Funding | Investment
In closing its latest funding round, Canva has seen its valuation surpass US$1 billion mark, making it the second Australian startup after Atlassian to obtain Unicorn status. [See also: Let’s Talk… Growth (Is there anything wrong with aspiring to be a unicorn?), “We’ve only achieved 1% of what we know is possible,” says CEO of […]
Splend, Australia’s leading supplier of rental vehicles for the ride sharing drivers, has secured a $7.2 million investment from Element Fleet Management, positioning it realise the next phase of its global expansion plans. In exchange for the strategic investment, Element has secured a 12.5% stake in the two-year-old business, which previously received funding from Investec […]
Agtech startup FluroSat has secured $1.5 million in funding for its crop health monitoring technology from CSIRO Main Sequence Ventures, AirTree Ventures, and strategic agricultural investors lead by CRDC. In addition to the equity funding, Flurosat has also secured several grants with the help of deep tech startup Cicada Innovations and its Growlab accelerator program. To […]
Cross-border payments startup Airwallex has received a US$6 million investment from VC firm Square Peg, bringing its total Series A capital raise to US$19 million The Melbourne-based fintech company previously closed its Series A funding round in May, having raised a combined US$13 million from Mastercard, Sequoia Capital China and the world’s fourth largest internet […]
As competition heats up in the venture capital space, it’s becoming tougher for VC firms to participate in funding rounds. Meanwhile, deep-tech startups face difficulties attracting ‘smart money’ in the seed stage because investors lack domain expertise and patience. These were some of the takeaway message from a panel discussion held at the Global Mobile Internet […]
Due to the ‘gigantic profits’ banks derive from processing the ‘lion’s share’ of home loans in Australia, traditional lenders haven’t had a compelling case for servicing small businesses – rejecting around 50% of their loan requests, according to Simon Isaacs, founder and CEO of fintech startup ebroker. “Banks can lend $62.50 for every dollar* of their […]
Fresh from winning the People’s Choice Award at the Visa Everywhere Initiative (VEI), a pitching competition for female-led startups, Puffling co-founder Sarah Parker spoke to Dynamic Business about the problem her ‘dating site’ for job sharers is solving for return-to-work parents and employers. DB: What is the elevator pitch for Puffling? Parker: Puffling solves the […]
The brains behind mentoring software startup Mentorloop have closed an oversubscribed seed round, raising $725,000 from Blackbird Ventures, Rampersand and Tempus Partners to bring their total funding to more than $1 million. Launched in 2015 by Heidi Holmes (COO) and Lucy Lloyd (CEO), Mentorloop is a cloud-based, mobile-first platform that assists corporates, universities, not-for-profits and government with […]
A review of publicly available data on capital raises undertaken by Victorian startups and scaleups over the past five years shows that 385 firms closed 510 investment deals, worth a combined total of $790 million. Commissioned by LaunchVic, the dandolpartners review also found that: The median seed investment was $100,000 while the median angel investment […]
Peer-to-peer car sharing platform Car Next Door has completed the first stage of its Series B capital raise, securing $2.3 million from new and existing investors, and kicked off stage two with the launch of a crowdfunding campaign through Equitise. Founded in in 2012 by CEO Will Davies and CTO Dave Trumbull, the startup enables […]
EpiSoft has secured $1,050,000 in capital for its cloud-based, SaaS platform, which helps health professionals, including researchers, manage patients with serious chronic illness and collaborate on efforts to improve health outcomes. Co-founder Jenny O’Neill told Dynamic Business that a quartet of private investors with “knowledge of and great contacts in the digital health market” […]
Melbourne-based fintech startup Finch has closed an oversubscribed seed round, raising $2.25m in funding for its social payments app for millennials. Launched in July, the Finch app allows users to pay and request money instantly (without a BSB), split bills, run tabs in groups to track shared expenses. According to Shahirah Gardner, who co-founded the […]
Having raised $5 million in Series B funding, this week, digital-native retailer Brosa is setting its sights on becoming a dominant omnichannel furniture brand. In addition to securing additional capital from Series A investor AirTree Ventures, Brosa welcomed Bailador Technology and BMY Group as new investors. Since its$2 million Series A funding round in 2015, […]
Solar tech startup Redback Technologies has raised US$7 million in capital from the Clean Energy Innovation Fund and Right Click Capital as part of its Series A-2 funding round. Based in Brisbane, Redback offers an energy management system that uses machine learning to optimise the generation, storage and management of solar energy for households and […]
GAVL, the real estate tech startup led by Ex-AFL player Joel Smith, has kicked off a planned $6m Series A round with an initial $1.8m in funding from existing investor Harris Capital, the investment office of Flight Centre co-founder Geoff Harris. Launched in December 2016, GAVL is an auction livestreaming and analytics platform that enables […]
Australia’s largest online jobs marketplace, Airtasker, has completed a $33 million funding round to bankroll the company’s first overseas foray, with an expansion into the UK. Airtasker had already been enjoying a milestone year, with the formation of strategic partnerships with IKEA and eBay plus the introduction of income protection insurance for its workers. The […]
Spacer is vying to become the dominant marketplace for storage, parking and warehouse space in Australia, today announcing that it has acquired Melbourne-based startup Parkhound and completed a $2.7m in Series A funding round. Founded by former private equity professional Roland Tam and ex-Deals Direct CEO Michael Rosenbaum, Spacer has raised $5 million in funding from angel […]
Melbourne-based fintech startup Study Loans has this week launched its responsible student lending service, with $5 million available to Australians seeking to finance their tertiary education. In addition to completing a $2 million seed round to get the business off the ground, Study Loans co-founders Brett Shanley, Mark McCoach and Rhett Simonds raised $5 million debt equity […]
NSW businesses can apply for matched grants of up to $250,000 to support joint R&D projects between NSW and Israel, under an innovation program announced by Minister for Innovation Matt Kean. The Minister said the ‘NSW-Israel R&D Tech Innovation Program’ would open global opportunities to develop, commercialise and sell new products and services while building […]
Entrepreneurs Matt Dyer and Nathan Airey have raised $2.6 million in seed funding to launch their new on-demand marketplace Bookwell into Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, Perth and Adelaide. Dubbed ‘Menulog for beauty and wellness’ by its founders, it is their second startup together. Their first, food ordering platform EatNow, was founded in 2010 before merging […]
