Small World Social is a technology company based in

Sydney Sydney ( ) is the capital city of the state of New South Wales, and the most populous city in both Australia and Oceania. Located on Australia's east coast, the metropolis surrounds Sydney Harbour and extends about towards the Blue Mountain ...

Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a Sovereign state, sovereign country comprising the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous List of islands of Australia, sma ...

. Founded in 2008, the company now has offices in

Melbourne Melbourne ( ; Boonwurrung/Woiwurrung: ''Narrm'' or ''Naarm'') is the capital and most populous city of the Australian state of Victoria, and the second-most populous city in both Australia and Oceania. Its name generally refers to a met ...

and

San Francisco, USA San Francisco (; Spanish language, Spanish for "Francis of Assisi, Saint Francis"), officially the City and County of San Francisco, is the commercial, financial, and cultural center of Northern California. The city proper is the List of Ca ...

with staff based all over the world.

Company history

Small World Social originally focused on using

social media Social media are interactive media technologies that facilitate the creation and sharing of information, ideas, interests, and other forms of expression through virtual communities and networks. While challenges to the definition of ''social medi ...

to change people's behaviors primarily in the area of health, health promotion and public policy. In 2009, the company patented a method and system for explaining complex concepts online. It now holds a portfolio of technology patents and has continued to have a research and development center based in

, Australia. In 2010 the company conducted research to develop a social networking training curriculum for Sydney teachers. Between 2010 - 2015 Small World Social worked with a variety of clients, including creating a professional training app with

Genentech Genentech, Inc., is an American biotechnology corporation headquartered in South San Francisco, California. It became an independent subsidiary of Roche in 2009. Genentech Research and Early Development operates as an independent center within R ...

and working with

New Balance New Balance Athletics, Inc. (NB), best known as simply New Balance, is one of the world's major sports footwear and apparel manufacturers. Based in Boston, Massachusetts, the multinational corporation was founded in 1906 as the New Balance Arch ...

to educate podiatrists, retail sales staff and fitness trainers about the scientific benefits of lightweight, low profile footwear. In 2016 Small World Social partnered with Lexus to convert their user manual into Lexus Now, an app for drivers with how-to guides.

Current work

Today the company continues to work in the field of complex digital knowledge transfer and behavioral change, working with clients in the fields of

health Health, according to the World Health Organization, is "a state of complete physical, mental and social well-being and not merely the absence of disease and infirmity".World Health Organization. (2006)''Constitution of the World Health Organiza ...

science Science is a systematic endeavor that builds and organizes knowledge in the form of testable explanations and predictions about the universe. Science may be as old as the human species, and some of the earliest archeological evidence for ...

medical device A medical device is any device intended to be used for medical purposes. Significant potential for hazards are inherent when using a device for medical purposes and thus medical devices must be proved safe and effective with reasonable assura ...

and

manufacturing Manufacturing is the creation or production of goods with the help of equipment, labor, machines, tools, and chemical or biological processing or formulation. It is the essence of secondary sector of the economy. The term may refer to a r ...

. Small World Social’s staff includes CEO Kathy Phelan, Project Lead and Director of HelpMe Feed Maddy Sands, and Head of Maternal Child Health Karina Ayers. Small World Social is currently working on HelpMe Feed, an app for health professionals supporting mothers to breastfeed.

Technology

Small World Social's technology is used in applications where

tacit knowledge Tacit knowledge or implicit knowledge—as opposed to formal, codified or explicit knowledge—is knowledge that is difficult to express or extract, and thus more difficult to transfer to others by means of writing it down or verbalizing it. This ...

transfer is required. The

SaaS Software as a service (SaaS ) is a software licensing and delivery model in which software is licensed on a subscription basis and is centrally hosted. SaaS is also known as "on-demand software" and Web-based/Web-hosted software. SaaS is cons ...

technology platform works across a range of

mobile Mobile may refer to: Places * Mobile, Alabama, a U.S. port city * Mobile County, Alabama * Mobile, Arizona, a small town near Phoenix, U.S. * Mobile, Newfoundland and Labrador Arts, entertainment, and media Music Groups and labels * Mobile ( ...

and

wearable technology Wearable technology is any technology that is designed to be used while worn. Common types of wearable technology include smartwatches and smartglasses. Wearable electronic devices are often close to or on the surface of the skin, where they detec ...

, providing content relevant to each of these different form factors.

Awards

2014

In February 2014, Small World Social was awarded an internal

Technology Innovation Award. In early March 2014, in

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, Germany, the company was awarded a Silver Medal at the 2014 World Media Festival for its work on the Genentech Learning Portal App. Also in March 2014, the company was awarded a Gold Astrid Award in New York for its Learning Portal App. In May 2014, Small World Social and the ABA won the Gold Questar Award in the Emerging Media: App section, for the Breastfeeding with Google Glass App. In June 2014, Small World Social's Breastfeeding Support Project was awarded the Questar Best of Category Grand Prize For Emerging Media, which is given to the top 5% of entries. In July 2014, Small World Social's Breastfeeding Support Project was awarded a Bronze Medal at the 2014 IDA International Design Awards for excellence in Multimedia Interface design. In October 2014, Small World Social's Breastfeeding Support Project received honorable mention at the 2014 Victorian Public Healthcare Awards for optimizing healthcare through e-health & communications technology excellence.

2015

On June 3, 2015 Small World Social was named a finalist for LTEN's 2015 Excellence Awards. Later in the same year Small World Social received honourable mention in Website Design Competition at Annual International Design Awards for Lexus Now: Reinventing the Car Owner's Manual.

2016

In April 2016 Small World Social was awarded the Hermes Creative Award (Gold) - Mobile Information Experience for the LEXUS NOW: THE FUTURE OF THE AUTOMOTIVE EXPERIENCE app. That was followed by being awarded the winner for Mobile Sites - Guides/Ratings/Reviews in the 22ND Annual Communicator Awards. In November 2016, Small World won a Gold MarCom Award in the Mobile Website Information category for Lexus Now, earning two awards within the W3 creative awards, one Silver Award (third tier award) in the General Website-Automotive category and one Gold (second tier award, one of hundreds given out) in the Mobile Apps/Sites-Innovative/Experimental category, and receiving an American Graphic Design Award from GDUSA.

Impact

Small World Social’s Australian programs have affected the behavior change of an estimated 4 million people in

The company now works across the world with a focus on adopting the latest technology so that enterprises can achieve their business objectives. The company employs many wearable and

mobile computing Mobile computing is human–computer interaction in which a computer is expected to be transported during normal usage, which allows for the transmission of data, voice, and video. Mobile computing involves mobile communication, mobile hardware ...

devices to achieve this end.

Diversity

The company consists of over 50 employees of 25 different nationalities and a diverse range of disciplines and backgrounds represented. This includes content researchers, designers, videographers, computer scientists, engineers and business analysts. The company's innovation approach follows a

design thinking Design thinking refers to the set of Cognition, cognitive, strategic and practical procedures used by designers in the process of Design, designing, and to the body of knowledge that has been developed about how people reason when engaging with des ...

methodology. It approaches innovation challenges by structuring teams into small cross-disciplinary groups of 6 to 8 people that work together on projects, akin to the

skunk works Skunk Works is an official pseudonym for Lockheed Martin's Advanced Development Programs (ADP), formerly called Lockheed Advanced Development Projects. It is responsible for a number of aircraft designs, beginning with the Lockheed P-38 Lightn ...

teams used by

Lockheed Martin The Lockheed Martin Corporation is an American aerospace, arms, defense, information security, and technology corporation with worldwide interests. It was formed by the merger of Lockheed Corporation with Martin Marietta in March 1995. It ...

during the 1950s. This diversity in thinking and approach has been a key to its rapid growth and success as a

startup company A startup or start-up is a company or project undertaken by an entrepreneur to seek, develop, and validate a scalable business model. While entrepreneurship refers to all new businesses, including self-employment and businesses that never intend t ...

References

{{reflist Companies based in Sydney Technology companies established in 2008 Social media companies Australian companies established in 2008