An Australian company, Rockmelon, has launched a digital platform designed to support families of children with autism and developmental delays.

The new tech company has spent the last 18 months building their first product, the Rockmelon Parent Edition, which is currently available in Australia and will launch to families all over the world in the coming months.

Rockmelon’s CEO, Nicole Rogerson, said the Parent Edition was created to provide the best tools, support and information for families of children with autism and other developmental delays.

“When children are diagnosed with autism, families are often told the news and then offered very little support. They are told to Google their options and see what works for their family, ” she said. “Too often I have seen families lose precious time and funds trying to find the right support for their child. I have watched this go on for 20 years and it’s always been unacceptable to me. I have seen the worry and frustration as parents try to navigate their family’s new reality with little to no guidance. Something needed to change.”

“There needed to be a tool, something that centralised everything parents needed to get started while empowering them with the tools to continue. The answer was a digital platform. The result is Rockmelon.”

Rogerson teamed up with fellow parent and impact investor, Alex André de la Porte, to change the reality for families struggling with how to best support their child. Joined by digital product and technology specialist, Stuart Waite, the founding team now had the broad expertise and resolve to build a business that really will make a difference globally.

“We have spent over a year building the exact product Alex and I would have wanted when our children were diagnosed,” Ms Rogerson said. “This platform is made by parents, for parents. Digital solutions like this are cost effective and accessible, so we are able to reach parents across Australia and around the world. All they need is a mobile device.”

The Rockmelon Parent Edition has been developed with the help of an international team of leading clinicians and experts. Families will have access to a wide range of visual teaching tools and interactive learning modules as well as essential features that will help streamline communications between everyone supporting their child.

Mary Lishomwa, whose daughter is on the spectrum, was an initial beta tester during the development of the Rockmelon Parent Edition.

“I am really impressed with what I have seen of the Rockmelon app so far,” she said. “What a difference this product would have made for me and my family in those early overwhelming days of my daughter’s diagnosis.”

Rockmelon’s Parent Edition is available now in the Australian Apple App Store. US and UK versions will be launched in mid 2019 with additional versions in other languages scheduled for 2020. An Android version will launch in mid 2019.

About Rockmelon

ROCKMELON aims to ensure all children with autism or other developmental delays are able to reach their fullest potential, regardless of their location or socioeconomic status. Our mission is to change the lives of millions of children around the world and reimagine the way early intervention products and services are delivered.

Rockmelon isn’t just a learning platform. It is a global community of parents, therapists and educators all working towards the same goal: access to quality early intervention that will allow our children to reach their best outcomes.

Created by parents for parents, Rockmelon has been designed to offer real-time insights into a child’s progress and support their ongoing development. Curated content provides families with all the information and tools they need to help their child reach their best outcome.

Rockmelon is developing the world’s most ambitious, scalable, content and application distribution platform for the autism community globally. Its power and flexibility enables Rockmelon to commercialise a wide range of products and services directly to parents, therapists, educators and other key partners. No one has attempted to utilise today’s technology to develop such a focused and capable platform, finally breaking down entrenched systems and disrupting the local “cottage” industries that have existed for decades. We are moving the autism and intellectual disability communities into the digital age – globally, and at scale. Our products and services will change the lives of 30 million children and their families globally.

Rockmelon wants to significantly reduce the cost to families and the economic impact to society by fundamentally improving the efficiency and effectiveness of products and services for the autism community. The company is building  a software platform to support the 200 million people worldwide who have an intellectual disability.