Daphne Shen

We have two strongly-held values at Something New ✨ — reinforced at the start of each dinner. 1) confidentiality: this is all totally "off the record" .. we run these events under chatham house rules / cone of silence, safe space for folks who aren't yet "open" about their plans to leave and start something new (i.e. with current employer, colleagues) 🤫 👀 2) spirit of service: don't come in asking "what's in it for me" ... join us and ask "what can I do for someone else here." The chances the exact person you need (co-founder, early believer, etc) is in the room at that moment is ultimately fairly low... but the chances someone in that room knows someone outside it they can introduce you to are much higher. Rising tides lift all boats 💪 ✨

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The Australian VC landscape is thriving, but gender disparity still casts a long shadow. As revealed by Cut Through Venture's Cut Through Quarterly Q3 report, women-led startups are gaining traction but face an uphill battle as they mature through funding rounds, with participation dropping dramatically from 50% at pre-seed to just 14% at Series A. In our latest Antler article, we explore how persistent barriers are widening the funding gap and why it’s critical to support women founders from day zero - supporting them from the start and providing continued backing throughout their journey. https://lnkd.in/gZds-cyk We're dedicated to pushing forward for a more inclusive and resilient ecosystem and invite all ambitious founders to join our February 2025 residency in Sydney, Melbourne, and Brisbane.

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Raising capital this year? 💰 Here’s a simple directory of Australia’s top VC Firms. ____ Raising capital is hard enough as it is. The startup ecosystem in Australasia has BOOMED over the last decade. Yet information still remains fragmented. If you’re looking to raise capital, this one is for you! ⬇ A simple directory. Highlighting the leading venture capital firms in Australia. Featuring investment leaders like: • Airtree • Blackbird • Square Peg • Skalata • Artesian (Alternative Investments) • Carthona Capital • Rampersand • Skip Capital • H2 Ventures • Sapien Ventures • Main Sequence and more… ____ Have we missed anyone? 🔗 Link to the full directory in the comments! #venturecapital #techstartups #austech #nztech ____ I’m Scott Kennedy, from Edition - Design & Technology Studio. We help pre-launch startups and growing tech companies scale. Repost ♻  if someone in your network might benefit!

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I recently had the privilege of speaking at UoA and AUT’s Startup Club NZ panel event all about transitioning from uni to working in the startup/VC ecosystem and saw just how many students were keen to learn more about the space from young professionals like myself.   Alchae circa 2021 didn’t even know the VC space existed and now I’m honoured enough to call it my job. Having recently reached 2 years in VC, and at GD1, I thought it would be perfect timing to distil my learnings from the past two years to hopefully make the VC space less opaque to students.   1.    Be curious!! - In VC, you’re constantly delving into new tech you may have never encountered and deciding where to invest millions. Embrace curiosity; it helps you ask the right questions and understand what drives companies. Take advantage of meeting bright minds – there’s no better access to specific information/knowledge. 2.    Networking matters - Get comfortable meeting strangers, and building long-term, trusted relationships. A big part of the role involves going to networking events and getting your brand as well as your firm’s brand out there. As an Analyst, you will be expected to scour the ecosystem and be across any new deals and compelling companies coming through. Your networks will be crucial for staying on top of this. Having a strong network sets you up for success in generating dealflow. 3.    You learn on the job - Don’t fall into the trap of thinking that no finance knowledge means you can’t make it into VC. My undergrad was in Medicinal Chemistry, completely unrelated to VC. Coming into VC as a recent grad, I was skeptical I would be able to do it well, but I have learnt that if you have the drive and the eagerness to learn, you will pick it up as you go. Support from your colleagues also helps. On top of that, there are books and courses online such as Breaking Into Wall Street that will equip you with the foundational info if you want to prepare. 4.    Be firm but open-minded in your opinions - At some point, you are going to disagree with a colleague on a company and that’s okay. Every person on the investment team at a VC firm is hired to present a different perspective that others can’t bring. Have an opinion and have points to back it up but have an open mind when it comes to deal discussions. Embrace diverse perspectives and be open to robust discussion, a good investment stems from differing viewpoints. 5.    Be up to date - In VC, staying current is crucial. Keeping abreast of tech advancements, market commentaries, trend reports etc helps across the board from networking to deal due diligence. Use platforms like TechCrunch, NBR - National Business Review, Caffeine Daily to get your news and of course, social media platforms like X and LinkedIn.   Breaking into VC can be daunting, I hope this has demystified it for you a little bit! Let me know if there is anything else I can share – always happy to help:)

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If I'm feeling a little low today, how must you all feel? Felt your euphoric high at the confetti canyon moment last night. Just wanted to share some reflections with the cohort of 2024 Techstars Tech Central Sydney Accelerator. 1. Cohort empathy and care - I've been on your floor most weeks, over the last 13. Sometimes mentoring and others just sat in the corner working. I witnessed cohort care like I've never seen before. More than just having each other's back's but often going out of your way to lift each other up! 2. The diversity & culture work paid off - most people just play a better game when they know others care - again we saw this happen in real-time - pivots, new growth models, co-founder splits, deals falling apart, new product wobbling - through it all you supported each other 3. Huge kudos to 🍇 Kirstin Hunter & team (Teala Stephens & Gwen Masonsong) - you enabled a more connected culture (year on year) - in 13 weeks! You showed immense calm whilst managing various degrees of chaos. 4. All the founders were truly genuine. I took a strategy to lean into one start-up in particular this year but I got to see you all in action in some way. Love it when there is purpose as well as profit. 5. I enjoyed seeing you all find your strengths & superpowers by Demo Day and playing to them both functionally and emotionally. I could list them but you all know. Don't you? You should list each other's! 6. As Kirstin said, "this is just the beginning", the springboard to help you leap into the chasms and canyons of start-up land. 7. Look forward to seeing you ride the waves - the smooth and the rough 8. As a mentor, you kinda become vested in the startups you have chemistry with. So if you get stuck or just need a ''friendly'' & curious sounding board, please reach out. We want and need you to win! #givefirst ''I'm just like my country. I'm young scrappy and hungry." #takeabreather PS My photo sucks - I was too engaged to take photos!

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I’m always inspired seeing Australian consumer tech founders doing great things. Lucy Mort is no exception – as the co-founder and CEO of Sunroom, a consumer app that provides a space for women to earn money by creating content and connecting with their communities, Lucy has used product and design to create a space that feels unique, and caters to their specific community. Building a product that can sometimes confuse people (wait - I can only talk on Wednesday?!), I loved these product design insights from Lucy’s interview with Natasha Gillezeau: 📈 Most Advanced, Yet Acceptable: Pioneered by Raymond Loewy, product design should be innovative, whilst accessible and familiar. In essence, as advanced as your target customer is willing to accept. The iPhone is a great example of this, providing incremental changes over time, whilst maintaining enough of the previous design so that it is familiar. ⬇ Less is More: Build on the assumption that your users have no idea what your product is. The more features, the more complexity, the greater the barrier to adoption. Strip things back, listen to your users and your metrics, find your 1-2 key features driving value and stickiness and double down. 👌 Selective perfectionism: Work smarter. Some features will require significant A/B testing and iterating and others won’t. Have a framework to understand the demand, value and ROI you are creating to guide what will move the dial and where to invest your time. Via Missing Perspectives

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It’s a huge day for the Grw AI team - we just raised our record NZ $2.4 million pre-seed (which apparently is the largest in NZ’s history 🚀 ). We're solving a critical challenge: scaling world-class 1:1 performance coaching for sales teams, empowering every organization to drive exceptional results. A big thank you to our amazing investors who are backing this vision. The round was led by Charles Hudson at Precursor Ventures in San Francisco, with participation from Incisive Ventures in Seattle (led by serial entrepreneur Martin Tobias), and Investible in Australia (Jayden Basha and Nicholas Oi). We also have support from an incredible group of US-based angel investors including: ⚬ Lauren Vaccarello - CMO at WEKA, former CMO at Salesloft and Talend ⚬ David Brock - Founder & CEO of Partners In EXCELLENCE ⚬ Shari Levitin - Founder & CEO of Shari Levitin Group ⚬ Woodson Martin - Former EVP of Salesforce AppExchange ⚬ David Schellhase - Former General Counsel at Salesforce, Slack, Groupon ⚬ Colin Wiel - Co-founded multiple unicorns, including Invitation Homes ⚬ Peter Kazanjy - Founder of Atrium and Modern Sales Pros ⚬ Scott Persinger - Founder of Supercog AI, founder CloudConnect, ex Stripe ⚬ Brian Bar - CEO & Founder of Victory Lap ⚬ Aaron Smith - Founder of Morphability Pty Ltd, ex sales leader, Sydney based ⚬ Michael Kelly - CRO of Wherewolf , one of Grw AI's customers We started Grw AI because we're passionate about coaching and the impact it can have on career and life outcomes - Alistair, Dan and I have all been fortunate to have been on the receiving end of incredible coaching throughout our careers - and we’re excited to scale impactful coaching out to millions of salespeople. We launched in April this year and have over 20+ companies in the US and ANZ seeing uplifts in sales performance from Grw AI (as high as 400% month-on-month). Our customers range from growth companies like Relab and Staffing Engine all the way up to large public companies in the US. This fundraise will enable us to set up an HQ in San Francisco, and to expand our engineering team in New Zealand. Here is the link to the full raise announcement: https://lnkd.in/gXNNggV2 Finally, a huge shoutout to those who have supported us on our journey so far. From our incredible advisors - David Brock, Lauren Vaccarello, 🇦🇺 Manik Surtani, 🏄‍♂️ Scott Leese, Shari Levitin, Scott Freeman and Linda Jenkinson, to our very first customers Glen Jones, Matt Dichter and of course to all of our other customers driving sales performance with Grw AI today. We owe a heartfelt thanks to all of you who have supported us on this journey - far too many to name here, but each and every contribution is deeply appreciated 🙏 We are so excited for what's next on our journey together! This is only the beginning.

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What's the biggest risk you've ever taken? I often hear this answer when I interview potential founders for Antler residency: "Left my life as I knew it, packed my bag, and moved to Australia without any prior connections or job secured." This resonates deeply with me. As a migrant myself, I took the leap to move to this country a couple of years ago. It felt like a risk, but also an exciting door to new opportunities. It's scary, it's exciting, and it's a constant juggle of rebuilding yourself and your life. It becomes much easier when you find the right place and the right support system to achieve your dreams. For aspiring entrepreneurs, Antler is one of those support systems. With our presence in ~20 markets globally, we're here to support diverse founders from all over the world, from day zero. Hear more on how, and join us next Tuesday, 5pm for an Ask-Me-Anything session with two of our very own founders who have ventured beyond borders – the legends Swetha Meenal Ananthapadmanaban from Dark Patterns Lab and Syed Hussan from Migrova. Register here: https://lnkd.in/gceefKdU

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One thing that I get an absolute kick out of is meeting founders and startups in the Brisbane community that only a few or select people have heard about 🤫    They're not pounding their chests daily on socials, instead are busy doing the work, building new innovative ideas, and launching products globally with astronomical success. You meet them and you're immediately blown away by the modesty of these hyper-intelligent individuals that are just simply "getting shit done" 💪    So when I meet people like this, I feel obliged to make noise about out them, because frankly, these companies are so bloody awesome and so impressive that everyone SHOULD know about who they are and what they're up to.    One of these examples I had the privilege of meeting recently is Gelomics – a BioTech startup founded by QUT's BridgeTech alumni Christoph Meinert, PhD. Adam and I were blown away by hearing how far they've come from R&D-stage in circa 2018, to today where the team is now distributing their products to 23 countries worldwide, tackling the issue of the reduction of clinical reliance on animal testing.     Why was it so impressive? Let me give you the scoop - their system reduces reliance on animal testing, potentially saving up to $65 billion annually by preventing late-stage drug failures. Currently, over 200 million animals are euthanized for research each year and from them, 90% of drugs fail after these costly animal trials, their product offers a more efficient and ethical alternative. Their technology cuts animal testing by up to 30% and saves $83 million per drug candidate, improving testing accuracy and efficiency.     This is a massive problem and while I don't use beauty products myself personally (I'm more of a 'body wash goes on head because it's part of my body' kinda guy 🥴), up to 80% of the top 50 beauty brands globally still test on animals to this day.    It's yuck, it's inefficient, and we should be doing better – and it's rad to see inspiring, forward-thinking startups like Gelomics doing just that 🤩    Give them a follow and support our #brisbanestartupheroes, because I feel we can all agree that monkeys should be swinging around in the wild, being all monkey-like and eating fruits and stuff 🐒🍌 and should absolutely not be injected with chemicals and killed for clinical data that isn't relevant 👇    Gelomics #BrisbaneStartups #StartupsToWatch #TechForGood #BrisbaneTech #EthicalTech

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Just a quick reminder: Not doing politics doesn’t stop politics from doing you 🌎 The 2024 US election is here, and it’s everyone’s business, even from across the Pacific. For any Aussies following along (or just curious), here's a quick breakdown of what to expect: 🕒 When to tune in November 5 in the US is Wednesday, Nov 6 for us. - Results start trickling in from around 10am AEDT, with early states like Indiana and Kentucky - By midday, we'll start seeing updates from Pennsylvania, Georgia, and North Carolina (where things could get interesting) - The last states report around 5pm AEDT, so keep any eye out for the news as the day goes on. 🗳️ What makes this election important It’s a close race between Kamala Harris and Donald Trump, and it could all come down to a few swing states. With delays likely, some results might not be confirmed until days later. 🤔 Why should Aussies care? Sure, it’s happening across the world, but US elections have a way of shaping global events, and Australia is no exception. Here's why 👇 1️⃣ International relations - The US-Australia alliance is critical, and policy shifts could impact our own foreign relations. 2️⃣ Economic Impact - Global markets are watching closely, which means trade, investments, and even our interest rates could feel the ripple effects. 3️⃣Environmental policy - The US stance on climate change influences international efforts. A win for either candidate could steer global climate goals. So, even if US politics isn’t usually on your radar, it’s worth paying attention to this one. Anyone planning to follow along? Drop a comment if you'll be watching, or tag a friend who needs a heads-up! #stayinformed #politicalupdates #USAustralia #economicimpact Image credit: BBC News

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$20.7M was poured into Australian start-ups last week, and I noticed something about this.   Reading the article by Eloise Keating on SmartCompany I noticed something poignant.   All the start-ups listed were Australian Climate Tech companies.   Undoubtedly, there were other start-ups and non-Climate Tech ones that confirmed raises last week, which were not reported, but this is an impressive week for Climate Tech.   Mick Liubinskas rightly said that funding for Climate has been hard to come by, but I sincerely hope we see more weeks like this.   Congrats to the teams at KC8 Capture Technologies, Sircel Limited, EVOS Energy and Fugu for their raises.   Also to Woodside Energy, Cemex Ventures, Kilara Capital, Investible, Jelix Ventures and Electrifi Ventures et al for driving these funding events.   Climate Tech ecosystem, drop a comment below - is funding on the up or this is a bright spot in a challenging time?

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A $2B Unicorn or a Donkey with a Carrot on it's Head? ... You decide. I'm our final weekly wrap for this year, 💼🧚‍♂️ Vinisha and I are back together on The Growth Cartel diving into the highs, lows and everything in between across Australia’s startup ecosystem. From the innovation and connection to tough conversations about workplace culture, this episode brings it all.

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I’m proud to share that Ajust has raised $2 million in a Seed round led by Carthona Capital. But I’m even more proud that Ajust has now supported thousands of consumers to resolve problems with over 750 Australian businesses. Being a consumer is a big part of our everyday lives. From banking to utilities to supermarkets to telco - we rely on businesses to manage our money, to eat, to keep warm and to stay connected to the world. When things go wrong, it isn’t just an inconvenience – it can bring our lives to a standstill and cause lots of stress. With my background in consumer law, friends and family often came to me for help when they had disputes with businesses. Part of me enjoyed the process - going up against insurance companies and huge retailers to get fair outcomes for the people I love. But it always took a lot of time and relied on my knowledge of consumer law. I started Ajust because getting fair resolutions as a consumer shouldn’t require a fight or being able to ask a favour from a friend with legal training. Orchestrated well, AI tools can massively help consumers to resolve issues with businesses. Thousands of consumers have been using Ajust’s AI platform to resolve issues - from getting refunds for faulty products, to fixing broken internet connections, to correcting energy meter readings. This Seed funding will support us to expand our platform to help consumers with even greater range of interactions. Soon, we’ll be more than an express lane for complaints, we’ll become the best option for consumers to contact businesses about all kinds of issues - from pausing a gym membership, to comparing quotes, to changing bookings. To read more about our journey to date and the opportunity we see for consumers to benefit from the AI revolution, here’s the article by Amelia McGuire.

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It is WILD to me that we all complain about a lack of support for women. But there are only four orgs that have supported our Women Initiatives consistently over the years: LaunchVic, Tattarang, NZ Growth Capital Partners and Blackbird (a massive shoutout for that! ❤️). Everyone acknowledges the problem and nods. Yet, nobody puts their money where their mouth is. So much talking, so little doing. Yet, we have three incredible and proven initiatives. The Women Fellowship has had 800+ fellows with 66% transitioning from outside of tech into a startup - either joining or founding. They are right here in our backyard: 1️⃣ Women Fellowship - bring more women into startups: https://lnkd.in/g7WtBnpE 2️⃣ Women Collective - peer groups for women in startups: https://lnkd.in/gWJSb5Ab 3️⃣ Women Leadership - executive coaching in peer group for women leaders: https://lnkd.in/gxdHKbMD It is so easy to support. 👉 Sponsor the program. 👉 Sponsor a couple of scholarships for women who can't otherwise afford it. As little as $3k changes the entire world for someone. As much as $100k is trajectory-changing for a program and 100s of women. For $500k we create something that moves tech across the entire country 🤯 DMs are wide open as always 🤗 Your org can be part of the change.

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🌳Climate tech companies going global 🌏 talk about a meeting of my two passions right there. Representing both Extolla and Tech Australia Advocates - What a delight it was to interview Paull Young (Head of Sustainability at GitHub) at the Climate Salad event this morning. Here are some of the things we chatted about: - Climate tech startups looking to win with large companies overseas need to think about the complexity of the procurement and vendor onboarding process, feels like a small detail but can be big factor playing on the mind of the decision maker - Globally “consumer sentiment” has not been enough to drive more sustainable purchasing decisions by business, it must also make economic sense - The “stick” (legislation) is proving to be more effective than the “carrot” (brand value) in driving behaviour among businesses Thanks to Olivia Utharntharm and Stuart Dullard Ashurst for having me! Fiona Windsor Chris Clark Mick Liubinskas

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At the Launch Vic Awards Nights, there was a lot of talk about the VC’s in our ecosystem, and quite a bit of mention of Angel Syndicates, but no mention of Venture Studios. In fact when people ask me what I do, I often have to explain what a Venture Studio is. So let me make the Venture Studio pitch. Firstly, what is a Venture Studio? Venture Studios give life to startups in two main ways. 1. Ideas are incubated and validated within the Venture Studio, once validated, the team finds the external resources/ people needed to bring the idea to life. 2. External founders brings ideas to Venture Studios, in which the Venture Studio provides services and resources to the founder in exchange for equity. So who is a Venture Studio good for? High Quality Founders, with scalable ideas: The success of a Venture Studio relies on the success of the startups they work with so naturally Venture Studios are looking for the highest quality founders / startups. Early stage founders who are missing a technical partner: During the early days of your startup, if you don’t have a technical partner, you generally require investment or you need to take significant financial risk to fund your MVP build. While most investors won’t want to invest until you have a functional MVP, this is the exact stage many Venture Studio’s like to play in. Why choose a Venture Studio over a development agency? Your developers will have skin in the game The app development process often goes wrong, because building apps is hard. If things go wrong, it’s easy for relationships to sour, and shortcuts to be made. Since Venture Studio’s success is so heavily tied into the success of their startups, by choosing a Venture Studio you have the peace of mind that your developers are so heavily incentivised to deliver an awesome product. Support beyond development Again because the success of the Venture Studios are so heavily tied to the success of the startup, it’s in the our best interest to ensure you are supported beyond your product build. So when it comes to GTM, capital raising and beyond, we aim to provide support and introductions where we. De-risk your financial position So this is the obvious benefit, get to launch without paying or paying a lot less. All of this is not to say, VC’s, Angel’s, Dev Shops all don’t play an important role in this ecosystem, I just feel the Venture Studio voice needs to be heard a bit louder.

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After years of slogging away, in 2020 Slice lost 95% of revenue. In 2024 they raised one of the largest seed rounds in Australian history. This is one of the most underrated stories in Australian startups. This week Farouk Ismail joined us to breakdown exactly how they got here: Expect to learn about: - The power of bootstrapping - How to realise when you have PMF - Pivoting amongst crises - Developing resilience as a founder Episode link in the comments.

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Here's my 2024 LinkedIn Rewind, by Coauthor: From tough-faced agbero to fintech storyteller—the streets prepared me for the boardroom in ways no MBA could. Some tales worth telling from 2024: → Bringing street wisdom to fintech → Turned payment narratives into stories that resonate from Balogun Market to Victoria Island → Learned to smile without losing edge (still a work in progress, but we move) Three posts that hit different: "I Am Learning to Smile" - On trading my toll-collector stern face for corporate charm "Life got better, things got better. Left my job as a toll-tout for marketing comms, the stern face followed me to my corporate rebirth." https://lnkd.in/dreU5nHU "Finding Happiness in Lagos" - How FX mallams taught me about customer experience "They make me feel wanted, needed, and even loved" https://lnkd.in/dW5pzDWJ "The Streets Have Your Brand's Report Card" - "That small sachet detergent you designed for one wash. A hawker has figured out how to stretch it to three." https://lnkd.in/dF-NtFTc 2025: More stories that bridge the gap between corporate corridors and Lagos streets. More smiles too, small steps. To every hustler trying to find their voice in corporate spaces—you don't need to change your essence, just your delivery. The streets taught us well. #LinkedInRewind #Coauthor #2024wrapped -- Get your 2024 LinkedIn Rewind! Go to coauthor [dot] studio in your browser

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AI shouldn’t replace the human, but replace the headache. When tech works 𝘢𝘭𝘰𝘯𝘨𝘴𝘪𝘥𝘦 us, not 𝘪𝘯 𝘱𝘭𝘢𝘤𝘦 𝘰𝘧 us, that’s when it’s being truly HELPFUL. There’s a reason it’s called Giga𝗯𝘂𝗱𝗱𝘆 🐣 #AIForGood Google for Startups x Gigabuddy Proving AI tech can do more than just beat you at chess - it can actually be helpful.

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