Peter Thiel – best known as the founder of PayPal – has been a prolific start-up investor. He’s had his eye on New Zealand companies for a while, but ventured into Australia for the first time last month leading a $1.2 million round in ScriptRock.
James Packer has been a key force in the online space during the past 18 months. In February, he put $5 million in an eCommerce company that allows people to book and track shipments online – Temando.
StyleTread is attempting to become the Zappos of Australia, stocking thousands of pairs of shoes and promising some rapid shipping. Founded in 2010 by Mark Rowland and Bjorn Behrendt, the company originally took money from Lakestar. But in a series C funding round this March, the company raised another $12 million.
Telstra’s venture capital arm made its first investment earlier this year, buying a stake in online restaurant booking service Dimmi, the company started by entrepreneur Stevan Premutico back in 2009.
It seems the restaurant scene is heating up. Optus purchased restaurant review site Eatability for $6 million in July, nine years after it was launched by Celeste and Hui Ong. It hosts 235,000 reviews and 37,000 listings.
This custom shoe retailer was founded by husband and wife team Michael and Jodie Fox, along with Mike Knapp, back in 2009. The company is regularly held up as a case study for the new breed of successful, Australian online retailers.
Back in June, the company raised $3 million from investors, which include Atlassian co-founder Mike Cannon-Brookes.
Cannon-Brookes has his own success story – Atlassian raised millions from Accel Partners in 2011.
Read about the Shoes of Prey deal here.
APN News & Media started with BrandsExclusive and continued with a stake in group buying platform MyTeamDeals in June.
The attraction to the company despite being situated in the saturated group buying market is its target – sporting deals. Larger, more general deals companies are struggling while targeted, niche-based sites are continuing to thrive.
This deal isn’t actually an acquisition of an Australian company – but rather the other way around. Freelancer has grown into a local success story after starting in 2009, founded by tech entrepreneur Matt Barrie. In July, he snapped up Canadian marketplace Scriptlance.
It’s yet another example of an Australian online company finding global success and extending its reach– Atlassian, 99Designs and Halfbrick have found similar success.
Read about the Scriptlance deal here.
Adelaide based tech start-up Thereitis.com raised $2 million back in February for an undisclosed stake. The company has a technology product built on displaying large collections of information at once.
The biotech sector in Australia has been gaining steam alongside those online retailers and group buying companies. Earlier this year, venture capital group OneVentures led a $15 million round in needle-free vaccine system produced by Dr Mark Kendall, known as Vaxxas.
Patrick Stafford is a freelance journalist and a former deputy editor of SmartCompany.
