Retreat26: VC at Sea

12 March | Sydney

What is VC at Sea?

Innovation Bay is Australia’s leading membership community for tech founders and investors. Retreat26: VC at Sea is our flagship venture capital retreat.

VC at Sea is a one-day, VC-only forum bringing Australia’s venture capital community together at a moment of transition.

The day will be centralised around the theme Charting the Course Ahead and reflects the reality venture investors face as 2026 begins. The map has changed. The signals are noisier. The next phase of decisions carries greater consequence.

After several years of volatility, capital cycles are no longer moving in sync. Exit activity is returning unevenly. AI has introduced sharp asymmetries in capital access, valuations, and outcomes. Geopolitical forces now sit at the centre of risk assessment. Local venture decisions are increasingly shaped by global conditions beyond any single firm’s control.

Rather than attempting to predict where the market is going, VC at Sea is designed as a moment of collective alignment. It creates space for experienced investors to compare how judgement is being formed, how risk is being underwritten, and how strategy is evolving before major capital commitments are made.

The maritime setting is intentional. Like navigation at sea, today’s venture environment demands calibration and shared reference points. It also requires steady decision-making amid uncertainty. VC at Sea creates the conditions for alignment so investment teams can move into 2026 with clearer context and stronger conviction.

This is not a predictions event. It is a deliberately contained environment where GPs and senior investment teams can pressure-test assumptions, challenge perspectives, and build shared understanding before committing to the next phase of the market.

Speakers

Dom Pym,
Co-Founder, UP & Founder Euphemia.

Dom is a renowned Australian entrepreneur and technologist, with over 25 years of expertise across software, web, and mobile development. He has Co-founded several successful businesses, including Up (Australia’s leading
digital bank), Pin Payments, Ferocia, Clear Interactive and most recently, Triple Bubble (Oceania’s first fit-for-purpose fintech fund).

As a pioneer in the neobank sector, Dom co-founded Up in 2017 — Australia’s first, and now most loved digital bank. Up has been the #1 rated banking app in Australia since launching publicly in 2018, earning the title of Australia’s “most trusted bank” and amassing over 1 million satisfied customers by September 2024.

Throughout his career, Dom has been recognised for his leadership and achievements, receiving prestigious awards including, “Outstanding Fintech Leader of the Year 2022”, “Fintech Leader of the Year 2022”, the Pause
Award’s “C-Suite 2022”, and most recently named “Australian Startup Investor of the Year 2025”. Dom is a board member at Fintech Australia and previously served as an advisory board member for Ferocia and Up at Bendigo and Adelaide Bank from sale until August 2024.

Dom is deeply involved in his family office, Euphemia, where he mentors, advises and invests in founders, startups and venture capital funds globally. With over 120 investments across various sectors, he is a sought-after investor and advisor in the startup ecosystem.

Michelle Deaker,
Founding and Managing Partner, OneVentures

Michelle is a Founding Partner and the Managing Partner at OneVentures. She serves on the investment committees of OneVentures funds and has led the capital raising activities for the firm. Her focus today is in the technology growth practice, though she has also worked extensively across both healthcare and technology investments.

With over 25 years’ experience building and investing in high growth technology companies across Australia and the US, Michelle has a proven track record in global business expansion and Australian R&D commercialisation. She has led or co led, and served as a Director of, several landmark investments including Employment Hero ($2B valuation, 13x ROI, Returned 1.5x Fund II), Phocas (7x ROI, acq. Accel KKR), Smart Sparrow (acq. Pearson Learning), My Mobile Data (acq. ASX: AYS), Hatchtech (Lic. to NYSE: RDY), and Vaxxas. Michelle chaired the Employment Hero board until December 2023 and continues to serve as a Director, alongside board roles at Vaxxas and Buildkite, and previously Phocas.

A current member of the Reserve Bank of Australia’s Payment Systems Board, Michelle is also a former board member of Australia’s National ICT Centre of Excellence (NICTA, now Data61), Seven West Media (ASX: SWM) and served on the NSW Government’s Digital Economy Taskforce.

In the lead up to founding OneVentures, Michelle worked for a leading family office on their alternative investments, served as an entrepreneur in residence at Southern Cross Venture Partners and was an angel investor. Prior to her investment career, Michelle was a business entrepreneur and founder, including one of Australia’s first fintech companies, E Com Industries (www.giftvouchers.com) (acq. LSE: ReD, 4.6x, 70% IRR), IT services business, Networks Beyond 2000 and a tertiary tutoring business.

Michelle is a member of the Australian Institute of Company Directors and Chief Executive Women (CEW). She was a founding advisory board member of Head Over Heels (now Apropela), supporting women entrepreneurs, and served on the advisory board of the Indigenous fund Ochre Ventures.

In addition to these roles, she lectures in the Australian Investment Council’s Foundations of Private Capital Venture Capital Course and is a Co-Founder of WinVC, a non-profit women-led initiative supporting the career trajectory of women investors in venture capital.

Agenda

This is a deliberately contained, full-day environment designed to surface how peers are actually underwriting risk, allocating capital, and adjusting strategy for 2026. The setting removes distraction. The structure forces interaction, creating shared context and clearer judgement.

A voyage into the new year that enables the captains of their respective teams to sail into clear skies, with clear judgement.

Day Program

Morning Arrival
8:30am – 10:30am
Guests gather for breakfast and coffee before boarding. Registration and onboarding take place at King Street Wharf, with time to settle in before departure.

Welcome & Setting the Context
10:30am – 11:00am
VC at Sea officially begins as the vessel departs Sydney Harbour. The opening session sets the tone for the day, framing the venture cycle ahead and outlining the structure and intent of the forum.

Opening Conversation
11:00am – 11:45am
A fireside discussion with leading venture voices, reflecting on where the market has been, where it is heading, and how investors are recalibrating judgement for 2026.

Mid-Morning Discussions
11:50am – 12:30pm
Parallel fishbowl conversations focused on two defining pressures in venture today:
• Exits, DPI, and liquidity realities
• Fundraising, LP expectations, and positioning venture in 2026
These sessions are designed to stress-test assumptions and surface how peers are thinking in real time.

Lunch on the Harbour
12:30pm – 1:30pm
A relaxed lunch with peers, designed to encourage informal discussion and synthesis of the morning’s conversations.

Community Conversations
1:30pm – 3:00pm
A series of concurrent, small-group working sessions focused on the issues shaping venture outcomes, including capital discipline, AI inside VC firms, liquidity pathways, regulation, mid-range growth strategies, and venture’s role in the broader economy.

Open Networking
3:00pm – 3:30pm
Unstructured time to reflect, connect, and continue conversations from earlier in the day.

Closing Keynote & Q&A
3:30pm – 4:30pm
A closing address focused on judgement, conviction, and leadership in an environment of uneven recovery and persistent uncertainty.

Closing Address
4:30pm – 5:00pm
Final reflections and a collective call to action as the day program concludes.

Evening Program

Arrival & Reset
5:00pm – 6:00pm
Day attendees disembark and evening guests arrive.

VC Cocktail Soirée
6:00pm – 9:30pm
An evening reception on Sydney Harbour bringing together the broader VC, investor, and operator community. Drinks, canapés, and informal remarks as the vessel cruises past the city skyline.

Conclusion
9:30pm
VC at Sea concludes..

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What people say about our events

“The Innovation Bay team structured one of the most relevant events for business leaders I’ve experienced with room full of positive ego professionals invested in success beyond 2024.”

Steve Lewis | Vigilum, Nabu

“Innovation Bay is really unique. It’s an open forum for discussion. We come and connect and share deals and talk about what we’re struggling with or what we’re aiming for. It’s such a great space to be able to get everyone together and all the different ideas in an open forum.”

Georgia Barkell | Sprint Ventures

“The magic happens when you can put lots of people in a room together who have the right values and intentions. What I’m finding is that everyone wants to help each other. We’ve built some really great relationships.”

Yash Varma | Empress Capital