:23

of say, we must have patents in every country in

16:25

the world. No. What

16:28

were the, before you went to

16:30

market, what were the non-negotiables that the

16:33

advisors that you guys had said,

16:35

look, these are the things you have

16:37

to get, get sorted in relation to

16:39

this particular device. Yeah. So there

16:43

was probably two things. And I think we

16:45

had been in a really prior to the

16:47

listing a really heavy R&D process,

16:49

cost money, cost a lot of money. But

16:53

one of the challenges that we've had is the sort of wheels of

16:55

science move quite slow. So

16:57

the actual publication and

17:00

the evidence of utility and the

17:02

actual tech working and the validation,

17:05

all of that body of work that we

17:07

had to do in the lead up to

17:09

that process was one

17:12

of the non-negotiables. So I could just stop

17:14

there for a second, like, so that's an important one. So

17:18

as I understand, these are the steps, you know,

17:20

you design it, you build it,

17:23

you build it, your mouth cut that

17:25

is, and then

17:27

you've got to validate. There's got

17:29

to be validated. So in other words, you've got to find guinea

17:33

pigs to test it out or you've got to find people to test

17:35

it. You can't test it out in a mouse. It's

17:37

not a mouse model, it's a human model. So

17:39

you've got to find people to validate it. So

17:42

what does that validation process look like? So,

17:45

and I think what you said you

17:47

had to do is pre-listing. So how did

17:49

you go about validation? Who do you

17:51

find? Yeah, good question. So the

17:54

word validation is a low-determed,

17:56

there's many levels to what we've had to do.

17:59

So the first one was... Can you put electrons into

18:01

a mouth guard without compromising A in the mouth guard

18:03

or B in electronics? And

18:06

will the play work? Yeah, will the play work? Comfortable, is

18:08

it comfortable? Yeah, and from where we are, where we were

18:10

to where we are now, from a size and comfort perspective,

18:12

it's just out of this world how well

18:15

we've been able to miniaturise the

18:18

size of the device. So,

18:21

yeah, so can we, like, basic questions, you know, can

18:24

we even do that? And we

18:26

answered those pretty well and then it was like, okay,

18:28

well... How do you go about

18:30

finding someone to validate it for? Like, do you

18:32

go on to a junior league or a field

18:34

basketball? Yeah, the first part was more of a

18:36

manufacturing question. Right. And that's

18:38

where, you know, my co-founder, Lucas Lang, he was a

18:41

dental prostheticist and Roan had the

18:43

expertise in the prosthetics and manufacturing.

18:45

So, we went

18:47

through that process and ticked that box and then the next

18:49

part was the data. Right. How do we

18:51

actually extract data out of this thing and

18:54

how good is the data? Because we're talking

18:56

about sensor systems. That's right. And you therefore

18:58

have to have software sitting on the other

19:00

end assuming the sensors work, which obviously they

19:02

do, but something, a machine

19:05

is receiving the data. I

19:08

presume it's not going to be that way. You're not

19:10

sending anything in there, are you? You're not sending stuff

19:12

back. So, you're just receiving data and then on the

19:14

reception side, you've got software which in took all banks

19:17

of data and then maybe interprets it, but at

19:19

least banks of data. So, you

19:21

have to build software around that. So,

19:24

who did that? Who just... CTO staff.

19:26

So, we built all that on the back end.

19:29

The primary concern through that validation process was actually

19:31

validating the data. Right. To

19:33

give you some background, when we first started, the

19:35

accuracy and the sensitivity of the device was at

19:38

40%. Which means... So, I think

19:40

it was at the time it was wrong. Yeah,

19:42

the data was just so... It was error prone.

19:44

Either that or it was just unusual. Yeah,

19:47

and error at 97. So, it's... That's

19:49

been a journey in terms of validating the actual data

19:51

coming out of the garden. We're going to do that in two ways. We're going to

19:53

do it in lab. So,

19:56

it is crashing dummies and we're

19:58

actually not real people. people. So

20:00

we've built devices in our laboratory

20:03

that is able to effectively

20:05

we can push around and

20:07

you know we've incremented those devices

20:09

with really honourable sensory apparatus

20:13

so that we effectively are comparing

20:17

the ground truth which is the sensors inside of

20:19

the test dummy versus the mouth cut which is

20:21

attached to the dummy. But when we started there

20:23

was nobody that could actually was fit

20:26

out to basically complete

20:29

that testing for us. So there's these car

20:31

cat crash test dummy facilities but we were

20:33

too small to engage with them they didn't

20:35

have the specific dummy that we needed

20:38

so we had to build ourselves which took longer

20:40

than we had wanted and hoped. But

20:43

we went through that process and then next but

20:45

was the field validation. So then we had to

20:47

instrument actual athletes and

20:49

record them. How'd you find them? It

20:51

wasn't that hard. So

20:53

people were willing to participate. But how?

20:56

We had people out in the field

20:58

sort of building relationships with groups

21:02

that were willing to sort of help us out really. But

21:05

it was very structured you know in terms of what we needed

21:07

and what we required from them. We

21:09

needed them to obviously onboard

21:12

their athletes they had to wear the technology. On

21:14

the back end we had to use video

21:17

verification to capture all the impacts

21:20

and then figure out the false positives and

21:22

the false negatives and then build algorithms to

21:24

repair. Did you do with adults or

21:27

teenagers or girls or boys? It

21:30

was done in amateur study in the Essendon

21:32

footy league actually in Victoria. So it was

21:34

just amateur male athletes to

21:36

start with. And

21:39

they were our sort of first testing protocol and then we

21:41

sort of evolved out. We started working with the AFL. They

21:43

actually did the NRL some time ago. And

21:46

the reason why we had to work with those

21:48

guys is because of the quality of the vision

21:50

that we required to be able to validate the

21:52

field data. So just so I

21:54

understand that. The

21:56

field data is coming off the mouth guard. So he's

21:59

sending you some data. back to your

22:01

system which you know you're reading but you need

22:03

a video to say yeah well actually he will

22:05

share you just got hit quite hard by someone

22:07

shoulder arm or whatever the case however the ball

22:09

yeah well that's right so you know Mark's

22:12

instrument with our mouth guard we've got the camera

22:14

on Mark the data file

22:17

is synced to the video file and

22:19

oh look there's an impact and he's just running

22:21

around there's no impact so oh

22:24

he was actually he was yelling yeah so

22:26

the yelling creates an impact profile on the

22:28

data right so we've had to

22:30

build over time these algorithms that filter

22:32

out all the noise they're false

22:35

positives yeah that's right you know and guys will put

22:37

their mouth guard in their sock and go for a

22:39

run and the file will show that he's had 200

22:41

yeah really high level impacts and we're like

22:43

well he'd be dead so that's not it's

22:46

not real data so the validation is really

22:48

valuable it's really valuable yes and it's and

22:50

it all goes down to trust and building

22:52

a body of evidence around

22:55

hey this actually works and this is the work that we've done

22:57

to prove it how long does the other nation process take

23:00

it it took us five years five

23:02

years well can I just

23:04

open my thumbs are no good so maybe I'll

23:06

get you to open up okay

23:09

just look all

23:12

right so I can see you so

23:16

this is a sort of normal

23:18

traditional fitted mouth guards correct and

23:20

inside there we've got yes

23:32

this charges in there correct like

23:34

a mobile phone sort of thing

23:37

it's all wireless yeah and this

23:39

is now sending messages to somewhere else is

23:42

it sending to that and that sends it on

23:44

or was it me no because it's not your

23:46

mouth no but what I has an L.T. my

23:48

mouth is it there's a sensor in there that

23:51

can tell that's in my mouth so once it's

23:53

in my mouth detection system so that's important because

23:55

that way someone put in a sock that doesn't

23:57

record it correct yeah so that

23:59

once it's my mouth, it detects and it's

24:01

in my mouth. It's obviously some

24:04

trick or secret that you guys

24:06

own that says it detects and

24:08

then it starts sending messages. Is it

24:10

constantly sending messages or it only sends

24:12

a message when there's an impact? Yes,

24:14

so only when it surpasses a threshold

24:17

do we record data. Right,

24:20

interesting. So we can

24:22

set that as low as we like. It's

24:24

generally set around 5G's. Yes.

24:27

So anything above 5G's. Tell me what 5G's means. I

24:29

mean explain 5G's. Well

24:33

5G's you know you

24:36

see pilots do training

24:38

at let's say 9G and

24:40

it looks quite intense. But that's 9G

24:42

applied over time. So when you look

24:45

at how long an impact

24:47

exposure lasts for it's only 5 milliseconds

24:50

at times. Sometimes 10 milliseconds.

24:53

So it's a very short sharp exposure to that

24:56

force. So

24:58

5G's are really low level impact and then we've seen guys

25:00

expose to 120, 130 G impacts. Which

25:05

are massive impacts. So

25:07

yeah we set that

25:09

threshold relatively low and

25:11

sort of disregard

25:14

all the low

25:16

level, not important. You know

25:19

because even changing direction for example or

25:21

a jump and a land can elicit

25:23

some level of a G force. So

25:27

we've set 5. I mean the research is emerging

25:29

on what the number needs to be but we

25:32

want to capture as much as we possibly can.

25:34

Right, okay. So you guys

25:36

doing, how did you fund your process before you

25:38

listened? So how is that all happening? Because I

25:40

mean this sounds like 5G's a lot of work,

25:43

a lot of

25:45

research, a lot

25:47

of design. I guess you've

25:49

got mechanical engineers and you know

25:52

electrical engineers building your, well you

25:54

know coders at least, computer scientists

25:56

building your software etc. How's

26:00

this all funded? What are we talking about, Branham,

26:02

for example? Early

26:04

days? Yeah, early days. So look,

26:08

I mean, we've spent over 25 million

26:10

bucks to date over

26:12

the life of our journey, which is how long? Well,

26:15

we started seriously, sort of

26:17

2017. 2016

26:21

was a year of sort of experimenting and

26:23

can we do this? But then 17 was when

26:25

we first took external funding. And

26:29

really look, it's just been a high

26:31

net worth that have helped us along into the family.

26:33

How do you find a high net worth? I mean,

26:35

everyone keeps saying, like, it's just like they're just going

26:37

to scratch the surface and there's a high net worth

26:39

sitting underneath. Like, where do you find

26:41

high net worth from? This

26:44

is a good question. So not

26:47

coming from the corporate world. You

26:49

know, that was obviously a big learning curve for

26:51

myself as a co-founder and sort of the lead

26:53

on the funding mechanism

26:55

of our business. But

26:58

it's just, it's door knocking.

27:00

There better out. I mean,

27:02

is a high net worth less somewhere? Yeah,

27:04

you just meet people who then refer you

27:06

to other people and say, hey, this guy

27:09

might be interested. And then you just follow

27:11

the breadcrumbs, so to speak. And

27:13

you eventually meet enough

27:16

people that

27:19

you're able to, it's just like a sales

27:21

funnel, right? Like you speak to a hundred

27:24

people and three will invest. So,

27:26

you know, my black book is full of a lot of people who

27:29

didn't believe in HitIQ and what we're trying to

27:31

do. But that's effectively what

27:34

it is. It's just a sales funnel. And you're going

27:36

out and you're trying to talk to as many people

27:38

as you can. And you're telling

27:40

the story and you're showing them a roadmap of

27:42

what you think the next 12 to 18 months

27:44

looks like. And most of the time you're

27:46

wrong. You're talking about VCs? You talk

27:48

VCs? We've not been on the VC radar. We don't

27:50

fit that model. Right. What does that

27:53

mean? Well, hardware technology

27:55

in Australia is a

27:57

difficult proposition to fund. And, you

27:59

know, we've... We've sort of taken a

28:01

path of travel in the sense that

28:03

this isn't born out, this tech or IP is

28:06

not born out of university land. So

28:08

we funded it from day one, privately.

28:12

So we just

28:14

don't fit the VC model. Whether

28:17

or not the addressable market is big

28:19

enough for them, hardware tech is hard

28:21

to fund particularly in Australia and the

28:23

VC pool in Australia is obviously quite

28:25

small as well. We did

28:27

have a plan in 2019

28:29

that we developed that we're going to try

28:32

and get some US funding but

28:34

then we got hit with the pandemic and that sort of

28:36

threw things up in the air for a period of time

28:38

and then that event pretty

28:41

much put us on the A6 route to

28:43

a pathway to an IPO because

28:45

we couldn't keep funding it as

28:48

a private business. We needed access

28:50

to the capital and the public markets. So

28:55

that was pretty much the limitation that we had

28:57

in the Australian market. The VC

28:59

pool was really limited. We were generally

29:02

attracted to high net worth, small family

29:04

offices, those types. So

29:06

you've now got high

29:10

net wealth investing and helping you

29:12

fund it along the way but it's pretty

29:14

stressful I guess because you're

29:16

always looking at your runway and you're probably thinking

29:18

to yourself, my God, it won't last another six

29:20

months. Let me go get some more money. Perhaps

29:23

go back and talk to the high

29:25

net wealth that had already invested. Perhaps they

29:27

might bring some more on but

29:30

at some stage around

29:33

the COVID period, you decided

29:35

to go on the A6. When

29:38

I look at your website, I notice you've got a

29:40

lot of heavy hitters on you. It looks like advisors

29:42

or board members. You've

29:45

got professors, etc. How

29:49

important is it in

29:51

terms of listing on the A6,

29:54

in other words, an IPO on the Australian Stock Exchange,

29:57

how important is it for CRED? to

30:00

have neuropsychs and neurologists,

30:03

et cetera, on your, I

30:05

don't know, I can't remember if they're on the advisory board or on your

30:07

board. How important

30:09

is it to have those individuals there? Super

30:12

important, I mean, in all aspects

30:14

of life, people look for social proof, you

30:16

know, and having high

30:18

level academics and researchers and

30:21

practitioners who are

30:23

supporting your journey and believing your journey is

30:25

a really good indicator, a very good signal

30:27

to the investment

30:29

community. How'd you get to them? I noticed

30:31

that one of your, one

30:33

of your, are

30:36

they board members or advisory boards? No, they're on advisory

30:38

boards. That's because it's difficult to put them on the

30:40

board because they have liabilities associated with being on the

30:42

board. Correct. And you've got DNO insurance, they're directors

30:44

and officers insurance, which you've got to sort of sort out. So

30:46

you put them on an advisory board to get it, which

30:50

you have to pay something for. One

30:53

of the neuropsychs you have on

30:55

there is out of Newcastle University. How

30:58

do you find these individuals? Do

31:00

you get someone to put in contact with them?

31:02

Or how do you select these particular individuals to

31:04

be on your advisory board? For

31:08

a variety of reasons, and they all bring different

31:10

skillsets to the table. But

31:13

when, you know, I suppose when you

31:16

maneuver through the journey and you start

31:18

to get some momentum in

31:20

the market and people are talking about you

31:22

and you're trialing in the AFL, for example,

31:25

whatever it may be, you start to

31:27

become a magnet for people of

31:29

this caliber. So the conversation becomes

31:31

a lot easier. I mean, when we first started, it

31:33

was a pipe dream, right? So you sort of have

31:35

to tell the story and you got

31:38

to onboard people and get

31:40

them to believe, right? And that's not only the advisors

31:43

and also your employees. But

31:46

in terms of the advisors, I mean, I think when

31:48

you've got leading tech and you're actually solving a

31:51

real problem. But they're probably researching. They're

31:54

researching and you're a real value

31:56

add to them. They're a value add to you. So

31:58

it's a really, synergistic relationship.

32:00

So what do you offer them

32:02

though? I know any detail, but

32:05

they do have to offer them

32:07

equity or cash. I mean some

32:09

of it's cash, a very nominal

32:11

amount really. Why do they do

32:13

it though? Well because they

32:15

want to advance the space.

32:17

And they see us as being a

32:19

primary source of doing that. So they

32:22

want to be involved and they want to

32:24

be part of the program. So there's a

32:27

lot. Do they want access to the data?

32:32

There is some of that. So

32:34

you know we work in a confined

32:36

space with data. Right because of the sensitivity

32:39

of not only the issue but also the

32:41

data privacy laws and all the ethics associated

32:43

with this stuff. Do

32:45

you have to de-identify everybody? Yeah

32:47

correct. Everything is de-identified. Everything's de-identified.

32:49

If the athlete wants

32:51

to see the data, it's

32:54

okay. If they release the

32:56

data, that's also okay. Are

32:59

you sharing the data as

33:01

it occurs with the athlete, with their

33:03

healthcare provider? At

33:05

this stage? This year we

33:08

will be. Historically we haven't. And

33:10

look, there's been in that

33:12

journey in terms of educating the market, educating the

33:16

medical people, the clinicians

33:18

have really. It's a big deal. There is risk off right.

33:20

And you have to convince them and then you have to

33:22

convince them again and then you got to convince them again.

33:25

So you know that process of

33:27

educating the clinicians and the medical

33:29

committees and saying hey this is what

33:32

we're doing, this is the data, this is what it means. And

33:35

it's just a process that you have to

33:37

go through with them. What platforms are you

33:39

using? Like you're using I

33:41

don't know LinkedIn, I'm talking

33:44

about not publish occasions, I'm not talking

33:46

about medical publications. I'm sure you guys

33:49

are doing those things. But

33:51

what platforms are you using

33:53

to, let's call it promote the idea, Instagram,

33:56

Facebook, LinkedIn,

33:59

etc. Yeah, so we've largely been

34:01

a B2B player today. So,

34:04

you know, it's building direct relationships with

34:06

people. So the rehab people at the

34:08

club. Yeah, the medical directors at the

34:10

club, CMOs. Those

34:12

types of characters, right? So building direct relationships with

34:14

them, building trust, and

34:17

just onboarding them on

34:20

our journey and saying, this is what we're doing. And

34:23

just keep, to continue updates, it's just relationship building,

34:25

right? But you've been doing it for nine years.

34:27

It's a long road, eh? It's a long road,

34:29

right? So when did you list? 2021,

34:32

middle of a pandemic, which is a

34:34

bit of a go. Yeah, but the

34:37

decision was pretty much made 12 months

34:39

prior. So it takes that

34:41

long to go through the process. And how

34:43

much did you raise? We raised 10, 10 mil.

34:46

And it was all in, or did someone take

34:48

some of them? I mean, what's that process

34:50

look like? So when you go to raise $10 million, obviously

34:53

your sponsoring broker, or if you have

34:56

one, but your sponsoring broker says, do

34:59

you want to take any off the table, or are you

35:01

going to leave all the dough in there? A lot of

35:04

times new shareholders insist that you leave everything

35:06

in there because they don't want you to take any off

35:08

the table. So what was your process? How'd you go? Let's

35:10

go about it. Yeah, nobody took anything off the table for

35:14

a variety of reasons. I mean, we were so small

35:16

and we were so much yet to prove that it

35:18

would have been a really bad signal if we did.

35:22

But yeah, no, and

35:24

obviously the blue sky and

35:27

the opportunity and where we were tracking and where

35:29

we still are tracking obviously could

35:32

be running significant business. How

35:34

do you establish a value? I mean, that's pretty

35:36

hard. I mean, not enough, you're probably not making

35:39

revenue or much at that stage. So it's not

35:41

a revenue model valuation. So it may

35:43

be in terms of to address a little market, potential

35:45

revenue, but like, how

35:47

do you work out a value? Because you're giving away a

35:49

percentage in return than $10 million. I'm

35:52

trying to work out, how do you work out

35:55

what percentage you're prepared to give away? And

35:57

that's all subject to the value. Yeah, yeah. And that's the

35:59

fourth. that you have with the brokers because they're... But

36:02

how did you work out about it? Oh,

36:04

it was worth, as you say, it was worth 100, happy

36:07

to eat 10% away for 10, I mean, is that how it worked? Yeah,

36:09

I thought it was worth a billion. But

36:11

it's a tough conversation because you look

36:13

at what you spent and you're pretty

36:15

much pre-revenue. I mean, we had to

36:17

be a revenue at the time, but

36:19

the revenue wheels hadn't started turning. So

36:23

you can't point to sort of

36:25

multiples of revenue. So it's largely,

36:28

well, what's the dynamics of the

36:30

market? You don't have a user marker either, because you're

36:32

not out there. That's right. So what do we think

36:34

that... First thing is we need to get

36:36

the 10 mil. 10

36:38

is what you need. We need it. To give you a runway, by

36:40

the way, how many years is that between that? Two years. Two

36:43

year runway. So the first thing is you need the 10.

36:45

And then the next question is, well, what's

36:48

the market gonna accept as a valuation? What story

36:50

can we sell, you know, based on... And then

36:52

the brokers obviously want it on the

36:54

low end because it's selling. It's easier for

36:56

them. And, you know, there's more

36:58

upside, you know, the founders

37:00

and the shareholders, the existing

37:03

shareholders want the higher number,

37:05

right? So there's a bit of push-pull negotiation. It's

37:07

an arm wrestle. It's an arm wrestle. There's no

37:09

science. It's really an art. It's

37:11

an art, absolutely. And you have to

37:13

learn that art. I mean, I've been through the process a

37:16

couple of times, but I, yeah, and I just want to

37:18

hear you say that because there is an art and there's

37:20

no science. Because people look for science, they go, oh my

37:22

God, you know, there must be some sort of a formula

37:24

that magic formula, secret formula, that everybody

37:27

applies. It's not scientific.

37:30

You can apply some science perhaps if you've

37:32

got revenues or if you've got a million

37:34

users or maybe you had to apply some sort of

37:37

science that might be able to relate back to what someone else

37:39

has done. But if there's none of those

37:41

two, it's more art. In other

37:44

words, you said we spent 25 mil. Maybe

37:46

it's worth 25 mil because if someone else was to get

37:48

to this point where we're at, it's gonna cost 25 mil.

37:51

That's right. Listed, 2021. How's

37:56

the, what's your thing in the experience of

37:58

the IPO? What was that like? How's it

38:00

been so far for the 2024 network? Yeah.

38:05

Look, there's just so many moving parts to

38:07

listing a business. And

38:09

when you're a small team like we were, you sort of,

38:11

you don't outsource too much of it. You do a lot

38:13

of it yourself, you know? So

38:17

it's a big

38:19

exercise. And then when you finally

38:21

get to the listing day, it's a bit of a, you know,

38:23

you take a deep breath and then, yeah,

38:25

but I can also get, because then you've got

38:27

your business, you know, what you've told people,

38:29

you've got to deliver on site. Look,

38:32

I wouldn't say it was a negative or positive. It was just,

38:35

it was what it wasn't. And, you know, there was a small,

38:38

you know, there was a small hit

38:40

on the share price on the day and then it

38:42

sort of trailed off. And, you know,

38:44

we've had probably, if I was to sum it up in

38:46

the last sort of three years or two and a half

38:48

years, it's been a challenging

38:51

experience for a small

38:54

cash burning tech business

38:56

in Australia or globally really,

38:59

hasn't been a friendly time for our type

39:01

of businesses. Or tech business have copped a

39:03

hard time. Yeah, that's right. Tech business is

39:05

life. Generally. Yeah, and, you

39:08

know, you're fighting for newsflow and

39:11

inherently the business that we're in is

39:13

that to get a cornerstone customer, there's

39:16

a long tail in that process. So

39:19

you're not churning out really high volumes

39:21

of newsflow. So then that,

39:23

you know, impact the retail investor who doesn't have

39:25

the patience to fit in. Correct.

39:30

And they just flip out and they go

39:32

into the next deal. Yeah, so you're fighting

39:34

for liquidity in your stock and you're trying

39:36

to get new people coming in

39:38

and you're trying to create your business. So it's

39:41

been a real challenging time for us. But I think, you

39:43

know, we've really, you know,

39:45

kicked some significant goals over the last two years.

39:47

We worked with the Premier League, you know, the

39:50

AFL. There's a number of

39:52

different organisations that are pretty developed

39:55

in our pipeline that we're confident on

39:57

landing. So we're, you know, and, you

39:59

know, world rugby have just mandated the

40:01

technology so we can see

40:03

technology generally or your

40:05

sense of technology, your mouth gun based technology

40:07

so and this was part of our

40:10

vision when we started we could see that there was

40:12

a pathway to this happening and it's done to unfold

40:15

before our eyes. It's

40:17

probably taken a bit longer than

40:19

we thought. It always does but

40:21

it's trending so we're pretty excited

40:23

about what's coming. Well it's interesting

40:25

because right now the

40:28

whole territory is trending around concussion

40:30

and all the other things associated

40:32

with concussion also measuring concussion and

40:34

detecting concussion and rehabbing on concussion

40:37

etc and I know your website

40:39

is very cool like it's quite

40:41

detailed and complete. I had a quick look through

40:43

it this morning. It's pretty cool and

40:45

this stuff sometimes you have to wait for people

40:48

to catch up to their technology. I mean

40:50

like iPhones, telephones, mobile phones. The other way

40:52

for people to catch up to the technology

40:54

sometimes. Now the technology is trying to

40:57

keep pace with people but consumers

40:59

but you know it's a very

41:01

interesting journey and sometimes the

41:04

main experience I say to people is when you IPO

41:06

is how do you feel when

41:08

you raise a doe? Well you're pretty happy you're sort

41:11

of relieved. The rest of it is management after

41:13

that you know and you can't control whether

41:15

technology is not a darling anymore or

41:18

becomes a darling or someone else, listen, someone else

41:20

becomes a darling. You can't control any of that.

41:23

You just have to manage your way through it. But

41:28

I'm glad you were able to raise money. I'm glad

41:30

you were able to do an IPO and by the

41:32

way you're probably right trying to raise that sort of

41:34

money at the time would have been very difficult with

41:37

VCs etc. Because

41:40

Australian tech needs

41:43

to be funded by Australians and

41:46

if ASX or IPO is one way

41:48

of doing it then we should

41:50

try it out and try and get it done and get

41:52

it sorted so we can get science

41:54

up to where it needs to be. I'm

42:00

gonna follow here to IQ. As

42:03

you probably know, I'm involved in the Sydney Roosters. We

42:05

are getting approached by lots of people in relation to

42:07

the mouth guards at the

42:09

moment. One of the things I will say

42:12

to some of our players who should be wearing them during

42:14

training don't like to wear them. In

42:17

fact, they don't wear a mouth guard. I can't even believe it. Frame

42:19

that mouth guard, like what's wrong with you? But it's more

42:22

a habit, so you gotta change a lot of habits. You

42:24

gotta change a lot of behaviors. And

42:26

that's a big deal. But over time,

42:28

I think it'll become, especially

42:31

as younger people come through, the

42:33

new ranks, if they start off with

42:35

this, it's just gonna be, oh, that's

42:37

what we wear. Or if they're playing

42:39

junior footy and they've already got one. Like junior clubs,

42:41

that's what I'm up with. Are they expensive? Is

42:44

price point an issue at the moment? No,

42:48

I mean, we sell these things for $6,700.

42:52

You know, the mouth guard, the whole thing. The

42:54

hardware's off my package, right? We

42:57

sell these data. That's our real product. We

43:00

just use the mouth guard, that's the vessel.

43:02

Yeah, but that

43:04

price point will come down as we scale. As

43:07

we get economies of scale, we're

43:10

able to fulfill larger order quantities and

43:12

the price point will come down naturally. So,

43:15

like, do you think, right, when it first comes to

43:17

market, it's more expensive, even the price point dwindles down?

43:19

Mobile phones, exactly right. So, I have one of the

43:22

$4,000 ones back in 985. So,

43:24

I know. And I

43:27

was one of the guinea

43:29

pigs early days. Well, Mike, look,

43:32

I, concussion's a big topic

43:34

for me in my life. I love talking

43:36

to people about this. HITIQ, I

43:39

will be following. Thanks for sharing

43:41

your experiences. More importantly, thanks

43:43

for sharing your trials and

43:46

tribulations, because it's not an easy thing to do, but

43:49

the ASX helps you out, and it's

43:52

been a great outcome. So, Mike Vega,

43:54

co-founder and managing director of HITIQ. Thanks

43:57

very much, mate. Appreciate it. And

44:01

less time than it takes to unsubscribe from

44:04

all those cringy marketing newsletters or

44:06

roll your eyes reading those overindulgent,

44:08

overwritten LinkedIn posts, The Hustle Daily

44:10

Show keeps you fresh on the

44:12

biggest stories in business and tech.

44:15

Listen to innovative, irreverent and entertaining

44:17

hosts bringing their humor and insight

44:19

daily, delivering the news that you

44:21

need at the speed that you want it. The

44:24

Hustle Daily Show for the fast and

44:26

curious.