Insights

For the last decade Optalert’s focus has been driver drowsiness. We are now turning our attention to other health conditions and have developed an AI-based model that tests for obstructive sleep apnoea (OSA). The condition affects 13.2% of the world’s population and it is chronically underdiagnosed: 80% of people with OSA never undergo diagnosis or...

From mid-2024, all new models of passenger vehicles in Europe require a driver monitoring system (DMS) that can detect drowsiness. Engineers across the automotive industry have generally used one of three ground truths to measure drowsiness in drivers. Ground truth Description  JDS  Johns Drowsiness Scale Eyelid movements are a window into the cognitive state of...

Introduction Artificial intelligence (AI) is a hot topic. Amid all the noise about generative AI tools like ChatGPT and MidJourney, the myriad of other powerful AI applications has been drowned out. One such shift we foresee is that of health monitoring via the PC webcam. Enabled by increasingly powerful graphical processing units (GPUs) and tensor...

How can a remote mine site transmit data without wireless connectivity? We faced a unique difficulty: How could we transmit data on a remote mine site where there was no Wi-Fi or cellular coverage? Our team developed a novel solution that transmits real-time data over radio packet network. Given the low footprint of our system...

Drivers moving from 8-hour to 12-hour shifts were less drowsy! A large Brazilian mine evaluated the outcome of changing its truck drivers from working 8-hour shifts to 12-hour shifts. Optalert analysed the data from its fatigue management solution to assess the impact on driver drowsiness. Read on to learn how we reduced risk by 40%...

Imagine if automotive regulation allowed seat belts to unlatch or airbags to fail to deploy in over half of severe collisions. And legislators were dragging their feet on raising the minimum standard for fault tolerance. In such a scenario, who should fix the problem? Thankfully seatbelts and airbags are mature, well understood technologies, and the...

Optalert’s Johns Drowsiness Scale (JDS) accurately quantifies impairment caused by drowsiness, surpassing competing technologies in predictive power. This post outlines how Optalert has been able to quantify the relative risk of a driver’s impairment from drowsiness with a unique biomarker. It is independent of age, gender, or ethnicity. These claims are substantiated through both internal...

Obstructive sleep apnoea (OSA) affects 425 million people globally at a mild to severe level requiring treatment, but over 80% of them remain undiagnosed. Optalert’s technology can now alert the 92 million people in Europe, 24 million in the USA, and 309 million across the rest of the world with undiagnosed OSA to seek diagnosis...

Automotive Original Equipment Manufacturers (OEMs) can now achieve both EU General Safety Regulation (GSR) compliance and European New Car Assessment Programme (Euro NCAP) assessment using Optalert’s non-invasive Johns Drowsiness Scale (JDS™) as the ground truth. Numerous automotive technical services firms in Europe, including UTAC, TÜV Rheinland, and Applus+ IDIADA, have reviewed the evidence and confirmed...

When we commonly speak of drowsiness, we may use a range of terms interchangeably, such as fatigue, tiredness, or sleepiness. In common speech, this is fine. But for the purposes of understanding the underlying science, we need to be more precise around what each of these words mean. Drowsiness is not fatigue Fatigue is defined...