US climate tech investor Sophie Purdom has made her first international investment via her New York VC fund Planeteer Capital, leading a $5.3 million Seed round. Purdom visited Sydney late last year as a keynote speaker at Climate Salad‘s Climate Tech Festival, which featured more than 50 Australian climate tech startups. The one she’s picked… Read more »
Ahead of Startmate Demo Day on May 2 in Sydney at Blackbird’s Sunrise, Startup Daily is profiling the 10 startups involved. Today it’s New Zealand startup Kiwifibre, which is hoping to build race cars from plants. KiwiFibre creates natural fibre composite materials from Harakeke – a natively grown New Zealand wonder plant, and one of the… Read more »
A startup turning agricultural waste into activated carbon, which is used to filter environmental toxins, has raised $2.6 million in a Series A. Government-backed investment fund Breakthrough Victoria chipped in $1 million, joined by VCs Alberts Impact Ventures, Investible, Artesian and Startmate. The funds will support the testing and establishment of Bygen’s large-scale production plant,… Read more »
Western Australian self-manage care platform PlanCare has topped up its Seed round to $2.5 million from existing backer Purpose Ventures. The new Perth VC originally backed PlanCare in July 2023, and the additional funding is the first follow-on investment from Purpose. PlanCare founder Dave Newman previously ran Morning Startup for more than a decade and… Read more »
Australia is a trading nation. Its economy relies on a strong and open global trade environment. Australian governments have historically rejected protectionist industrial policies that undermine fair competition, and Canberra has long been a staunch advocate of the World Trade Organisation, whose rules help “promote and protect the open global trading system”. Yet Labor has… Read more »
Victorian startup Diversity Atlas, a diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) data analytics platform, has raised $6 million in a bridge round. The capital came via Canadian impact investment platform Gener8 VC. The Melbourne-based startup is looking to double the size of its current team of 35 as it expands into new markets in the EU and… Read more »
Clean energy startup MGA Thermal, has raised an additional $5.7 million to develop its thermal energy storage (TES) system. This round was backed by existing investors including Main Sequence and Melt Ventures with specialist clean tech investor JEKARA joining the cap table. The new capital tops up an $8 million in September last year. MGA Thermal has… Read more »
A senior marketing exec from Canva and Eucalyptus has struck out on his own to launch a media strategy startup. Matt Rossi left his role as head of growth at Eucalyptus to found Oodle, saying it will offer media strategy and buying for growth-oriented brands, with a focus on helping internal marketing teams build conviction… Read more »
China’s Qitian Dasheng Network Technology is expanding its 72 Byte AI System for smart hotels and commercial buildings into Australia, with the help of a local AI expert. Launched in 2014 by entrepreneur Qi Wu (Allen), the Beijing and Shanghai-based company’s AI-powered IoT services are used by some of China’s leading hotel and real estate… Read more »
FinTech Australia is calling on the Federal government to address the challenging capital raising environment for startups and renew its support for Austrade’s effort to promote our local sector abroad. In its pre-budget submission tabled ahead of federal treasurer Jim Chalmers announcing his 2024 Budget on May 14, FinTech Australia CEO Rehan D’Almeida said the… Read more »
After a year in power, NSW Premier Chris Minns has decided to put Investment NSW under his watch, along with the Office of the Chief Scientist, amid a restructure of the NSW Department of Enterprise, Investment and Trade (DEIT) that will see its demise. The state government announced the shakeup on Friday afternoon, claiming that… Read more »
Startup founder, government tech advisor and Spark Festival director Maria MacNamara will be the next CEO of the Space Industry Association of Australia (SIAA). Sydney-based MacNamara will step into the role on April 22 having recently completed a term as the Director of Government Affairs and Innovation Strategy at global ICT infrastructure company Kyndryl. She was… Read more »
New Zealand lawtech startup VXT has raised NZ$1.8 million (A$1.65 million) in a pre-Series A. The round was led by existing investor GD1 with follow on-investments from Startmate and Phase One too as well as Silicon Valley entrepreneur and former Lattice boss J Zac Stein joining the cap table. VXT has developed an AI-powered communications… Read more »
Ahead of Startmate Demo Day on May 2 in Sydney at Blackbird’s Sunrise, Startup Daily is profiling the 10 startups involved. We kick off with NOA The Brand. NOA The Brand is on a mission to untether humanity from the world of cords, and their breakthrough tech could change the way we power just about everything. … Read more »
No founder achieves greatness without getting spooked along the way. So the challenge is how you vanquish those demons, with the right ghostbusters by your side, that makes all the difference. Funding and customer growth may be the loudest concerns we hear from startups, but there’s a lot more happening beneath the surface that should… Read more »
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