FOLLOWING the completion of the Barayamal Accelerator program, five Indigenous entrepreneurs will present their businesses at an investor pitch event – the Barayamal Demo Day and Awards – at the Victorian Innovation Hub in Melbourne on October 25.

Assisted by LaunchVic – the state’s startup agency – this national event will bring together Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australians to showcase some of the best Indigenous entrepreneurs in Australia. Organisers said the event would show the world that Indigenous entrepreneurs exist – like the black swans described by the Indigenous Barayamal name – and they can also build successful businesses.

Five innovative Indigenous businesses were selected for the Barayamal Accelerator, which provided free co-working space at the Victorian Innovation Hub, mentoring and training from industry experts, along with financial support for the growth of their companies.

“The Indigenous entrepreneurs have grown their businesses and will now showcase their successes at the culminating demo pitch night, which is now open to the general public to register to attend with over 100 attendees  including investors, professionals, community and government representatives expected to attend,” Barayamal CEO Dean Foley said. 

One of those successful businesses featured is Binary Security, which has already received enquiries for partnerships from Australasian and South East Asian countries.

“I feel that indigenous business in Australia is set to explode onto the world stage and being part of it is both incredibly exciting and humbling,” Binary Security director Stewart Stacey said.

Mr Stacey said through the Barayamal Accelerator program the participants had learned the importance of embedding Indigenous culture into their businesses. One of the outcomes for Binary Security was the opportunity to engage with a second national enterprise customer for cyber consulting services.

As part of the Accelerator program, the business had also deployed its first proof of concept (POC) for digital product into an enterprise customer of 1,100 users.

“We have received enquiries for partnerships in Fiji, New Zealand, China, Indonesia and the Philippines,” Mr Stacey said. And the company has now opened a new office.

Other participant in the Barayamal Accelerator program were Pawa Catering and Events owner and operator, Niyoka Bundle; Pearlii CEO Kyle Turner; Our Songlines director and CEO, Kayla Cartledge; and Ngali founder, Denni Francisco.

INDIGENOUS STARTUPS LAUNCH

Barayamal CEO Dean Foley said an accelerator program typically helps startups to gain access to business networks, knowledge, expertise and early-stage funding they need to build successful businesses. 

Mr Foley said Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander entrepreneurs can make a valuable contribution to this momentum towards innovation if they build and grow companies with a global impact.

“The Barayamal Accelerator wants to help Indigenous entrepreneurs achieve just that,” Mr Foley said.

“At Barayamal, we believe that entrepreneurship and technology can change the world for the better. We do this by building technology solutions, running business accelerator programs, free events, the Indigipreneur podcast, school-based education and by investing time and funding Indigenous startups, which are the high-growth economic and employment solution.”

Mr Foley also acknowledged the support Barayamal receives from LaunchVic.

This program is an initiative of Tharamba Bugheen, the Victorian Aboriginal Business Strategy 2017-2021, released by the Victorian Government in March 2017. Tharamba Bugheen recognises that economic advancement of Aboriginal Victorians is critical for self-determination and is making significant investments to support this agenda.

“LaunchVic is thrilled to be supporting indigenous entrepreneurs through the Barayamal Accelerator Program,” LaunchVic  CEO Kate Dornick said.

“We wish the five startups who participated in the inaugural cohort the all very best at their upcoming Demo Day and are looking forward to watching them succeed, as we follow their startup journeys.”

Mr Foley said Barayamal means ‘Black Swan’ in the Gamilaraay language. Its significance is that black swans were first seen by Europeans in 1697 but, before that, Europeans had only known of a white swan.

“In this instance, the black swan represents Indigenous entrepreneurs who have not been noticed in the world for their innovation,” Mr Foley said. “Barayamal plans to show the world that Indigenous entrepreneurs exist and they can also build global businesses.”

www.barayamal.com

ends

By Leon Gettler >>

AFTER starting business just 10 years ago, Fred Schebesta is now in charge of a $1 billion global enterprise.

Finder.com is a global phenomenon as a comparison website.

“We’re obsessed about helping customers make better decisions,” Finder co-founder Mr Schebesta told Talking Business.

“We help people learn and solve their problems on the site and go on to make great decisions because decisions at the end of the day help you better your life and get you into a better situation so that you can go on and do the things you want to do.”

At its core, Finder.com offers lots of tables and comparisons on the website. This means customers can compare credit cards, mortgages, insurance, personal loans, broadband offerings and mobile phone plans. 

The site offers hundreds of different things people can compare to get the best possible deal and it’s all free.

A GOOD IDEA GOES GLOBAL

The company has now turned itself into a global business.

“We started here in Sydney Australia and we’ve slowly but surely grown,’’ Mr Schebesta said. “We now have offices in the US and the UK. We also market to the rest of the world – Singapore, Hong Kong, Canada, New Zealand, and we’re really pushing on our vision bettering all the world’s decisions.”

Mr Schebesta has also set up a venture capital arm for the business, Finder Ventures, which invests in new businesses.

One of these new businesses is the crypto currency brokerage Hive X. It is also moving into the ‘fin-tech’ space.

His advice for other start-ups wanting to expand is to think global.

“I think that it’s really important if you want to build a global business that you need to get out of Australia,” Mr Schebesta said.

“Australia doesn’t have the same dynamics as the rest of the world. It’s actually a bit of an island, it’s a small place on the earth. And it has similar systems to the UK.

“When you go to other countries and you realise the state of things and the innovations that are taking place and the cadence of the majority of the population, you’ll find it’s very different to what’s happening in Australia.

“The second thing I would do is ensure your business is robust and scalable and tested in a small way. So do it small first and start to build on it and then once you find some success, you go from there,” he said. 

“A lot of people go for a big bang but that’s not really my style. My style is a consistent, considered approach and hen when we find success, we invest big. 

“That’s what we did in the US and the UK. We put a lot of money into those businesses.

“We want to make the first global comparison service.”

www.finder.com

www.leongettler.com

Hear the complete interview and catch up with other topical business news on Leon Gettler’s Talking Business podcast, released every Friday at www.acast.com/talkingbusiness.  

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By Leon Gettler >>

STRUGGLING businesses looking for assistance can expect to get some ‘sweat equity’ from Tamara Loehr.

Ms Loehr has delved into the world of investment with a current focus on her online beauty-disrupter, Dollar Beauty Tribe, designed to promote cruelty-free, vegan indie brands. Ms Loehr has become globally known as a leading wellness entrepreneur.

What she does is she goes out into the world looking for businesses need what she calls ‘sweat equity’.

Her businesses include hair care, a health range, and vitamins. She also looks for businesses she can invest in and grow through her ‘sweat equity’ model, which sees her investing her marketing services, instead of money.

“There’s a real gap in the market, there’s a lot of small businesses that need help with their business,” Ms Loehr told Talking Business.

“They’re not going to get access to capital unless they have a business that’s usually over $10 million, preferably around the $20 million mark because that’s less risky for investors. 

“But before that, they often need a lot of help so that’s where I come in, I fill that gap. I come in where they might be struggling.”

‘SMARTS’ BETTER THAN CAPITAL

Ms Loehr said for a lot of small business, capital was not the best thing they need from angel investors – it’s business ‘smarts’ – as many of them spend that money figuring out the lessons more experienced businesses have already learned.

This is where Ms Loehr, who had an agency for 20 years before she turned investor, comes in and – if she sees the business has a great product but is really struggling with the market and struggling with the dollars to create marketing campaigns – she will take equity in exchange for marketing.

This is something a new business would not ordinarily be able to afford with her agency, and she gets them to their key milestones – which is, primarily, how much revenue they want to achieve.

The businesses she chooses are usually product-based operations in the wellness sector. Her mandate is vegan, organic and cruelty-free.

VALUE INVALUABLE

The business is valued with due diligence, assessed, and priced as if it was being sold in the real market or raising capital. Ms Loehr provides her equity to the business in services.

So if, for example, the business is valued at $200,000 and she takes 50 percent, she will give that business $100,000 worth of marketing. Ms Loehr then has to get them to a certain agreed target to take that 50 percent. If they don’t reach that target, she gives them back their equity.

A timeline is put in place, and that is critical.

“That’s really good for me because if, in 12 months, I have given them four or five hundred thousand dollars of free marketing time and agency time, and a little bit of capital, if that doesn’t work in 12 months, and I’m not hitting those targets, I believe in failing quickly, I’ll pull out,” Ms Loehr said. 

“Because at the end of the day, if that business isn’t reaching those targets, that business isn’t one I would want to be on the bus of. So fail quickly, give them back their equity and move on to the next project.”

Then again, as she says, that hasn’t happened too often.

www.loehrblend.com

www.leongettler.com

Hear the complete interview and catch up with other topical business news on Leon Gettler’s Talking Business podcast, released every Friday at www.acast.com/talkingbusiness.  

ends

By Leon Gettler >>

LIVESMILES, brought to you by independent software vendor LiveTiles, is an intelligent corporate wellness solution, kicked off in collaboration with global launch partner Microsoft.

Available on a freemium model, LiveSmiles incorporates key features. These include an artificial intelligence-powered Bot Assistant, data analytics and insights. It also provides real-time recommendations to managers on how to improve engagement and understanding of wellness of employees.

Peter Nguyen-Brown, LiveTiles co-founder and executive director, said wellness is a growth area.

“Our aim is to make wellness part of the workplace as opposed to an after-thought which it often is today,” Mr Nguyen-Brown told Talking Business. 

He said it offered the complete range of technologies from LiveTiles which is listed on the ASX.

“What we’re effectively doing is taking all the technology that we’ve built over these four years, tailor it to a wellness activity, a wellness solution for the workplace and we’re giving it away for free globally so we think that combining all our technology and doing something with it in a global viral sense it can have a big impact,” Mr Nguyen-Brown said.

“Effectively what it’s doing is providing organisations with the ability to build and tailor their own wellness portal, their own wellness solution that suits them.”

He said about 70 percent of companies were trying to do something with wellness but modelling it as an add-on to employees’ workplace experience.

“What we’re finding is that most wellness strategies with organisations are actually overwhelming employees so what we’re doing is helping companies by providing the technology behind it,” Mr Nguyen-Brown said. “We see a lot of companies trying hard but they don’t have the technology to support it.”

WELLNESS SPECTRUM

Mr Nguyen-Brown said wellness was a broad area. For some it was physical health, for others it was mental health. Some saw it as a matter of mindfulness, while for others it was about spirituality.

The key here was to allow employers and employees use the technology to develop a wellness solution that suited them.

He said the wellness industry was growing massively.

“By connecting really good wellness experts with employers, it’s up to them to forge relationships and engage employees,” Mr Nguyen-Brown said.

At the same time, different companies and employees had their own take on wellness. For some it could be about mental health, for others it could be physical health starting with the basics of yoga classes to getting people on their bikes. 

“If we can connect the wellness industry with some of the best employers in Australia, we can accelerate those outcomes,” he said.

Mr Nguyen-Brown said it also worked as a platform to help employers and employees collaborate on their existing initiatives.

https://www.livetiles.nyc/intelligent-intranet/livesmiles

www.leongettler.com

Hear the complete interview and catch up with other topical business news on Leon Gettler’s Talking Business podcast, released every Friday at www.acast.com/talkingbusiness.  

ends