News / 'Alarm Bells' Trigger New Business for Alert...
'Alarm Bells' Trigger New Business for Alert Limited
It was this anomaly which fired the imagination of Stuart Stead, founder of Alert Limited in Malton, and he set about developing a personal safety service capable of rapidly placing a call for help, pinpointing and tracking an individual’s location. A little over two years after he first began to explore his business idea, Stuart successfully launches his groundbreaking Safe-T personal safetysystem.
“I had heard of services whereby parents could track children via a mobile phone, but no system enabled tracking to be undertaken when the phone holder themselves quickly needed to raise an alarm,” Stuart explains.
“Such a service would offer a distinct advantage over any existing contact method. I took this initial idea and developed it further by linking up a detailed user profile to a ‘device’, in the first instance a mobile phone.”
Stuart is a trained systems analyst and a contract database designer and developer by trade with the skills and experience to design and develop the technology required to make an extremely effective and secure database-driven system.
“I knew I had a great idea and possessed the technical expertise to develop Safe-Tbut it was a chance meeting with Jim Lyons from the Enterprise and Innovation Office at the University of York a few months ago which has helped me turn my idea into a marketable product. Jim immediately saw the value in what I was trying to deliver and introduced me to Science City York Business Promoter Andrew Griffiths.”
Andrew mentored the drafting of Alert's Business Plan and encouraged Stuart to apply for Science City York's Proof Concept Fund, providing a much needed £10k cash injection to develop Alert's sophisticated telephone and data storage system and assist in marketing the service, including developing an on-line presence.
“The Safe-T service immediately provides detailed information to the receiver, including a location map along with a physical description of the person, their contact details and those of their next of kin, together with their medical history such as allergies or known medical conditions, even any current medication they are taking. All this information is invaluable if emergency assistance is required.”
Subscribers to Alert’s service enter their details into an online secure database. They can then login to their own ‘control panel’ and update personal details and any devices that they wish to register at any time. Strict control measures are in place to ensure no one can be registered without their consent. The service is available to individuals and businesses. For organisations with the responsibility of safeguarding the welfare of lone workers, an extended ‘Amber Alert’ service provides a ‘minding’ service for people visiting strangers, traveling or working alone.
Users store a dedicated ‘speed dial’ number on their landline, mobile handset or a simple trigger device for older people living alone, to be used in the event of an emergency. Calls can be received 24 hours a day, 365 days a year by Alert’s support team. Each call is automatically logged by the database, with a map of the member’s location appearing on screen along with corresponding personal information. If the member is on the move, new locations are also shown on the maps. The support team operator can also speak directly to the person or attempt to contact them if a ‘silent call’ is received and alert the emergency services if required.
“The involvement of Science City York and the Enterprise and Innovation Office at the University of York has been magnificent. Without their support, encouragement and financial assistance Alert would have been unable to bring the service to market so quickly. We are hoping to achieve great things. This is a first-rate, expandable business model and we will make our service available nationally following a successful North Yorkshire launch. For this, we will be looking for private angel investment to rapidly grow the business.”
More information on Alert Ltd can be found at www.alertltd.co.uk
