ASX BRIEFS
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ASX BRIEFS
ADVANCED BRAKING TECHNOLOGY LTD (ABV) - Revolutionising Mine Safety: The Future of Braking Technology
Join us for an engaging episode with Andrew Booth, CEO of Advanced Braking Technology, as we explore the groundbreaking innovations in braking systems tailored for the mining industry. With a relentless focus on safety and sustainability, ABT is leading the charge in developing world-class solutions that enhance operational efficiency and compliance with evolving regulatory landscapes.
Andrew shares the story of ABT's remarkable journey, highlighting a strong 25% profit increase and the company's strategic move into international markets. With 56% of revenue now stemming from overseas sales, ABT is pushing boundaries in regions like Africa and North America, addressing the unique challenges posed by ageing machinery in the mining sector.
Dive deeper into their revolutionary product, BrakeIQ, a comprehensive braking system designed to enhance safety without disrupting existing equipment. As the industry adapts to new technologies and safety regulations, Andrew discusses how ABT’s commitment to R&D will pave the way for future innovations.
As listeners, you’ll gain insight into how ABT combines technology and safety to meet the demands of the modern mining landscape. Join us in shaping the conversation around safety and effectiveness in heavy industries. Subscribe, share your thoughts, and let us know what you think about the advances in braking technology!
Andrew Musgrave Host
Welcome back to ASX Briefs, the podcast that brings you exclusive insights from the leaders of Australia's most innovative ASX listed companies, and today I'm joined by Andrew Booth, the CEO of Advanced Braking Technology. Advanced Braking Technology is at the forefront of safety and environmental responsibility, developing world-class braking solutions for industries such as mining, defence, civil construction and waste management. Andrew, thanks for joining me today and welcome to the ASX Briefs podcast.
Andrew Booth Guest
Thanks for having me.
Andrew Musgrave Host
Now, Andrew, for listeners that may be unfamiliar with ABV, can you just provide a brief overview of the company?
Andrew Booth Guest
Yeah, sure so. Advanced Braking Technology Technology, or ABT, is an original equipment manufacturer. We're an OEM specializing in cutting edge vehicle safety systems. Through our BrakeSAFE brand, we feature basically a patented integrated brake system that's favoured in heavy industrial settings, the likes of which include mining, defence, civil infrastructure and other heavy industries.
Andrew Musgrave Host
Okay, and just looking at recent performance, your latest quarterly report highlighted a strong 24% growth in product sales and a 25% increase in net profit. So, what have been the key drivers behind this growth?
Andrew Booth Guest
Yeah, sure, we see this as being a combination of new product development, innovation, as well as really working strategically with our valuable blue chip customer base of global mining and mining services companies largely. We're essentially activating our customer base in offshore points through leveraging strong relationships in our home market of Australia into key regions such as Africa, Asia and North America.
Andrew Musgrave Host
And international sales now make up 56% of the company's revenue, up from 42% last year. So what specific markets are fueling this expansion and where do you see the most significant opportunities?
Andrew Booth Guest
Yeah, look, we're seeing really strong opportunities in the continent of Africa. So we just recently placed a sales team into Johannesburg to really work the South African market, which is heavy in rich in minerals such as copper, gold the coal market is large there silver, platinum mining, as well as Iron ore. So, Africa we see as being a really key, opportune market. Again, Indonesia is also very, very prominent on our growth trajectory moving forward. We're doing a lot of work at the moment in Mongolia and North America. The market of Canada remains our largest export destination, but we're also seeing more and more opportunity in the United States. But we're just keeping our eye on the tariff situation and what that impact might have on an Australian engineered product such as ours.
Andrew Musgrave Host
Okay, and mining remains a core industry for the company. So how do you see the evolving regulatory and safety landscape influencing demand for your braking solutions?
Andrew Booth Guest
Yeah. So, look, we're unapologetic about our focus on mining. Mining is a very unique industry sector. It's an industry with large corporate global mining operators supported by large mining services operators. Mining companies are unique in that they have unique and specific engineered solutions, engineering problems to solve and they've got the deep pockets to solve them, and they do preference their own intellectual property sort of solving of these problems. So, look, ABT has got over 25 years’ experience in the mining sector. It is a concentration on an industry sector but there is so much more growth that we can extract from this sector as we expand outside of our home market of Australia, which there still is a good deal of growth opportunity here in our home market, but very exciting growth opportunities in these offshore markets. As I said before, we've got very strong brand relationship and loyalty in our domestic market and we're more and more activating these offshore points of this very valuable customer base that ABT has.
Andrew Musgrave Host
Now looking at BrakeIQ, which was recently launched as a next generation automatic braking system designed to integrate with collision avoidance systems. So, what makes BrakeIQ unique and what kind of market reception have you seen so far?
Andrew Booth Guest
BrakeIQ is a unique technology brake product. It's unique in that it's a vehicle intervention control system that installs in the cab of a vehicle. It doesn't interrupt any of the vehicle's braking system, which is quite important system, which is quite important. It's designed for yellow heavy equipment, whether it be a haul truck or whether it be a grader or a dozer. It's basically a product that plug and plays with collision avoidance technology and it does that agnostically.
So BreakIQ is quite unique in that it will plug and play with any collision avoidance technology that might be operating on that mine site and it also, agnostically, will integrate across a very diverse range of equipment and OEM brands. It also solves a key problem with mine operators where they have, for one thing, they have a very diverse fleet of equipment, but they've also got a very diverse age span of this equipment. They don't have the financial capability or the appetite to replace all the equipment with new gear and some of this equipment lasts up to 30 years in life. So BrakeIQ really gives a unique solution in providing that vehicle with interoperable collision avoidance level nine capability that will override the driver in the event of an emergency and do it in a very economic and sustainable way. So, we see a big future for BrakeIQ. ABT has the global distribution rights for this product and we're very excited in that it takes us into a whole new market of above-ground mining and typically we haven't had products that sold for heavy yellow equipment and this product does.
Andrew Musgrave Host
And with technology evolving rapidly, what role does R&D play in the company's product innovation, and are there any new developments that we should watch out for?
Andrew Booth Guest
Yeah, technology is a massive opportunity for ABT. Combining technology with safety solution solutioning is absolutely on the forefront of every mining company's strategic agenda. In some markets we're seeing increasing mandates from regulators to adopt better safety compliance, and in other markets, like Australia and Canada, for instance, we're seeing operators adopt what is best practice safety solutioning. And this is because safety not only enhances the environment and the culture of a company and an operation, but it also has a material impact on the economics of that operation in terms of productivity, minimising downtime, as well as optimal fleet asset management for that operator.
Andrew Musgrave Host
And just touching on the financials, your cash position has increased by 21% and your net assets grew by 19%, so how do you plan to allocate capital for future growth and innovation?
Andrew Booth Guest
So ABT has always had a very strong research and development strategy and philosophy. We will continue to reinvest heavily in innovation, both in terms of ensuring that our current intellectual property and product range is relevant and meaningful in terms of what's happening on the technology front, but also in having this unique perspective of working intimately with tier one global mining companies and being in that very trusted position of understanding what their problems are and developing technology and safety system solutions which solve these problems. So ABT is in a very unique position whereby we don't have to speculate on what the market might want. We know what the market wants because of our very strong and deep relationships with these global mining companies
Andrew Musgrave Host
And just to wrap things up, what are some of the key milestones that investors can look out for over the next 12 months?
Andrew Booth Guest
So, we are currently building a commercial market channel or channels, for our new BreakIQ product, which is a very exciting frontier for this business, for ABT. We will continue to deepen and activate offshore points in those key markets of Africa, Asia and the Americas moving forward, as well as continue to deepen our market penetration in our home market in Australia. You'll see ABT continue to invest in strong foundations for future scale. We're looking at growth trajectories that are a step change and it's important that we have a well-founded business that can manage that level of step change scale. And we'll continue to invest in safety technology that's beyond just braking but is solving for large mining operators and mining services operators that require solutioning for their safety needs.
Andrew Musgrave Host
All right, Andrew. Well, it's been great to chat today and get an update on all the activities at the company, and we look forward to further updates from Advanced Braking Technology in the upcoming months.
Andrew Booth Guest
Thanks for having me, Andrew.
Andrew Musgrave Host
That concludes this episode of ASX Briefs. Don't forget to subscribe and we look forward to catching you on our next episode.