About Adams Pest Control, A Division of Orkin Australia
Since 1944 Adams Pest Control has been a leading Australian pest service provider. With a company culture that values innovation, Adams was one of Australia’s first pest management firms to track and control rodent activity using world-leading technology.
The Opportunity
Use science and data to disrupt traditional commercial rodent management methods with a technology-based solution that remotely detects and monitors rodent activity 24×7 enabling fast, targeted treatment.
The IoT Solution
RATSENSE, an Internet of Things (IoT) enabled digital rodent surveillance system, remotely monitors rodent activity and supports targeted treatment to help customers:
- improve speed and efficiency of rodent management.
- protect business reputation and property.
- save time and money.
- meet ISO compliance standards.
Adams Pest Control, a division of Orkin Australia, have been industry-leaders in commercial pest control for over 75 years. The team understands all too well the immeasurable damage the humble rodent can cause to a business’s property, reputation and human health.
Rats and mice carry more than 50 diseases communicable to humans. Rodents must gnaw hard materials daily to control tooth growth, which creates structural damage and fire risk. And no business wants a customer complaint about a rodent running across the floor of their restaurant, university lecture hall, supermarket or hospital.
Over fourteen years we collected field data on our traditional rodent control methods of manually laying traps and baits, sealing entry points and removing food and water sources. Those techniques are time-consuming, costly and inefficient. In one example, our technician took ten hours every month to manually check 300 bait stations to find only two had activity. We knew there must be a better way to get better customer outcomes. Our leadership team embraces innovation and backed plans to transform our approach to an age-old problem.
Peter Taylor,
General Manager of Adams Pest Control, a Division of Orkin Australia
Early Challenges
The Adams Pest Control team explored sensor-based technology to detect and control rodent activity. Rodents create nests, holes and runways which are used repeatedly to move between nesting areas and food and water sources. Such activities are often concealed in challenging environments including basements, cellars or structural foundations encased in thick concrete.
Taylor says, “Our first project with sensor-based technology used Wi-Fi to connect sensors. In practice, Wi-Fi had poor range where we needed it to work and it became expensive because of the number of hardware, modems and repeater stations necessary to cover a commercial building. Next we tried SIM cards, but we found the battery life too short to be sustainable and the business case simply didn’t stack up.”
Why Thinxtra?
In 2017, Taylor and his team consulted with Cre8tec, an Internet of Things (IoT) solution provider. Cre8tec offers a market-leading IoT-enabled solution for digital rodent surveillance: RATSENSE.
To install RATSENSE, trained Adams technicians place infrared sensor-based tracking devices, running on long-life batteries, around a property to monitor rodents in real-time. Activity data is captured and sent to a centralised base station through the most challenging environments, including basements and cellars, via the Thinxtra 0G Network, powered by Sigfox. The Thinxtra 0G Network is the public, low-cost, low-power, wide area network dedicated to connecting Internet of Things (IoT) devices over long distances.
Taylor says, “We partnered with Cre8tec because RATSENSE is world-leading digital rodent surveillance technology that runs on the Thinxtra 0G Network. The 0G Network is fast, reliable, low cost, long-range, flexible and can provide coverage in all the locations where we need it. Connection to the network was as easy as turning on a switch. It hasn’t let us down once since we went live with our first customer.” on-site.
The RATSENSE digital surveillance system records rodent activity in real-time, taking the guesswork out of rodent management. Multiple Grade A buildings, large infrastructure sites and universities in Singapore and Australia have installed RATSENSE. We’ve proven the ability to reliably identify rodent activity for rapid treatment improves time and cost savings for customers and increases the efficiency of rodent management by pest control companies.
Deanne Baptista,
Director of Cre8tec
Data Drives Positive, Measurable Impact
Adams Pest Control deployed its first RATSENSE system in July 2018 for a customer at a large entertainment facility. The facility used over 900 bait stations every month to manage rodents, which Adams replaced with 500 sensors. The savings in technician time to detect problems, reduced cost of chemicals and baits and improved speed to fix problems motivated the customer to deploy the RATSENSE system to its three other locations around the country.
Taylor says, “We believe Adams was the first Australian pest controller to hire a data analyst. Data captured by the RATSENSE system lets us create heat maps of rodent activity. For one customer, the heat map identified an activity spike which pinpointed the details we needed to fix the problem in a single day. In the past, we might have taken a month to find that problem. For another customer our kill rate went from 120 rodents a month to just over 3,000 rodents over 3 months Using data in our business is the best solution we’ve found to improve how we help customers in over a decade.”
The Good News from False Positives
Critics of digital rodent surveillance systems cite faulty sensors and false positive sensor readings as a drawback to technology-based pest control. Taylor takes a different view, “It’s simply not true that sensors aren’t reliable. Modern sensor technology is mature and trustworthy. Alleged false positives have led us to discover other business problems. At one customer, the sensors detected a damaging slug infestation. At another, the sensors revealed an inadvertent security risk by a chef who left a door open when he took breaks. We take advantage of so-called ‘false positives.”
Measurable Outcomes
With RATSENSE, pest control companies can offer customers 24×7 always-on digital rodent surveillance delivering positive, measurable outcomes. Customers save time and money by efficiently fixing problems while protecting reputation, property and human health. RATSENSE helps customers meet ISO compliance standards and reduce rodent chemicals used on-site by up to 80 per cent. Pest control companies can divert technician time traditionally needed on-site for manual rodent management towards supporting treatments for a broader range of customers. RATSENSE also enables pest control companies to offer COVID-safe treatment due to the reduced need for technicians on-site.
Cre8tec are a strategic, innovative partner who are leading the market in disrupting pest control with the IoT. RATSENSE is a powerful example of the speed, flexibility, reliability and ease-of-use of the Thinxtra 0G Network.
Loic Barancourt,
Chief Executive Officer of Thinxtra
About Adams Pest Control, a Division of Orkin Australia
Since 1944 Adams Pest Control has been Australia’s largest independent pest control provider. In July 2020, Orkin Australia, a subsidiary of Atlanta, Ga.-based Rollins Inc, acquired Adams Pest Control. With a company culture that values innovation, Adams was one of the first pest controllers in Australia to adopt electronic monitoring, using world-leading technology, to track, monitor and control rodent activity. Adams Pest Control treats rodents, insects, birds, possums, spiders, bees, silverfish and termites.
Visit the Adams Pest Control website for more information about its full range of services.
