Company Information: Hindsite 

• PropTech 
• 250+ Users 
• 8 Staff

Hindsite’s knowledge management tech is a worker’s best friend.

What, when, where.

Imagine you’re on a worksite. 

You’re staring at a piece of hardware you’ve worked on a few times in your career, but the exact process for what to do next escapes you. You ask the question out loud about what to do, and the exact procedure bursts to life on the heavy duty headset that’s displaying everything you need on a small screen just in front of your eye line. It’s completely hands-free, meaning you can concentrate on what needs to get done without having to scroll or tap a screen for more information. 

That’s the genius of Brisbane PropTech company Hindsite.

Co-founder Liam Scanlan describes Hindsite as a knowledge management platform that helps niche industries capture content, knowledge and skills. It then displays that content at the time and place their workers need it.

“We partner with best-in-breed in-field wearable devices, and we use a cloud-based system to connect in and capture the perspective of people on site from their point of view, using Google Glass or RealWear, or just through their phone,” he says. 

“That is stored into a purpose-built cloud offering that’s accessible to anyone, anywhere, and we tag it with strategic information so that it’s searchable and consumable at a later date when needed.”

Neo-tech connecting the worksite

Hindsite was established in 2017, with the idea coming to co-founder Doug Hastings thanks to a spark of an idea inspired by futuristic film The Matrix.

“You know that scene in The Matrix where they need to learn how to fly a helicopter, and that information is downloaded into them?” Scanlan says. 

“It’s a similar concept – how do you proactively provide the skillset required, or the information required, when you’re about to perform a task?

“The very big benefit for any business is that you can capture and retain all of that in-situ knowledge, which you can use for training purposes, but can also have a massive governance, reportability and operational improvement value.” 

Hindsite’s technology means that whenever any employee is using a device and is learning something in the field, the business can take that training and systemise it into accessible, wearable business knowledge.

“And it’s not just a way of capturing information,” he says. 

“You could also dial in someone using the platform, but you’re doing it to that person in the field, and they can continue to do their job in a safe way. Typically hands-free. 

“That subject matter expert would apply that remote mentoring experience to be able to get the job done, but you also capture that information, so it’s then able to be imparted to the next person who comes up to do that task.”

Hindsite fuelled by intiative

Hindsite has built its network of clients and users substantially, but being part of Brisbane Economic Development Agency’s PropTech Initiative has given the business the opportunity to spread its wings and fly deeper on to the Brisbane property community’s radar.

“We’ve been in the ecosystem for a while and when we got in contact with Brisbane City Council – because we have a lot of field services provided to customers – they saw the value of it, and directed us towards Brisbane EDA and the Proptech Initiative,” Scanlan says.

“It’s only a city of two or three degrees of separation. Having Brisbane EDA behind those interactions lends us that credibility. And from there we’ve been able to start up several really exciting conversations that we otherwise wouldn’t have been able to.”

Scanlan says the past year has seen Hindsite chalk up tremendous growth, and Brisbane EDA’s PropTech Initiative has enabled the business to level up its customer prospects, its network and its offering.

“It’s only been two or three months since we really got started in the PropTech Initiative, but in that time we’ve been able to have conversations with major infrastructure and construction providers. For the business itself, separate to the EDA, we’ve quadrupled our user base over the last six months. So that’s been exciting for us,” he says.

“We got to walk into Savills and do a pitch to basically all of their different divisions. We got an opportunity to go and pitch to the Brisbane Airport, and we’re continuing that conversation. We’ve been introduced to Cross River Rail. And there’s more to come. So that’s been exceedingly useful. And in the last year we were Brisbane Lord Mayor’s finalists for Fastest Growing Startup.

“We’ve had an opportunity to connect, not just with potential customers, which is the most valuable thing, but separately with potential partnership opportunities and investor opportunities, leveraging that network of people who have similar investor profiles and customer profiles. And that makes all the difference from a growth-of-business perspective.

“The guys over there at BEDA have just been really awesome to deal with. It’s a credit to the city. We don’t need handouts, we want customers and that ecosystem. So it’s a great initiative.”