IT’S OUR BIRTHDAY! Today, Innovation Bay’s Open The Pod Bay Doors turns 5! To celebrate, we’ve taken it way back to our very first guest. Daniel Petre is the Godfather of the ecosystem and has arguably been around longer and had more success than anyone else in the sector. In 2014, Daniel founded Airtree alongside Craig Blair but a year ago, made the move out of VC and into the philanthropy space.

Anthony Zaccaria is the Co-Founder of Linktree which is essentially a category creator for link in bio tools and a one-stop place to house entire online link ecosystems. In just 6 years, Linktree has gathered a massive global following with a user base of 24 million people – or the population of Australia (!!) – generating 1.2 billion Linktree visits per month. Earlier this year, Linktree reached unicorn status, with a $1.3 billion USD valuation following a $110 million USD raise.

Darren Miller is the CEO of Australian Renewable Energy Agency (ARENA) – whose purpose it is to support the transition to net zero emissions by accelerating the pace of pre-commercial innovation.

Dale Brett is the Co-Founder & CEO at Fl0 – a low code platform for software engineers. Founded just a year ago (in 2021), Fl0 raised $11.5 million in its seed round with funding from the likes of Blackbird, Skip Capital and Jelix. Fl0’s vision is to empower software developers and engineers to be 20 times faster and more efficient. 

Laura is the CEO and Founder of SafeStack Academy, a community-centric online education platform on a mission to give software developers, analysts and architects all of the skills they need to build secure internet software.

Allegra Spender, currently running as an independent candidate for the Senate seat of Wentworth in Sydney’s east, is daughter to Italian immigrant parents – her father a barrister, politician and diplomat, her mother a renowned Australian fashion designer, the late Carla Zampatti.

For the past 14 years, Tech23 has showcased and amplified the emerging deeptech talent coming out of Australia that have the potential to create new industries and smarter solutions. Tech23 is a national forum whereby 23 early stage companies are chosen to tell their story and speak about their innovation on stage to an audience of industry leaders, investors, potential enterprise customers and other up and coming founders.

Duncan Anderson, along with his two friends Jeremy Cox and Ben Sze, is the Co-CEO and Co-Founder of EdTech company Edrolo. After some time working at Google, Duncan and his two business partners met while working at Goulburn and Sacs some 10 years ago.

Ben Thompson is the Founder and CEO of Employment Hero. The company is Australia’s newest unicorn, recently announcing a funding round of $181 million, valuing the firm at $1.25 billion. Ben grew up in Frenchs Forrest in Sydney and finished his schooling in Armidale, rural NSW.

Rebecca Schot-Guppy is the Director of Investment Leverage and Portfolio Management at IAG Firemark Ventures. Previously, Rebecca was the CEO of FinTech Australia, where she made a significant impact on the ecosystem. Prior to Fintech Australia, she worked as a Community Manager at Stone & Chalk. Rebecca found her way into the world of venture through her background in law and biomed. She is a passionate and knowledgeable member of the startup ecosystem with many insights to share.

Ian sits down with Hugo Bieber, Partner at Think & Grow, and Jacqui Tucker, Head of Employment, Taxes & Reward, Enterprise, KPMG, to discuss the 2021-2022 Australian Startup Salary Guide by Think & Grow and KPMG High Growth Ventures. Supported by Tech Council of Australia, the guide was produced with 20 leading VCs, surveying over 3,000 positions across 140 companies and is designed for startups looking to recruit and retain the best talent in the ecosystem.

Max Cunningham is currently the Group Executive of Listings at ASX. Previously, he was the Head of Equity Capital Markets at Goldman Sachs in New York and the Director of the Macquarie Group in London. Max has a wide array of global experience and provides unique insight into the state of the Australian market.