Panviva mulls $15m raising to fund global Covid-19 contact tracing demand

Melbourne software company Panviva says it is experiencing strong demand in the US to assist with COVID-19 contact tracing.

Panviva is considering options to strengthen its balance sheet to fund a wave of growth stemming mainly from the US, but its contact-tracing technology has yet to win over Victorian authorities. Picture: Getty Images

A Melbourne-based technology company that’s on the frontline of contract tracing in the US is mull­ing a $15m capital raising to fund an upswell in demand for its ser­vices that is happening everywhere except in its own back yard.

Panviva, backed by Telstra Ventures, is considering options to strengthen its balance sheet to fund a wave of growth stemming mainly from the US, where its technology has been deployed across four US states including Florida. But the company has yet to win over local authorities, despite Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews agreeing that the local contact-tracing system, which had been reliant on pen, paper and, in some cases, fax machines, needed changes, including digitising.

Mr Andrews also dispatched Chief Scientist Alan Finkel and Mark Hill, the Australian Defence Force’s Victorian COVID-­19 chief, to Sydney last week to see if “there is anything that is different­ between our response and the response­ in NSW”.

Dr Finkel is the brother of Panviva chairman Ron Finkel, although the latter says there is a Chinese wall between them when it comes to business but he is pleased his sibling has been called on to help improve Victoria’s contact-tracing system.

“Alan has stepped in and has been seen by people inside as kind of a circuit-breaker,” Mr Finkel said. “He’s giving them an opportunity to get out of the rut that they’re in … And that’s evident in the travel to Sydney to talk to the equivalent in NSW.”

Australia’s Chief Scientist Alan Finkel. Picture Kym Smith

He said he hoped the Victorian government would step up digitisation of its contract tracing because its reliance to date on “whiteboards and paper” had been the “bane of the Victorian system”, with metropolitan Melbourne still under a stage-four lockdown.

“It’s beyond comprehension that you are trying to deal with this level of problem and challenge using whiteboards and paper. It’s incredible.

“Contact tracing is the key to flattening the curve and bringing the problem to manageable terms. And right now people have had a eureka moment and … we believe that now is the time to implement these knowledge management tools. You can test to the limit but if you fall over because you don’t have an efficient contact tracing system, then we will never get out of this.”

Panviva’s platform uses call-centre scripts to eliminate the need for extensive training and equips tracers with the necessary information to identify sources of infections. It aggregates all the information a tracer needs to quickly do the job in one place.

Mr Finkel said the company’s platform — used by Westpac, ANZ, Medibank, Foxtel and Telstra — can be integrated into Salesforce, a US cloud-based software company, which recently signed a contract with the Victorian government.

The system has seen a strong uptake in the US and Mr Finkel said Panviva’s management was assessing a range of options, including tapping its existing shareholders and the broader market, to fund its next wave of growth.

“We have a global opportunity — a little Aussie company that has grown steadily over a number of years. We feel confident that we are in the right place and the right time, and to address our global market we have to look at all options. No decision has been made about which strategy will provide the resources to address the global opportunity. It will include consideration of things like our existing shareholders, debt instru­ments and capital, and so forth.

“The clear message is Australia has in Panviva a company that has got a proven track record, a global footprint and a product offering that is road tested, successful and addresses the complexity of contract tracing in a very efficient way.”