How a Hollywood car chase gone wrong saved mining giants $50m

By Rishab Jain, originally published in The Courier Mail October 16, 2025

A Hollywood car chase gone wrong inspired Lucy Cooke to create a revolutionary planning tool that’s already saved one mining company $50 million.

SpacDraft is a 4D time-and-space rehearsal platform that transforms static plans, documents, work instructions, and project management charts into interactive and shareable visual blueprints.

The company has been working with City of Brisbane to solve logistic challenges for the marquee Brisbane 2032 Olympics, creating a visualisation plan for volunteers’ participation during the event.

The company was founded by Ms Cooke, a former Hollywood VFX assistant with a decade of experience.

Ms Cooke identified a significant gap in the market: the absence of visual designs for scenario planning.

Her frustration with the lack of visual communication tools came to a head in 2015, while working on a car chase scene for movie Sicario in New Mexico, which went awry due to miscommunication.

“I spent so much time on two radios, frustrated that the person on the other end couldn’t see what I was describing,” Ms Cooke said.

“I knew there had to be a way to visualise what you were trying to communicate. Plans change constantly, so the platform had to be dynamic and update in real time.”

SpaceDraft debuted during the production of Mad Max: Furiosa, where it helped the locations department save $12.5 million in pre-production costs by producing visualisation videos ahead of the planned scenes.

The platform also proved its value in mining, where it reduced downtime by 46 hours during a shutdown by producing a visual map of the mine, saving a client approximately $50 million.

Founded in 2019 with support from friends and family, Ms Cooke built the company after completing three coding accelerators over three years.

Starting with a team of three, SpaceDraft has since grown to eight full-time employees and apprentices.

The company secured $2.95 million in angel investment and now serves clients across diverse sectors, including defence, education, mining, entertainment, events, and healthcare, with Curtin University its first paying customer.

Despite the platform’s success, Ms Cooke said she faced significant personal and professional challenges as a female entrepreneur.

“Building a company as a woman costs a lot in terms of sacrifices,” she said.

“But I have no regrets because what I’m building is bigger than me — it’s a service to humanity.”

The company is exploring new technologies, including holograms and augmented reality hardware like “magical glasses.”

Using AI, the platform generates an initial draft plan, which supervisors can review and tweak.

Its patented technology allows real-time updates to plans, ensuring they adapt to changing conditions.

University of Washington’s Data Institute has also partnered with SpaceDraft.

Ms Cooke said SpaceDraft could take over management of word documents, PDFs and complex communication mediums to make people’s everyday jobs easier.

Recently, the company’s software was used in co-ordination of 1500 cyclists for the Harry Perkins Medical Research Annual Bike Ride (which is the biggest in the Western Australia).

The Perth-based company’s expansion in Queensland is backed by prominent Australian tech entrepreneur Steve Baxter of Beaten Zone Ventures.

Ms Cooke said the goal for SpaceDraft was for it to be the go-to pre-visualisation tool for volunteers and organisers across events of all sizes.

Read the full story in The Courier Mail