This Week in Australian Startups #91, 3rd November 2024

A busy weekend with family visiting - mostly involving me running around (attempting to) my daughter and niece, so short and sweet just with the updates below :)

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Top News

• WiseTech scandal ‘a missed opportunity’ to show leadership (The Australian)

• Atlassian Shares Surge 18% on Cloud Revenue Growth and New Executive Hire (AFR)

• Deep tech VC Main Sequence is bolstering its healthcare investment strategy (Capital Brief)

• Founder Institute reveals 7 ANZ startups to emerge from its pre-seed accelerator (Startup Daily)

• Immutable, is facing allegations from the SEC that it broke securities laws when it was issued and traded cryptocurrency tokens (AFR)

• Milkrun founder Milham returns to Koala as CEO (AFR)

• US securities watchdog flags legal action against blockchain Immutable (Capital Brief)

• Victoria’s VC fund posts loss after grants drop off (InnovationAus)

• Afterpay co-founder and buy now, pay later pioneer Anthony Eisen steps down (The Australian)

• Calls to defund Grok Academy, WiseTech programs after scandals (The Age)

• Canva valuation jumps 23% to $49 billion following share trade (Startup Daily)

• Google laments that it 'overpaid' Australian news publishers (Capital Brief)

• Landmark NRF startup deals within weeks (InnovationAus)

• Private equity EQT has acquired HR software business PageUp (AFR)

• Battery tech startup eLumina’s $20m Gold Coast EV charger factory aims to bridge the country divide (BNA)

• CSIRO looks to commercialise printed solar cells (InnovationAus)

• MEX Maintenance Software has been acquired by Boston-based growth equity firm Silversmith Capital Partners in a deal understood to be worth as much as $125M (AFR)

• Podium Australia expands into Melbourne to create 55 new jobs (ARN)

• Xero faces allegations of pay discrimination, bullying in Fair Work lawsuit (Capital Brief)

• Angry members brand Tech Council a ‘billionaires lunch club’ (AFR)

• AnteoTech scores first-ever ARENA battery manufacturing grant (InnovationAus)

• SXSW Sydney pitch winner NanoCube Health scores $3M federal grant for pancreatic cancer plans (Startup Daily)

• Vaxxas granted licence to develop new needle-free vaccine (InnovationAus)

• Workplace app firm SafetyCulture narrows losses, but profit elusive (AFR)

• 10 new startups from University of Newcastle’s I2N accelerator (Startup Daily)

• Aconex founder Leigh Jasper calls for major mindset shift on startup exits (Capital Brief)

• LaunchVic has up to $1M in grants to make people better investors (Startup Daily)

• Siteminder shares rise on Q1 growth, reiterated FY guidance (Capital Brief)

• Canva's Magic Studio has been honored as one of TIME Magazine’s Best Inventions of 2024 (Cameron Adams)

• Atlassian has announced its new CRO - Brian Duffy, and some thoughts via Loom from Mike Cannon-Brookes (Mike Cannon-Brookes)

• Breakthrough Victoria Annual Report 2023 - 24 (Breakthrough Victoria)

• Calls to defund Grok Academy, WiseTech programs after scandals (SMH)

• Psylo, Tessara Therapeutics, and the Brain and Mind Centre, University of Sydney have been awarded a $3M CRC-P grant to develop novel neuroplastogens for the treatment of substance use disorders (PR Newswire)

Funding Rounds

• Neara, an AI-powered predictive modelling software platform for critical infrastructure, has raised a $47.2M Series C from Square Peg, EQT and Partners Group (Capital Brief | BNA)

• PMY Group, a full-service technology solutions company that supports venues and major events of all types to enhance their infrastructure, experience and intelligence, has raised an undisclosed sum from Alignment Growth Management (BNA)

• Earthodic, a green packaging startup which is the creator of Biobarc, a water-resistant coating derived from bio-based materials, has raised a $6.1M Seed round from FTW Ventures, Circulate Capital, QIC, UniQuest Fund, Significant Capital Ventures, Branch Venture Group and RedStick (Startup Daily | Capital Brief)

• exteRNA, which is developing a set of novel drugs capable of regulating RNA biology for the treatment of cancer, has raised an $11M Seed round from IP Group, Tin Alley Ventures, WEHI Ventures and HostPlus (BNA)

• 2cloudnine, a payroll and billing applications built on Salesforce for the Staffing and Healthcare Sectors, has raised an undisclosed sum from Partners for Growth (2cloudnine)

• Antler has invested $225K in Pre-Seed funding each into Authentified, Balo, Bella, Communiti Labs, Frontcover, JubJub, Lyngo AI, Pactify, Seestone, Shopfront, Spoony and Yeyro (Startup Daily)