The “start up scene in Australia” is being noticed by the big players in US , judging by the big Amounts of funding some of the luckier start-ups in Australia have received recently.
Aussie start- ups Bringing in investor’s
While start-up companies and new businesses coming into the news are quite Normal, most of the recent media news and releases recently has been more partial to the “ technology start ups” as the preferred favoured sector, which is actually booming and garnering a lot of attention.
The start up scene in Australia has been quite slack since a long time , but suddenly there are million dollar takeover happening in small aussie start ups , possibly due to US investors taking advantage of our dollar as well as the weak economic activity in the US
Mike Cannon-Brookes and Scott Farquhar (pictured) from software tools maker and start up Atlassian, that received a $68 million cash injection recently.
Start up helpers and angel investors
There are now more easier methods for getting cash injection for tech start ups. While traditionally this was done by banks( which was quite difficult to get finance sometimes for start ups), nowadays its easier to get a venture capitalist , angel investors or a private investment bank or even crowd sourcing helping out your start up monetarily.
If your start-up is a promising new tech start up it can just be bought up or taken over by a major organisation as well, which is proven by the wallmart buy out of local start up company (grabble ). some of the cash injection investment helpers for tech start ups are listed below
Pollenizer
Key people: Mick Liubinskas and Phil Morle
Pollenizer transforms ideas into global web businesses. They invest team, process and capital and collaborate with gutsy entrepreneurs to launch startups.
Future Capital
Key people: Domenic Carosa, Andrew Fiori-Dea, Danny Wallis, Tony Stephen, Irwin Saunders and Bill Kyriacou.
Future Capital has 14 businesses in its portfolio — five in Sydney and five in Melbourne, with the others spread across different parts of the country.
PushStart
Key people: Kim Heras and Roger Kermode
Start up Mentoring network PushStart recently unveiled eight start-ups that will take part in its first accelerator program.
Startmate
Key people: Co-founders David Jones and Nicki Scevak.
Startmate has been a very integral part of promoting Australia’s most promising tech businesses. Their four start-ups last year managed to attract external funding, with one, Grabble, even being acquired by US retail behemoth Wal Mart.
AngelCube
Key people: Andrew Birt, Andrew Stone and Richie Khoo.
AngelCube is a newer start-up incubator in Australia, who recently chose its first four start-ups, each getting $20,000 each in seed capital.
Their recent start ups are RentWant.com, Lexim.com.au, TestPilot.me and Goodfil.ms
Kickstarter – Your Investment banker / Venture capitalist Alternative
This site first began as a way for people to raise money for quirky projects like pop-up wedding chapels, around-the-world boating trips and offbeat documentaries, it quickly expanded to include video game production, feature films and innovative new gadgets.
They have now also backed up projects like the Elevation dock, a sleek stand for the iPhone, or Brydge, which turns an iPad into a laptop resembling the MacBook Air.
Kickstarter has raised more than $200 million for 20,000 projects
When Eric Migicovsky, an engineer, wanted to develop a wristwatch that could display information from an iPhone – like caller ID and text messages – he went the traditional route of asking venture capitalists to finance his company. He failed to get any interest from them to develop his this product now called “the Pebble watch”.
He gave Kickstarter a go, a site where ordinary people back creative projects. Backers could pledge $99 and were promised a Pebble watch in return. Less than two hours after the project went up on the site, Mr. Migicovsky and his partners hit their goal of $100,000.
This project got so much interest from “KICKSTARTER” It was not before long they managed to get $600,0000 and then a record million dollars in funding.
Other sites offering Crowd funding or financing through a crowd
Other sites for financing through a crowd have appeared. There’s CROWDTILT, a service that lets friends contribute money for outings like a beach vacation; Zokos, a start-up that gives guests a way to pitch in for a dinner party; and Gambitious, a financing site devoted to indie game developers,
Wide range of sectors including Aviation, Construction, Property, Energy, Film, Finance, Food, Medical, Retail, Telecoms and Tourism have still to rely on the traditional banks form of investment while tech start-ups are the new darlings of the venture capitalists and angel investors.
The Australian government have also been pro-active with new business entrepreneurs over the past few years, with moves such as the “Entrepreneur Tax Discount” reducing the amounts of taxes for small business start-ups as they get established. But with recent changes, there is no guarantee these rebates will stay.
(Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO) is Australia’s national science agency )
