Oliver Morton Evans

0:00

(POIGNANT MUSIC)

0:06

MAN: I was made to feel different

0:08

by everyone, basically, in the school.

0:16

Disability doesn't define someone.

0:19

It's a part of who they are.

0:21

It's not all that they are.

0:26

Accessibility is about making the world

0:29

a much more friendly place

0:30

for everyone

0:32

and a lot easier to navigate,

0:34

and I think attitude

0:36

is definitely where it starts.

1:04

(DRAMATIC STRING MUSIC)

1:06

To do anything unique that's never been done before,

1:10

there's always an inherent risk involved.

1:13

Being an entrepreneur,

1:16

you equate the risk and reward quite closely,

1:20

so the more risk there is,

1:22

the potential reward is greater.

1:26

When you're birthing something new into the world,

1:29

it's never a straightforward plan.

1:31

You need to be willing to ride the roller-coaster.

1:38

I was born two months premature

1:41

and I died twice at birth

1:44

and had to be resuscitated.

1:49

I was diagnosed with cerebral palsy after about 12 months

1:52

'cause I wasn't hitting the typical developmental milestones.

2:00

He was a gorgeous baby.

2:02

Absolutely gorgeous.

2:04

We were told that he had cerebral palsy.

2:07

We really had no idea

2:09

what that meant.

2:10

MUM: Because cerebral palsy affects so many young children

2:14

in so many different ways,

2:16

I did kind of wonder, you know,

2:18

where this would take us, you know?

2:22

(FILM PROJECTOR WHIRRS)

2:25

OLIVER: It wasn't until I was five or six

2:28

that I was able to start speaking.

2:30

Because I wasn't able to take enough breath,

2:33

I wasn't able to utter the words to communicate.

2:36

So I would use physical gestures to communicate.

2:43

The eyebrows would go up 'yes' and down to 'no' and what have you.

2:47

I must say, you had a very full life,

2:51

even from, you know, a very, very young age.

2:54

We did so many things.

2:56

DAD: How do you feel about seeing pictures of yourself at that age?

2:59

Very old.

3:00

(MUM LAUGHS) Very old?!

3:02

(DAD LAUGHS)

3:05

My parents were instrumental in

3:08

the advocacy of mainstream education for students with a disability

3:13

back in the mid '80s,

3:15

where integrated schooling was not a thing at all.

3:22

He learned to read very quickly.

3:25

He was...four.

3:27

-And to type very quickly! -(LAUGHS) Yes!

3:29

DAD: He was four by the time he was reading fluently.

3:33

And we began to think that maybe

3:36

the real place for him

3:39

was in the local public school

3:40

rather than in special school.

3:43

And after a great deal of hoo-ha,

3:47

for about 12 months,

3:49

Oliver was accepted into our local primary school.

3:54

The needs were supplied mostly by the Department of Special Education,

3:59

which was ramps, you know,

4:01

and special table heights and things like that.

4:05

(GENTLE PIANO MUSIC)

4:10

OLIVER: But unfortunately, the headmistress

4:12

was quite old-school and didn't really want me there

4:16

and didn't want the responsibility.

4:18

The directive was that I needed a teacher's aide,

4:23

which was really not the case at all.

4:27

But I wouldn't be able to go to school

4:30

if that teacher's aide was sick or off for some reason.

4:34

So my parents would often get a call

4:38

to tell them that

4:40

Oliver couldn't come to school that day.

4:44

MUM: The much more difficult problem is attitude.

4:47

(LAUGHS) He was just another little boy

4:50

except that he had his own wheels.

4:53

OLIVER: I was always made to feel quite different.

4:57

I was subject to quite a lot of bullying at school

5:01

and I remember one student used to line a ramp that was built for me

5:06

with thumbtacks so I would pop my tyres.

5:10

That period was really the time that I built my resilience.

5:16

I was very grateful that I did have a supportive environment

5:20

outside of the school.

5:22

That's what really helped me to be able to wade through it.

5:25

(HOPEFUL GUITAR MUSIC)

5:29

I joined the Cub Scouts in 1988 when I was nine.

5:34

When I joined the Scouts later,

5:36

I became one of the first patrol leaders with a disability

5:41

of an able-bodied Scout troop in Australia.

5:44

When it was announced that I would become a patrol leader,

5:48

there was a belief there that I was just given the role

5:51

because of, like, a tokenism.

5:53

So it was a little bit of working and educating through that.

5:58

A patrol leader leads a team of around about five Scouts.

6:04

We would often have to plan the trips -

6:06

so plan inventory and the activity that we would be doing.

6:10

I assumed a role of more like a project manager.

6:15

So that's probably where I started getting those skills from.

6:23

(WOMAN VOCALISES WORDLESSLY)

6:24

At one stage in Cub Scouts,

6:27

I decided to go and try and get my swim badge.

6:32

(MAGPIE WARBLES)

6:35

DAD: For a Cub Scout to get their swimming badge,

6:38

they had to be able to swim -

6:41

I think it was, then - six lengths of the pool.

6:45

My Cub Scout leader automatically thought that

6:50

they would have to change the rules

6:53

for me to be able to obtain this badge.

6:56

But I didn't really want to be subject to different rules.

7:01

If someone tells me I can't do something,

7:04

that's the impetus for me to double my efforts

7:07

to change that opinion or attitude.

7:11

So that's kind of what I did.

7:14

(INSPIRING MUSIC)

7:16

I swam quite a lot of laps in a pool.

7:21

He did the six and he got his badge

7:25

and could say that he'd rightfully earned it.

7:28

OLIVER: I've always been a firm believer that my disability

7:33

isn't a barrier to achieving the goals and aspirations

7:38

of people without disability

7:41

and not only has that allowed me to command the respect

7:44

of everyone around me,

7:46

but it's also allowed me to achieve

7:50

more than, really, I could possibly imagine.

7:55

Do you remember when you were doing your Duke of Edinburgh Award?

7:58

-Yeah. -The Gold Award?

7:59

Some of the things that you did were absolutely hair-raising.

8:03

-Whitewater rafting and abseiling. -(MUM GASPS)

8:06

OLIVER: I almost took my head off on a low-hanging branch

8:10

while I was whitewater rafting.

8:12

-MUM: I'm glad I wasn't there. -Were you scared?

8:14

OLIVER: No, it was just quite taxing.

8:16

MUM: Some sort of safety harness on - dare I ask?

8:19

-Yeah, yeah. Of course. -(MUM LAUGHS)

8:22

(WARM GUITAR MUSIC)

8:24

In Year 12, I decided to go and get my Gold Duke of Edinburgh Award.

8:29

As part of that award, I had to do a certain amount of community service.

8:34

I decided to form the association for

8:38

disabled students in mainstream schools,

8:41

which was a support network for students primarily in NSW

8:47

that had a disability but were integrated into mainstream schooling.

8:55

As a result of founding the association,

8:58

I was nominated for the 1997 Young Australian of the Year.

9:05

I decided that I wanted to pursue

9:08

a career in graphic design,

9:10

so I picked up art in Year 11

9:15

in order to pursue that.

9:18

My Year 11 art teacher recommended to my parents that

9:22

graphic designers weren't very well paid, for a start,

9:26

and I wasn't particularly good at that either.

9:29

They should be pushing me to pursue

9:34

a career in computing.

9:37

Obviously my relationship with that particular teacher,

9:40

uh, soured a bit at the time,

9:43

but it was the fuel that I needed

9:47

to be able to apply myself even more.

9:50

I ended up getting top 500 in the state

9:54

and preselected for ARTEXPRESS.

9:57

That really helped me to decide to pursue what I was passionate about

10:02

rather than what would be a good financial decision.

10:11

When I went to uni, I started studying a Bachelor of Business

10:15

majoring in marketing

10:17

and doing a sub-major in entrepreneurship.

10:21

I made a really great bunch of friends at university,

10:24

quite a few that I still keep in touch with now

10:28

and, in fact, I would come to work with later.

10:30

Yeah, I don't remember exactly how I met you,

10:33

but I guess maybe it was doing a university project.

10:36

I think that might have been it.

10:37

'Cause you had, like, group projects, right?

10:38

I don't remember what one it was, but, um,

10:41

we pulled a few all-nighters there.

10:44

OLIVER: My résumé obviously featured

10:46

the awards that I had won

10:48

and the fairly good marks that I'd received

10:50

both at university and school

10:52

and in my humble opinion, my résumé was pretty good!

10:56

(SPRIGHTLY MUSIC)

10:58

So my first junior marketing interview was at a trucking company.

11:04

I didn't tell them on my CV

11:09

that I had a disability.

11:11

The interviewer was taken a little bit aback by me.

11:16

The interview went...OK,

11:19

but then at the end of the interview,

11:21

he ended up giving me a toy truck.

11:26

I immediately knew I didn't get that job.

11:31

Probably 12 months seeking a career in marketing.

11:35

I would often disclose my disability on the résumé

11:39

and not get a first interview.

11:41

And other times, I would not put it on there

11:45

and I would get a first interview

11:46

but then, yeah, I wasn't invited back for a second interview.

11:52

This was in the day, in the early 2000s,

11:55

when really, 'equal opportunity' was rhetoric

11:58

and not really practised.

12:00

Often it was a shut door even before we got to that.

12:05

(DRAMATIC PIANO MUSIC)

12:08

After some time of looking for work in the private sector,

12:12

an idea was suggested to me

12:15

to potentially look at government work,

12:18

because they were far more likely to be equal-opportunity employers.

12:22

But that didn't really fill me with much...much interest.

12:26

Saying no to government jobs

12:29

was really the first time that I knew I was taking a risk

12:32

to continue looking for my so-called dream job.

12:36

That was when I kind of came up with

12:40

the plan to look at it from a different angle.

12:48

During that time that I was looking for a more corporate career,

12:52

I was doing graphic design work as a side hustle.

12:56

I ended up beginning to see that I could make this a career

13:00

and instead of going to work for someone else,

13:04

I could actually be the master of my own destiny.

13:07

(PLAYFUL MUSIC)

13:11

While I was formalising my graphic design business

13:14

is when I met The Wiggles.

13:19

I went for a job interview at The Wiggles

13:22

and I was asked directly if I was able to build online games.

13:28

Really not wanting to pass up this opportunity,

13:31

I said yes without having a clue how to build games.

13:36

So off the back of that, I got the gig at The Wiggles

13:41

and I had to go home and learn

13:43

how to build six games

13:45

for their website.

13:47

WIGGLES: Wake up, Jeff!

13:49

OLIVER: In 2009, a colleague at The Wiggles gave me a book to read

13:53

called 'The Last Lecture'.

13:54

It was about a man who was dying of pancreatic cancer.

13:58

And he really went back to his childhood dreams

14:02

to work out what he was most passionate about

14:05

and how he really wanted to live out the rest of his life.

14:10

And that got me thinking about really

14:12

what I was like as a child,

14:14

and that was really about being creative and art

14:18

and being at the cutting edge of creativity and technology.

14:24

After about seven years of working at The Wiggles,

14:26

I got sick of looking at primary colours all day.

14:29

I realised I needed a new challenge.

14:32

(STEADY PIANO MUSIC)

14:36

At the age of...I think I was 30,

14:38

I went back and studied for two years.

14:41

I studied a Diploma in Animation and Visual Effects.

14:45

Once again, I made the risk

14:48

to go back at that age and study full-time.

14:51

I was horrified!

14:53

I thought, "Here he is, he has a stable job, regular money.

14:58

"And here we go, back to this business again

15:02

"where he's gonna have no job.

15:03

"He might well go and study

15:05

"and then we're gonna go through the whole process again."

15:08

I was wrong.

15:09

For him to decide to make a start in another direction,

15:12

it was just another risk he took,

15:14

another challenge.

15:16

OLIVER: During my time studying,

15:19

I came to realise what it would be like

15:21

to work in the visual effects industry.

15:24

I was confronted with the problem that my fellow students were having,

15:30

which was to, you know, get a foothold.

15:33

A junior artist in an industry

15:37

where a showreel is really important.

15:41

So I basically put up the money to make that happen.

15:46

So we moved into a studio in Newtown

15:50

and bought quite a lot of equipment

15:53

to make it happen.

15:54

We collectively got together to make

15:58

the 'Little Darling' fully animated music video.

16:01

(CLOCK CHIMES)

16:02

(WOMAN VOCALISES WORDLESSLY)

16:10

SONG: ♪ Bom-ba, bom-ba, bom-ba, bom-ba... ♪

16:12

OLIVER: And off the back of that,

16:14

we founded Big Cookie Studios,

16:17

which was a 3D animation studio.

16:19

And the idea behind it was

16:21

to employ senior professionals in the lead roles

16:25

to mentor the junior artists.

16:30

I was hired as a visual effects supervisor.

16:33

So he brought me on board to help him complete that project.

16:36

I think the most enjoyable part was definitely

16:39

when I saw these graduates,

16:40

the young people we had working on it,

16:43

how they sort of developed their skills.

16:44

I saw them from knowing nothing, and then suddenly they're producing,

16:48

like, some amazing-looking shots.

16:49

And I think that was incredibly satisfying.

16:52

OLIVER: Some friendships were tested over that time,

16:56

because it was meant to be a 6-month project

16:58

which ended up becoming a 2-year project.

17:02

So in order for me to get the project completed,

17:05

I had to put more money into it.

17:08

Even though that everyone knew what the end result would be,

17:11

that was a very testing time.

17:13

(SUBTLE MUSIC)

17:19

And we ended up winning quite a number of awards

17:22

both in Australia and internationally for it,

17:25

including the LA Movie Awards Best Music Video in 2015.

17:30

I think it was gonna be very hard to top that one. (CHUCKLES)

17:39

During Anshul's second engagement with the studio,

17:45

we got talking and really wanted to go into business together

17:50

and shifting our emphasis of work onto virtual reality.

17:59

I said, "Look, you know, I think virtual reality is the way to go.

18:03

"There's new opportunities in this space,

18:05

"and we should team up again and see if we can get some work."

18:09

OLIVER: We rebranded Big Cookie Studios to pic4.

18:13

At the time, VR was still very much in its infancy.

18:17

There was a lot more apprehension about adoption of the technology.

18:21

We spent quite a long time

18:23

convincing potential clients

18:25

of the benefit of immersive VR.

18:29

We were only making money, basically,

18:32

when we were sitting on a box, doing work.

18:37

I had a conversation with my family.

18:40

I was probably gonna close the studio within, you know, two months

18:45

unless more work came in.

18:49

One day, I was working on a project

18:52

and it was getting very close to deadline

18:54

and we were running out of time

18:58

and I started getting heart palpitations.

19:01

(HEARTBEAT THUMPS)

19:04

At one point, I did feel like I was having a heart attack

19:07

and I ended up getting admitted to hospital

19:11

for a stress-related illness.

19:13

(HEARTBEAT THUMPS)

19:15

It was a wake-up call for me

19:17

that this kind of business wasn't sustainable

19:21

for my own health.

19:23

(HEARTBEAT THUMPS)

19:26

(SILENCE)

19:30

When I first heard Oliver speaking about VR across a crowded room,

19:34

I was looking for collaborators.

19:37

And I just picked it up and I just went,

19:40

"Excuse me, I'm sorry to bother you, but were you talking about VR?"

19:44

And he goes, "Yeah, I have a VR animation studio here in Newtown."

19:47

And I, you know, went, "Bing!"

19:51

OLIVER: I met Rohan O'Reilly, who was a rehabilitation therapist

19:56

that had been sort of pioneering VR for rehab

19:59

for the last five years,

20:02

and he was actually looking for a VR content producer

20:06

to produce custom VR software

20:10

for his new technology that he was building.

20:13

There is a word called 'serendipitous',

20:15

and it can be overused,

20:16

but it is 100% descriptive of how that happened.

20:19

ANSHUL: After meeting Rohie, Ollie came back in the morning and said,

20:22

"I've met this guy, and that could be the way for us to...

20:25

"..you know, transition to that...

20:27

"..the product-based business we've always talked about."

20:30

And that was the beginning.

20:33

OLIVER: Rohan had just been featured on ABC 'Catalyst'

20:37

about his pioneering work,

20:39

so I think, you know, that was

20:41

testament to the fact that he was working on something pretty special.

20:46

Within 3-6 months, we were in business together.

20:50

That business became Neuromersiv.

20:52

(ACTIVE STRING MUSIC)

20:55

Hey, Steph, come on in.

20:57

Looking forward to testing this with you.

20:59

-STEPH: Oh, can't wait! -Yeah.

21:00

-Look forward to your feedback. -OK.

21:05

You should have the menu in front of you now.

21:07

Yep. Yeah, this is incredible!

21:09

I've not seen this yet.

21:10

Um...

21:12

It takes two seconds before you're so immersed that you kind of...

21:16

..you forget that's not real.

21:19

And that's why I'm still cleaning the basin! (LAUGHS)

21:22

ANSHUL: Is your arm getting a good work-out with this?

21:24

-Yeah, really! I'm really tired. -That's the idea.

21:27

Half of the entire battle in rehabilitation is people get bored.

21:31

I don't know if you've ever been to a physiotherapist

21:33

and they've said, "Go home and do this 400 times.

21:36

"And in the middle of the night, wake up and do another 400."

21:38

Engagement is massively problematic.

21:41

What we're building is essentially

21:43

a way of making rehabilitation fun and engaging

21:48

by immersing the user

21:51

in a whole new fun and gamified environment.

21:55

-So you found the hair dryer? -STEPH: I found it.

21:57

-On the right-hand side. -The hand dryer.

21:59

ANSHUL: You're probably sitting right next to it.

22:01

(LAUGHS) Oh, yeah. I am!

22:04

ROHAN: The way that the system worked

22:06

was really secondary to the person's perception of their experience

22:09

and the perception of the experience was "I'm really enjoying this.

22:12

"This is really novel, and I wanna try harder."

22:14

It's more realistic than the last time I tried this.

22:18

In terms of upper limb rehabilitation,

22:20

which is what we're targeting,

22:21

there really hasn't been anything really significant

22:24

in about 30 years

22:26

that you could say is close to what we're doing.

22:28

OLIVER: As our business grows and we get closer to a commercial product,

22:33

so too has the technology of virtual reality.

22:37

I think people are now starting to really see

22:39

the actual use case of VR in a clinical setting.

22:44

Attitude adjustment in a vertical direction.

22:46

(OLIVER LAUGHS)

22:47

ROHAN: When it comes to generating money and opportunity,

22:51

that would be something I'd say is Oliver's key skill set.

22:53

We're tremendously lucky that he's on board

22:56

because he makes things happen.

22:58

Grant writing is an art.

23:00

ROHAN: It's a black art.

23:01

(LAUGHS)

23:03

ROHAN: So each time we get a grant, it is a big deal.

23:05

I would say that the type of grants that we can get access to

23:08

are mostly because of the work that O's done

23:10

in knowing how to master the art of grant writing.

23:13

But you never take it for granted

23:15

and it is always an amazing thing when it comes off.

23:17

(WARM GUITAR MUSIC)

23:21

So most recently, we received a $1 million grant

23:24

from the BioMedTech Horizons program.

23:28

So that will help us complete product development

23:32

of our unique wearable device

23:36

that will allow you to feel objects during a VR therapy session.

23:43

I didn't think that this journey that we're on

23:47

would happen the way it has.

23:48

I thought, "You're just gonna battle it out,

23:51

"and if you're still standing at some point down the track,

23:53

"you may have a chance of succeeding."

23:57

But I never saw things like million-dollar grants happening.

23:59

That was just...out of the ballpark.

24:02

And I know for a fact if it wasn't for Oliver,

24:05

that would not be happening like that.

24:10

OLIVER: Australia's actually had quite a few

24:13

highly successful - particularly medical - innovators.

24:18

We, you know, obviously have the dream to be held in that esteem.

24:22

The icing on the cake, really, to know that

24:25

your technology and the hard work and the sweat and the tears

24:30

were all worth it

24:32

and what we are doing is really helping millions of people

24:36

and helping to improve their lives.

24:39

With this technology, we can actually really improve people's lives

24:42

who haven't had, you know, the opportunity until now

24:45

to have access to this incredible technology.

24:50

For me, success is much more than just making money.

24:55

It's really about making a difference

24:57

and being able to not only make a difference in the world,

25:01

but to actually really be able to

25:03

change people's attitudes about what is possible

25:06

for a person with my level of disability.

25:11

I'm just a firm believer in actions speaking louder than words.

25:17

And by me just involving myself with as much as possible,

25:22

with as many people as possible

25:25

that don't have an experience of a disability,

25:28

that's been the best way to really change people's attitudes,

25:34

because attitudes are really the major barrier.

25:37

(MAGPIE WARBLES)

25:42

I can see a light-bulb moment in people

25:47

when they finally twig that I am the real deal

25:50

and I am doing what I'm doing

25:53

and really, you know,

25:55

bringing that education around

25:58

how people with varying abilities can make a change in the world.

26:04

(HOPEFUL GUITAR MUSIC)