Latest news with #MarcWilson
ABC News
6 days ago
- Health
- ABC News
Varroa mite spreads to south-east Victoria with bee hive infestations
Honey bee killing parasite, varroa mite, has been detected in several hives in Gippsland, in Victoria's east. The latest infestation is at Yarram, which is the southern-most detection of the parasite in the state. Local hobby beekeeper Marc Wilson found the tiny red mites in his hives last weekend. "I went out there and did a routine check," he said. "The third hive in, I looked at it and said, 'Oh boy, I've got 'em'." Mr Wilson reported his find to Agriculture Victoria straight away. "I rang the varroa development officers and asked what needed to be done," Mr Wilson said. "They were quite happy to send someone out … to verify it." Varroa mites attack European and Asian honey bees, feeding on the adult insects and their larvae. They are considered one of the greatest threats to Australia's honey and pollination industries, with economic losses estimated to reach up to $1.25 billion over 30 years. The killer pest was first detected in Australia in Newcastle in February 2022. Authorities abandoned efforts to eradicate it 15 months later, focusing on management instead. Victoria had its first outbreak a year ago and the parasite was found in Queensland earlier this year. Agriculture Victoria's Bee MAX map shows there have been 13 infested premises in the Sunraysia region in the state's north west. There are also six in central Victoria, seven in far east Gippsland, as well as the latest find in Yarram. Fellow Yarram beekeeper, Matthew Petersen, said he had been preparing for varroa to reach the area, but the local detection was "a concern". Mr Petersen, who is also the president of the Australian Crop Pollination Association, praised Mr Wilson's efforts to get on top of his infestation. But Mr Petersen said he was concerned the industry as a whole was not prepared, particularly commercial beekeepers. "We're a small industry but we're so important when it comes to food production so we need to keep everybody in business," he said. Gippsland Apiarist Association president and Jeeralang beekeeper, Stan Glowacki, said management was the key to getting on top of the destructive parasite. "It was detected in far east Gippsland about two months ago, specifically in the Bruthen and Nowa Nowa areas," he said. Mr Glowacki said selective breeding could help in the future. "Once the mites are established here and people know more about their bees' genetics, we'll eventually look to breed varroa-resistant bees," he said. "We're not at that stage yet." Mr Wilson said he would do what he could to save his bees. "I'll be doing a treatment in the next couple of weeks with chemicals," he said.
Globe and Mail
07-07-2025
- Business
- Globe and Mail
Bond Introduces World's First Perpetual Smart Ring with Patent-Pending LifeDrive System
Detroit-Based Wearable Technology Company Introduces World's First Perpetual Smart Ring Featuring Clinical-Grade Sensors & Bionic Design DETROIT, MI - July 7, 2025 - Bond, a Detroit-based consumer wearable technology company, today announced the official launch of the Bond Ring™, positioning itself as the most advanced wearable wellness device in the smart ring market. The groundbreaking technologies integrates 11 breakthrough capabilities while being powered by the company's patent-pending LifeDrive technology, marking a significant advancement in wearable health monitoring. Revolutionary Bionic Design Sets New Industry Standard The Bond Ring distinguishes itself from conventional smart rings through its innovative bionic design that wraps ergonomically around the finger, departing from traditional "sliced tube" concepts. This patent-pending approach is developed using Dassault Systèmes' CATIA V6 platform, the same software utilized by Medtronic for medical implant engineering, representing four years of intensive research and development. "The global wearable technology market reached $84.2 billion in 2024 and continues expanding at a considerable rate," said Marc Wilson, Chief Marketing Officer at Bond. "Our patent-pending bionic design, clinical-grade sensor integration and strong partnerships with some of the largest players in vital signs monitoring - position Bond Ring as the ultimate long term monitoring tool for health enthusiasts, clinics and professionals." Advanced Technology Partnerships Drive Innovation The device incorporates space-grade PCB fabrication processes and components typically reserved for advanced drones, satellite imaging, and medical implants. Through partnerships with industry leaders including Analog Devices, Infineon, and AMS-Osram, Bond Ring delivers comprehensive health monitoring capabilities previously unavailable in consumer wearables. Key technological innovations include two pole body composition analysis providing relative breakdowns of body fat, muscle, bone, and visceral fat percentages alongside single-lead ECG monitoring for atrial fibrillation detection. The device introduces environmental sensing capabilities measuring UV exposure, ambient light, temperature, and noise levels, the first wearable solution to assess how environmental factors impact sleep quality. The patent-pending Bionic Feedback system utilizes electrical muscle stimulation (EMS) to deliver whisper-quiet morning alarms and critical notifications without disturbing others. Additionally, the TrueTemp technology employs a clinical-grade digital temperature sensor array to accurately detect body temperature variations regardless of environmental conditions, advancing immune system monitoring and women's health tracking. AI-Powered Health Insights, Professional Integration and Customization The accompanying Bond Ring App empowers users to create custom workflows and automations while securely sharing health data with healthcare professionals. The device integrates with Bond's proprietary Genome PRO platform, featuring advanced AI algorithms and long-duration raw data logging capabilities developed in collaboration with leading longevity clinics. Bond Ring's patent pending swappable panel system allows users to customize their device's appearance with various materials ranging from cost effective disposable panels to true 18K gold-plated finishes. This innovative approa3ch reduces electronic waste by enabling panel replacement rather than complete device replacement when damaged or for aesthetic preferences. Advanced Manufacturing and Future Medical Applications The company's strategic partnerships unlock access to advanced manufacturing processes and exotic materials typically reserved for aerospace and medical applications. This partnership enables Bond Ring to integrate cutting-edge sensor technology and algorithms backed by decades of vital-sign monitoring expertise. Bond Ring's onboard artificial intelligence and ballistic sensing technology create the fastest heart rate tracking system available, utilizing motion and vital sign-triggered adaptive sampling. The device maintains water resistance and durability standards suitable for diverse user groups and activities. Environmental Health Monitoring Breakthrough The smart ring market's expansion reflects broader consumer trends toward discreet, multifunctional wearables that provide comprehensive health monitoring without compromising style or comfort. Bond Ring's clinical-grade sensors and secure communication protocols position the device for potential future medical device approvals and FDA clearance. Environmental health monitoring represents a significant advancement in wearable technology, as Bond Ring becomes the first consumer device to correlate environmental factors with sleep quality and overall wellness. This capability addresses the growing understanding of how external conditions impact personal health outcomes. Availability and Company Information Bond Ring launches today with availability through the company's website at The device represents a new category of perpetual smart rings designed for continuous health monitoring without frequent charging requirements. About Bond Bond is a Detroit-based consumer wearable electronics company specializing in advanced wellness monitoring technology. The company develops clinical-grade health tracking solutions designed, developed, and manufactured in the United States. Media Contact: Marc Wilson, Chief Marketing Officer at Bond Business and corporate inquiries: partnerships@ General inquiries: shop@ Instagram: @ Media Contact Company Name: Bond Contact Person: Marc Wilson, Chief Marketing Officer at Bond Email: Send Email Country: United States Website:
Techday NZ
16-05-2025
- Business
- Techday NZ
Exclusive: Appian's Marc Wilson on why AI needs process to deliver business value
Artificial intelligence doesn't work in a vacuum. That's the key message from Marc Wilson, founder and Chief Executive Ambassador at Appian. He believes businesses are still struggling to generate value from AI because "they're not integrating it properly into their core operations." Speaking with TechDay during a recent interview, Wilson offered a blunt assessment of the current AI landscape in enterprise. "One of the biggest misconceptions that most businesses and most organisations have about AI is that it's indistinguishable from magic - that it just shows up and solves everybody's problems," he said. According to Wilson, too many companies treat AI as an end goal rather than a tool to improve specific outcomes. "I've heard time and time again, senior leaders in organisations basically coming to us and saying, 'I have to deploy AI,' as if that's an end state. The truth is, if you don't look at AI through the lens of value, it's indistinguishable from a science experiment." Appian's core philosophy is clear: AI works best in process. Wilson emphasised that for AI to drive change, it must be "operationalised" - embedded directly into the workflows that govern how an organisation functions. "For an AI capability to affect change in a positive way, it needs to plug into one of those operational flows," he said. "A good example here in Australia is our work with Netwealth," Wilson said. "They used Appian to orchestrate how client service requests were handled, embedding AI to classify and route customer emails." "They achieved 98% accuracy - and got the project running within minutes." Wilson highlighted Hitachi's efforts to unify customer and sales data from across its hundreds of operating companies, and Queensland's National Injury Insurance Scheme, which used Appian's generative AI to extract data from documents with 100% accuracy. Appian also recently launched its new Agent Studio platform at the event, introducing what Wilson described as "agentic AI". Unlike standalone tools that execute isolated tasks, Appian's approach allows AI agents to function as structured contributors within business processes. "With our agentic studio, we're able to tie agentic AI into larger, meatier processes - tasking agents the same way you'd task people or systems," Wilson said. "We're combining multiple agents into an overall journey." That structured approach, Wilson argued, is essential to scale AI safely and effectively. Without a clear framework, he warned, AI agents risk becoming uncontrolled or ineffective. "More organisations are going to get very frustrated very quickly, because they're just going to have this agent, they expect it to do something, and they'll prod it and hope," he said. "If it's not tied into a structure, there's a lot that can go wrong." Governance, he added, must be built in from the start. "Governance and structure are going to become increasingly synonymous," he said. "This is what processes you're allowed to call, what data you're allowed to see, and the limits of your actions. I've created a circle that within it, the AI can do lots of things, but I've constrained the inputs and outputs." Another critical piece is data. AI's performance depends on access to high-quality, integrated information - but that's a challenge when data is spread across disconnected systems. "One of the problems that most organisations have today is that a lot of their data is siloed," Wilson said. "Those silos stop really good AI development and learning." Appian's solution is its patented data fabric, which allows data to be accessed and written across disparate systems without physically moving it. "It creates a virtualised database, allowing you to consolidate customer data and write back to systems," Wilson said. "The AI capabilities come along with that." Wilson is clear about the risks of poorly integrated AI. There's the obvious threat of rogue agents making unauthorised decisions, but there's also the quieter failure mode - when organisations fail to realise any return at all. "If you can't integrate it effectively, if you can't bring it to your processes that matter, it's going to be something that people look at in a year or two and say, 'Yeah, that was a lot of hype, and it really didn't deliver.'" For companies still waiting to see ROI, Wilson had a simple diagnosis: "That's probably an organisation that's trying to stand up AI by itself, looking at it, waiting for it to produce something without having it truly integrated." His advice? Start small, and start practical. "Identify a core business process and think about how AI can remove friction, add speed, or cut costs. We've seen AI take something that took 50 days down to five hours." And if it feels a little mundane? That might be a good sign. "Some of the most impactful AI today is going to be boring - and that might be exactly what you want to get started on," Wilson said. "Boring becomes interesting when it drives real value."
