Startup Speakers,
Inspiring Stories

Aimee Stanton is a one stop powerhouse of ideas and she’s one of those rare people who embrace making mistakes ‘every single day’ and learning from every one of them.

Aimee is not your average tradie. Breaking stereotypes & making waves in traditionally male-dominated fields - she is well known for being one of Australia’s First Lady Tradie Presenters. Plumber turned Tiny House builder & DIY Specialist - she Co-Founded Tiny Stays in 2018, and just weeks before she gave birth to her daughter, she launched Zadie Workwear - a clothing brand designed to make every single woman from the job site to backyard feel comfortable & confident in their work gear.

Aimee is one of those people with an insatiable appetite for life and works hard to reach the goals she sets for herself.

She is a big believer in learning more, reflecting more, reading more, laughing more and exploring more and she loves sharing what she’s learned in the hope it will inspire others to ‘give it a crack.’

Aimee is an energetic and entertaining entrepreneur who loves visiting schools just as much as corporate seminars to share her unique insights into overcoming obstacles and getting the most out of life.

When you first read that someone is a self-described tech investor, radio host, founder, coach, and t-shirt designer you really wonder what sort of person they might be!

Well, we’re here to tell you Alan is generous, articulate, and very fun which is why we are delighted he’s part of our stable of speakers.

He has a hands-on approach with founders of early-stage startups and new product development teams and has a wealth of expertise across the sector from pitch presentations, capital raising, product strategy, team dynamics, brand development and growth marketing.

He has advised and invested directly in new Australian startups and through BlueChilli, Blackbird Ventures, Pollenizer Ventures and Startmate and generously coaches startup founders globally both directly and via accelerator programs and incubators across myriad industries including tech, finance, food, health, music, education, med tech and space.

Alan is particularly interested in developing entrepreneurship skills in refugees, migrants, youth, and mid-career professionals, improving diversity and inclusion in tech, renewable energy, clean transport, smart cities, sustainable food production, wearable technology, autonomy, ML and true AI.He is a sought-after keynote speaker and panellist, and appears regularly in the media as a tech startup and technology industry expert.

Ananya is a venture capital investor passionate about closing the gender funding gap across the startup landscape. She invests in high-growth, female-led startups that are often entirely overlooked via a $100m fund that's actively investing across APAC with a gender lens at Series A and B.

She is passionate about exploring how technology can be harnessed to create social impact.

Ananya says that one of the first things female founders comment on when they come to pitch to her is how unusual it is to see female investors sitting on the other side of the table, this in part explains why only 2% of VC funding goes to women.

It’s a shocking statistic that globally, companies founded solely by women are awarded only 2% of venture capital investment. This has significant flow-on effects for the pipeline of female talent in the tech industry and for gender equality more broadly.

But it’s the sort of work that makes sense for a woman whose career has often focussed on elevating underrepresented voices from her NFT side hustle ‘Brown Baddies’ through to the important initiatives she has supported including NGOs working to combat gender-based violence in South Asia.

As a teacher who spent months of her life assessing her student’s work late into the evenings and across weekends, Ange knew there had to be a better way. It’s what led her to create Flohh, an online assessment platform designed by teachers, for teachers.

Teachers often talk about the relentlessness of marking. It’s a time-consuming and soul-destroying aspect of any teacher’s job, adding huge hours to teacher workloads.

Flohh is a clever tool that integrates student management and learning management systems and is fast and easy to set up. Best of all, it works by improving marking times for teachers by 40%, promoting consistent teacher practices and importantly, it’s been shown to improve student outcomes too.

Around the world there are more than 4,000 teachers reducing their workload with Flohh Version 1. It’s been such a success that this edtech is now being enhanced and Ange and her team are building Flohh 2.0, based on feedback from the current cohort of users.

When Ange isn’t challenging the status quo and making giant leaps with Flohh, she enjoys surfing along the spectacular coastline in South-East Gippsland Victoria.

Not every teenager knows what they want to do as a career, but after working in a pharmacy in her hometown of Wodonga, Cassie knew that she wanted to be a pharmacist when she grew up. 

Fast forward a few years and it makes sense to learn that when it came to her own startup, Cassie decided to use her pharmaceutical and cosmetic formulations knowledge to create a clean, green and safe magnesium-based product range.

‍Of course, we all know that there’s no such thing as an overnight success and developing products for market and distributing both locally and overseas has not been without challenges.

But as Cassie says, if you have a burning desire to do something, ‘You just have to start. Nothing is ever going to be perfect. You move through it, you learn from it, and you keep going. You will stifle yourself, so you just have to start.’

Her founder's story covers everything from the importance of a trusted network, managing a market disruption, distribution, marketing and the unique challenges of being a female entrepreneur and mum of three.

Claire has over 15 years of experience in international trade, technology, sustainability, and innovation. She has been globally responsible for identifying, engaging, and building long-term relationships with ecosystem stakeholders in Singapore, Korea, Japan, UAE and the UK. These include governments, corporates, startup support agencies, regulators, investors, and more. All with the goal of helping businesses more easily expand into new markets. 

She says she’s ‘easily inspired’ – we think this is because she herself inspires easily. 

Claire is passionate about connecting the dots between people and ideas, and moving projects forward by creating and executing strategies, collaborating with partners, and solving problems. 

She’s worked with a range of businesses from one-woman bands to some of the world's biggest multinationals, across different sectors and regions globally. 

She mentors and advises several startups, accelerators, and organisations that support entrepreneurship and innovation, with a particular passion for supporting female and diverse founders. We’re thrilled that Claire's on our books because one of her biggest goals is to contribute to the development and growth of the startup ecosystems in APAC and beyond!

As the Co-Founder & Head of School at Earlywork, Dan is on a mission to close the education-careers gap. Today, he's building Australia's first tech sales bootcamp, Earlywork Academy, where jobseekers only pay if they land a job. Alongside this, he runs Earlywork Village – the #1 free tech careers community for early-career folks in APAC with 6000+ members.

Dan’s a great leader and an amazing storyteller. In 2022, he was named one of LinkedIn’s Top Voices in Technology, and was listed on The Australian’s Top 100 Innovators. In 2023, he was recognised as a TEDxSydney Youth Speaker.

He has had a diverse start to his career across tech, startups and corporate, working as an Associate Product Manager at Atlassian, an Operations Associate at Ofload, a Project Management intern at Amazon, an Account Executive at Uber Eats, a UX Design intern at Deloitte Digital and a Marketing Intern at IBM. He studied Commerce (Marketing) and Computer Science at the University of New South Wales.

Beyond his role at Earlywork, Dan is also a founding investor at Ultraviolet Ventures, a microfund of emerging founders & creators across Australia.
When he’s not working, you’ll find him singing, beatboxing, running, hip hop dancing, board gaming, playing poker, hiking, or meditating.

David has been writing about Australia's startup industry for longer than most in the business. He is one of the nation's leading technology reporters and editors and has built trusted relationships with many across this sector which is why it’s often his name printed alongside the biggest breaking stories.

David has incredible tales about Silicon Valley, publicly listed companies and the startup world and knows many of the untold histories of the people, places and businesses involved in this sector over the past few decades.

He appears on TV and radio as a tech expert and was recently awarded Australia’s best business technology journalist at the 2022 ACS IT Journalism awards and was highly commended in 2018 at the Quill awards for best business feature writing – he clearly knows what he’s talking about!

David is keen in particular to moderate panels and host fireside chats - his probing yet warm interview technique is always a winner with audiences.

Most recently, David exposed what really happened on ‘Optus’ day from hell’ when Australia’s worst telecommunications outage in recent memory took almost 16 hours to recover from and affected more than ten million customers. 

It’s a story with many twists and turns, an allegorical tale we can all learn from. 

The enthusiasm Dickie Currer has for the broad church of Australia’s startup ecosystem really is worth bottling. It's a community he champions whenever he can on his mission to make this sector stronger, globally. 

The first time you meet Dickie, you’ll see why his nickname as the ‘hype man’ of our innovation economy has stuck – he sees life as an adventure and he loves that he gets to work across such a broad community with so many vision-driven people.

Encouraging our homegrown entrepreneurs to shine on a global scale means working hard to troubleshoot the challenges unique to the local startup landscape including:

• Flattening the tall poppy mentality  
• Finding ways to solve the two-way talent crisis to keep top talent on home soil and attract the brightest international minds to our sector
• Ensuring we stay connected across the innovation landscape both culturally and economically  
• Garnering infrastructure and investment support so we can keep up with the rest of the world.

Dickie is a thought leader who shouts from the rooftops about Australia’s vast array of innovative startups and the people working in them.  

He is an authentic, entertaining and experienced public speaker who leaves audiences ready to tackle their own challenges across the startup ecosystem and beyond. 

Goal-driven digital marketing icon, Doone Roisin, has always done things her own way and her stories of how she got her foot in the door of the industries she wanted to work in are legendary.

She’s worked for global brands such as Snapchat, IMG and The Iconic and as an entrepreneur she launched her own companies including the direct to consumer jewellery brand Kincs and Female Startup Club, an educational media company.

Today, she’s an author, releasing ‘Your Hype Girl’ which became an instant bestseller in 2022. She’s also the founder and host of the internationally acclaimed Female Startup Club podcast and has inspired thousands of small business owners and entrepreneurs with her relatable and fun chats with inspirational female founders.

You could say Doone is part of the very fabric of Australia’s startup landscape.

‍Doone is on a mission to level the playing field for female entrepreneurs in this country and change the ‘two percent statistics’ and empower young women to create wealth through the work they do. 

When Dr. Anushi Rajapaksa was 7 years old, she was so terrified of needles that she had to be sedated to receive a simple injection. Now, after 15 years of dedicated research, she and her team have created a breakthrough technology with world-changing potential.

Misti’s unique nebuliser mask “MyMisti” is a multi-award winning, novel and non-invasive lung delivery system that uses ultrasound waves to turn life-saving biomolecules into a mist that can deliver treatments to the deep lungs.

No needle required.

But the jump from blue sky dreaming to creating a viable product with all the necessary regulatory approvals has been quite the journey and it’s not over yet.

From being accepted into a prestigious accelerator program Dr Anushi learnt what it might take to go from being a researcher to a successful entrepreneur.

Hers is a wonderful story of resilience, hard work and persistence. It’s about having the courage and self-belief to begin the work and enough tenacity to keep going when everything gets too hard. 

Whether your audiences are interested in learning more about why we need more science and technology companies led by women, the importance of women in STEM, how medtech is changing the world or why her mum is her business hero, Dr. Anushi is the speaker for you. 

As the Co-Founder of Realbase, a venture he excited for $180 million, Frank helped launch and scale a cloud-based platform that simplifies and streamlines the marketing process for real estate agencies, offering services like photography, floor plans, video, brochures, signboards, and more.

Frank’s background in business development and marketing combined with his domain expertise in real estate technology and trends absolutely played a key role in the success of this business.

It also didn’t hurt that Frank is such a naturally positive person because there’s a lot more to this founder’s story than meets the eye.

His is a story of resilience, relationship building, trusting his instinct, the importance of fostering a high-performance culture and bloody hard work.

Listening to Frank is easy as he takes audiences on the journey of his life’s work and maps out his philanthropic pursuits for the future.

Meet Grace Brown, a robotics engineer, a Mechatronics Engineering graduate from The University of Melbourne, and the founder of robotics and AI startup Andromeda.

At Andromeda they’re on a mission to revolutionise human-robot interactions. Founded by a team of passionate engineers, their vision is to create companion robots that are not just smart and functional, but also warm and empathetic. We believe that robotics can be a force for good and make a positive impact on people's lives.

Grace says that building a robot like Abi has been a bit like parenthood. ‘There’s no denying that Abi is my baby. In her infancy, I knew everything about her. Every line of code, every cable, every screw and its placement down to the millimetre. I loved her as a prototype - when she still needed a rack to keep her stable, and essentially, she still needed ME. I feel like she’s now entering her teen years where so many other people are influencing her, changing her design — sometimes I don’t even recognise her, in the best way possible.’ 

She’s part of a small but mighty team based in Boston and Melbourne. They believe in working hard and having fun.

When they’re not tinkering with Abi (their flagship robot), they can be found debating the latest theories in AI ethics, playing foosball, or catching up on their favourite Pixar movies.

Hannah Moreno is an outspoken feminist author, social justice advocate, and the founder and CEO of climate, tech and finance PR and marketing firm, Third Hemisphere, where she heads media strategy, content, and thought leadership. She has over 20 years’ experience across the gamut of communications disciplines, and has authored and had published hundreds of articles for clients in Tier-1 media, including as a ghostwriter and author herself at the Australian Financial Review.

Third Hemisphere specialises in accelerating and showcasing the Australian technology, venture capital, startup and innovation ecosystem and telling the stories of the Australian startup landscape, making her perfect for this speaker’s bureau. 

Hannah has an enviable depth of knowledge across myriad industries spanning financial services, climate tech, and deep tech more broadly across manufacturing, sustainability, spacetech, biotech, and more. 

But her primary specialty is in aligning her clients’ actions and words with society’s evolving approach to a wide range of social justice issues, as a critical act of reputational and commercial risk mitigation. In this pursuit, she’s not afraid of calling a spade a spade.

This might explain why, as a public speaker, Hannah isn’t afraid of the truth. She’s engaging, fearless, and thoughtful and whether she’s speaking to a small or larger audience, you can usually hear a pin drop when she has the microphone. 

Jodie is passionate about helping businesses start and grow and boy, does she have some amazing stories for you! 

She’s the co-founder and Co-CEO at Tractor Ventures who help founders unlock possibilities! They provide flexible, revenue-based financing alternatives and access to a world-class community of experienced entrepreneurs to help founders grow their tech companies on their own terms. 

She also co-founded two-sided marketplace Occasional Butler, which was acquired by rival Airtasker in 2014.

She’s worked at SBE Australia where she led a team in accelerating some of Australia's most innovative female leaders and she established the Innovation Bay community in Melbourne, is an advisor to multiple startups and a mentor at Startmate.

With this sort of experience, it’s no surprise to learn that Jodie has also worked as a mentor, lecturer, and Director of Startups at the Wade Institute.

Beyond this, Jodie spent nine years as the General Manager for leading Australian fashion designer Leona Edmiston, driving strong business growth from 2 stores to 25 stores and growing the team from 3 to 100+.

In her spare time, this busy woman is a Non-Executive Director at Private Media Group, known for its publications Smart Company, Crikey and The Mandarin.

Not everyone describes their mistakes as ‘beautiful, spectacular failures’ but Joumana sees the beauty in most things. And as an entrepreneur, a life she says ‘chose me,’ this sort of positivity and joy is at the heart of everything Joumana does.

Joumana has begun a number of startups and has much to say about just starting, the algorithms, the best way to grow your team and a few habits she thinks have really set her up to do the best she can.

One of her goals in life is to share things that have worked for her and there’ll be no shortage of audience note-taking when Joumana steps up to the microphone.

She can explain why she only gives herself 30 days to fail at something, why it’s important to make social proof the hero on a landing page, how often she posts on social media and much, much more.

She’ll explain how Skale helps early stage startups scale in less than 10 days with disruptive brands that stand out, websites that grow with you and landing pages backed by psychology.

Joumana has worked with lots of brands that are making a name for themselves including Wedgetail, Earlywork, Blinq, Square Peg, Workyard, The Care Co and more and she spends most of her work time ‘giving startups an unfair advantage.’

Kyra Snell's career has always been guided by her core values. Following her university education, she spent over a decade teaching in both secondary schools and TAFE institutions. Kyra then ventured into entrepreneurship, establishing her first business focused on plain English writing and editing. However, it was the challenges her own family faced while navigating Australia's aged care system for her paternal grandmother that inspired her to start CareAbout in 2015.

Since its inception, CareAbout has been instrumental in assisting over 100,000 Australian families with aged care needs. The organisation has expanded its services to include care delivery through Hazel Home Care, operating in three states, and most recently launched a new venture called Dulcie in Self Managed Home Care.

Kyra firmly believes that providing the right information and guidance at the right time can significantly impact someone's life. Her experiences in the startup world have taught her valuable lessons, which she generously shares with others. Beyond being one of Australia's leading Home Care experts, Kyra's insights span various topics, including launching a startup, understanding customer needs, and the importance of fostering a passionate and diverse team.

A skilled storyteller, Kyra is equally comfortable addressing audiences in boardrooms, conferences, classrooms, or community centres. Her ability to communicate effectively across diverse settings underscores her versatility and commitment to making a positive impact in the aged care sector and beyond.

Lea’s vast areas of expertise span almost everything you need to know to build successful startups from relationship building, customer success, marketing operations, strategic planning, clever communications and everything else in between. A career generalist and operator, Lea believes in the power of transferable skill sets and a strong student mentality. 

Born and raised in Hawaii, she is a leader in her field and has worked across the United States (think California, Hawaii, and more recently, a decade in New York) prior to relocating to Australia and enjoys the flexibility and challenges of working remotely across several countries. You can catch her musings on Aussie Founders Going Global in her monthly contributions to Overnight Success’ newsletter, ‘The Pulse Check’.   

Those that have worked with her often reference her boundless energy and infectious positivity.

‘Besides uplifting the entire team, she's been a versatile, all-around gem, extending her helping hand to everyone who needed it. Lea’s exceptional communication skills significantly contributed to the fantastic team experience. She is incredibly reliable, getting things done with lightning speed, and she's just a blast to have around.’

Lea has a full kit of real-world stories that illustrate how and why things work when they do, why they don’t work and can outline the exact steps she takes to identify solutions and drive impactful results. She loves talking through the method behind the madness and embraces the understanding of looking at a situation from multiple angles.

When she’s not working, Lea is reading, writing, travelling, finding the closest body of water and actively supports other startups including taste-testing the products in her partner’s natural wine business Sauced.shop – it is, as she says, the least she can do!

Many entrepreneurs find their ‘why’ because of their own lived experiences which shape the sort of person they become and the sort of impact they want to make in the world. This is certainly the case for Mat Bertrand whose personal experiences led to him leaving behind a varied career in the financial planning industry and time as an underwear model to founding the fourth fastest growing tech startup in Australia.

Like Family, is part of Australia’s growing care economy and it’s a beautiful solution for people living with a disability, an illness, injury or simply getting a little older.

Since launching in 2016, they’ve helped thousands of Australians find the most reliable locals who can help people with non-medical activities such as community participation, daily activities and skill building.

And, it also means they have a unique workforce (who are like one big family) comprising students, full-time workers, stay-at-home mums and dads, retirees, professional athletes, musicians, actors and much more – it’s this diversity that helps people to find the best match for them.                                          
                                                               
Mat is a brilliant communicator and is as comfortable in a corporate setting as he is in an intimate informal environment, just hand him the microphone and he’ll do the rest. 

As the Co-Founder and CEO of Birchal, Australia's leading crowd sourced funding platform, Matt is passionate about supporting Australian entrepreneurs to do their best by simplifying the way they raise capital.   

Matt is an experienced financial services lawyer and entrepreneur and has worked in private practice at a top tier law firm and founded several successful businesses. A recognised expert in the regulation of financial services, and equity crowdfunding, Matt is a regular media commentator and contributes to scholarly journals and industry consultations.

He’s at home speaking to a wide range of audiences and is extremely passionate about mobilising retail and wholesale investors to back Australian startups and small and medium businesses. 

As he says ‘we must leverage the full capacity of Australia’s crowd-sourced funding regime to deliver fast and efficient capital to small and medium businesses. But we must also encourage and reward the next generation of investors that answer this call.’

When he’s not working, Matt is an expert when it comes to barbecue and what he doesn’t know about meat, fire, smoke, local produce and time honoured bbq cooking techniques isn’t worth knowing.

The first startup Michael ever worked in was called Madpaws (a place to find local pet sitters and dog walkers) back when he didn’t know anything about startups, or cats and dogs!

He’s come a long way since then and is now the CEO of Startmate, one of this country’s startup stalwarts.  

A decade has passed since Startmate first opened its doors, and what a revolving door of wisdom it has been. Founders helping founders, founders becoming investors and investors becoming mentors. Startmate has built an ecosystem for startups and become the epicentre for ambition in Australia.

Over the past decade, they have invested in 230+ startups, with a collective portfolio value of over $2 billion.

Michael is a sharp, passionate and entertaining speaker who has a finance and consulting background and believes that startups are all about people finding the answers to problems for themselves.

He’s witnessed Australia’s startup waves firsthand and has some interesting predictions for the future of the sector.

Among a bevy of topics, Michael has exceptional insights on the pivotal role of customers, Australia’s risk taking appetite, fundraising challenges and what we can do to address the gross underrepresentation of women in the ecosystem. 

Looking back, Nathan sees that growing up in his immigrant Chinese family’s restaurant and then studying commerce at university, were just part of a natural entrepreneurial progression that led him to a world of accelerator programs and startups.  

He now works full-time at award-winning Australian edtech startup, HEX, as the Community and Partnerships Coordinator and is also the co-founder of Stint.  

Nathan understands what’s needed to build a community from the ground up because this is what he’s done with Stint – a growing platform that helps companies hire the best international student talent in Australia, transforming their job-hunting journey and creating a more equitable landscape. 

Stint has grown to become a community of more than 3,800 international students from over 50 countries and 30 institutions across Australia. It’s a wonderful example of how it’s possible to turn your conviction into a career. 

Nathan loves waving the flag for Australia's startup community and is happy to share his experiences of being a founder, working in startups and partnering with the right people to build successful communities.

Niamh Sullivan has helped 100s of brands launch, scale and raise capital. Her communications and storytelling strategies have generated millions for organisations across the globe through crowd sourcing funding, private investment, brand growth and community fundraising. 

Since she was very little, she’s never stopped asking questions and she credits her parents with her open positive outlook and strong mindset – it’s helped her navigate some very challenging times in her life. 

Niamh has been public speaking since she was a young teenager, which led her to study communications majoring in journalism. But live crosses in front of the camera weren't for her and despite being warned not to leave a comfortable job because ‘you’re too young, you don’t know enough about the industry’ like all good entrepreneurs she went her own way regardless. 

Niamh is a well-respected panellist, conference presenter and keynote speaker and has many words of wisdom to share about what it takes to be a founder, forging your own pathways to success, embracing your uniqueness and when the best time to do anything really is. 

She also has some excellent affirmations to share including this one – ‘A day without laughter is a day wasted.’

Nikita is a Startup Advisor at AWS, Airtree Explorer and a passionate angel investor assisting Australian startups, with a particular interest in supporting female founded, deep tech and AI startups.

Prior to AWS, Nikita worked for WIRED Magazine’s Future Thinking consultancy and AI Cyber Security startup, Darktrace. 

Others describe her as a ‘tremendously empathetic professional who gains the trust of her customers by driving new, innovative ideas and deeply understanding their needs’.

And she isn’t afraid of doing the work and is always putting her hand up for learning opportunities across the startup ecosystem. 

As a public speaker, Nikita has experience in keynote speaking and is an interesting and engaging panellist.

Nikita is also an avid art collector and is the current chair of Art Centre Melbourne’s Contemporary Foundation.

Nikki Tugano is the Founder and CEO of SeenCulture, passionate about recognising and developing human potential in organisations. Nikki is a pioneer for creating inclusive and high performing teams in the Future of Work supported by her background as an experienced HR leader, Positive Psychology practitioner, and now Tech Startup Founder. 

She earned a scholarship for her Masters in Applied Positive Psychology and Coaching Psychology (MAPPCP), also has degrees in Commerce and Science, is an associate with Melbourne Business School, and guest lectures at various universities in Melbourne and Sydney. 

She has also been recognised as the most influential CEO for Diversity, Equity and Inclusion, and nominated for Entrepreneur of the Year, and Startup Woman of the Year. SeenCulture has been awarded Speediest Startup, and Startup of the Year. 

SeenCulture currently serves more than 1,500 users on its people analytics platform and primarily works with professional services firms and global technology companies with customers like Atlassian and Culture Amp.

Nikki is an experienced and articulate public speaker and award-winning CEO who walks the walk when it comes to driving impact and performance, but she’s also so much more than this. 

She’s also an authentic storyteller who openly shares her experiences of being an underrepresented founder and the challenges she has faced breaking through both the glass and bamboo ceiling, how her challenging childhood experiences shaped who she is today and what she hopes to achieve in the future through her important purpose-driven work.

Paul McCann is a Marrithiyel man born and raised on his family’s traditional Country, 350 kilometres south-west of Darwin. Growing up he was surrounded by his father’s uncles and aunties creating paintings, wood carvings and didgeridoos and his own art practice, depicting the landscape of his traditional Country through wearable art and jewellery. Now based in Melbourne, McCann explores modern and abstract ways to bring his traditional culture to red carpets and festival runways.

McCann studied fashion design at Darwin’s Charles Darwin University, but it wasn’t until 2021 when his fashion career got its first wings when his Gumnut ball gown appeared in the first-ever First Nations runway event at Australian Fashion Week. McCann went on to win the Cultural Adornment and Wearable Art Award at the 2021 National Indigenous Fashion Awards.

The fashion business is all about the art of storytelling and Paul is an inspirational and articulate storyteller. He is an experienced panellist and keynote speaker and has appeared on the ABC’s documentary, ‘The Way We Wore’, a vibrant exploration of Australian fashion uncovering its cultural and historical significance, revealing how the clothes we wear can give intimate and surprising insights into how this country has evolved.

Reuben’s startup story is epic. In 2017, the week after he finished his final university exam he landed a full-time dream job in the digital department at Cricket Australia - he’d worked hard to make it happen. 

But just four years later, that dream took a hit when he was made redundant during the pandemic.

Not one to waste time, Reuben had picked himself up and dusted himself off and in the space of 9 weeks he had moved to Lorne, started a business and launched a #1 podcast on iTunes. 

This is when SportsGrad – a private network designed to help future leaders break into the sports industry was born. Fast forward a few years and SportsGrad has now helped more than 500+ and nothing makes Reuben happier than helping aspiring sports professionals land their dream role. 

Reuben has a full kit of inspiring stories about mastering networking, taking a chance of that side hustle and saying yes to every opportunity. 

When he isn’t working, he loves cycling and being open to life’s possibilities. 

Former professional cricket player, strategy consultant, policy adviser, leadership coach, dad of three and Founder of Dadfit, Ryan Carters knows from experience that the road to satisfaction is rarely a straight line.

At 26, Ryan ended his award-winning professional cricket career to pursue a career contributing to social change. He founded and led the education-focused charity Batting for Change, studied public policy and leadership at Harvard, and has advised Australia’s leading organisations as a strategy consultant and leadership coach.

Today, Ryan is best known as the Founder of Dadfit, a non-profit organisation supporting fathers to enable healthy, gender equal families.

Founded because he wanted to be a better dad himself, challenge gender stereotypes, and create stronger families and communities, Dadfit connects and empowers dads to be the best they can be.

Ryan is a sought-after keynote speaker, facilitator and coach. He is inspirational and thoughtful and is adept at combining personal stories with data-driven insights that make people think, feel and remember what matters. He’d be a great addition at your next corporate gig, but he’s equally at home in an educational, recreational, or online setting.

Ryan lives in Melbourne with his wife and three children, and has an exceptional knowledge of Bluey episodes and inner north playgrounds.

Ryan’s dreams came true the day he landed a role at Cricket Australia. And that’s where he thought he’d stay, until the pandemic changed the course of his career.

He now spends his days helping others land their own dream jobs across the sporting world through his business SportsGrad which he founded with his good mate Reuben Williams.

In just a few years, Ryan and Reuben have built a strong community that’s morphed from a tiny idea, to a chart-topping careers podcast and now a fully fledged business and it’s where people across the world come if they want to work in the sports industry. 

SportsGrad helps people get their foot in the door of the sports industry, propels them up the ladder in their current roles and fills vacancies across the big wide world of sport. 

He’s an entertaining and inspirational public speaker who lifts the mood of every room he steps into with his positivity and storytelling ability.

Sam has been described as a dreamer and a doer since he arrived in Australia as an 8-year-old from Iraq in 1997.   

He’s achieved so much since his humble beginnings at Villawood Immigration Detention Centre and this short biography only tells you a fraction of his story. 

Apart from founding Startup Speakers, Sam has worked as the Head of Commercial at Acusensus, a world leader in road safety technology, where he helped secure over $120 million in contracted revenue in four years, he co-founded an online conveyancing business Settle Easy, facilitates the Regional Angel Investor Network and has founded Almaliki & Co, which provides cross-industry solutions to businesses and governments.

His entrepreneurial spirit shines brightly wherever he goes whether he’s on a board, advising early-stage businesses or identifying innovative solutions to deliver real-world measurable results.

Before his startup career, Sam worked at Cricket Australia and he’s also held leadership positions at the ABC Advisory Council, been a member of the SBS Advisory Committee, chaired the Caulfield Racecourse Reserve Trust and the John Curtin Research Centre – does he ever stop?

Sam is engaging, passionate and has an infectious positivity that makes him a great keynote speaker. He’s never lost for words and is good fun on panels, in workshops and MC-ing events of all shapes and sizes.  

When Tina began Alt. Leather in mid-2022, she had no idea how much she didn’t know about disrupting the $70 billion plastic leather industry.

Ever since, she’s been fast-tracking her learning about the whole startup gamut by joining every startup network she could find, applying for several grants and accelerator programs, attending every online session available on capital raising and the associated legal requirements, and pitching to investors.  

In other words, she’s hustled!

It’s part of the reason she’s recently closed a massively oversubscribed seed funding round, raising a total of $1.1 million, which will be deployed to complete R&D, secure a provisional patent and kick-off product development with a range of local and international brands.

Tina is perfect for Startup Speakers because hers is a case study of how it’s done, from building a solid network, keeping key stakeholders engaged, validating your market, understanding your value proposition, being ready for anything and accepting there will be failures along the way. 

One of the most important things she says she’s learned is how to block out the negative statistics surrounding investment in female founders, ‘I backed myself and the Alt. Leather team, and now, many others do, too.’

Will Richards is a co-founder of Overnight Success, a weekly newsletter on a mission to make the Aussie startup and VC ecosystem more accessible, transparent and connected. This startup is a 100% bootstrapped media brand often shining a light on stories that don’t even make the cutting room floor of mainstream media outlets.

Will started his career in startup land while studying at university with entry level roles at two digital car insurance businesses. That’s where he fell in love with this fast paced world where small teams can have a huge impact.

He then spent several years working within private equity focused on the early education sector. This role focused on large transactions and turn-around businesses and gave him his first chance to invest in early stage startups. 

Now, as the Head of Investments for the Regional Angel Investor Network and CEO of Startup Speakers, Will is able to combine his passion for storytelling and impactful investment, something he says is ‘mission impossible’ without the right team by his side.