🇦🇺 This Week in Australian Startups #114, 4th May 2025
Top News
Atlassian shares plummet on swing to quarterly loss, revenue guidance (Capital Brief)
WiseTech is “accelerating” its acquisition spree, confirming it’s in talks to buy New York-listed logistics software company e2open (The Australian)
Antler backs 8 new AI-first startups, from robotics to health, cybersecurity and fintech, in its 12th cohort (Startup Daily)
From $100m to $1m: Inside Swoop Aero's tumultuous sale (Capital Brief)
Mighty Partners taps ex-Macquarie banker and secures Zip Co co-founder backing to grow loan book to $100m over the next two years (AFR)
Tech roles surge 55% in digitisation decade (InnovationAus)
Thinking Machines Lab, led by ex-OpenAI CTO Mira Murati, seeks $2b seed round at $10b valuation led by a16z with Square Peg, Airtree set to buy in (AFR)
Third Door Ventures builds on its proptech vision with acquisition of iBuildNew (BNA)
Losses rise at $1b start-up Pet Circle despite growing sales (AFR)
Project Hawke: Bridget Loudon’s Expert360 hunts capital partner (AFR)
Australian IVF screening start-up pulls Nasdaq IPO, blames US tariffs (AFR)
Australian workers lead the world in mistrust of AI (The Australian)
Forensics software biz bdna courts private equity (AFR)
MGA Thermal unveils world-first renewable steam system (Capital Brief)
Silicon Valley’s Stripe eyeballs Tyro’s languishing share price (AFR)
Bailador-backed PropHero guts local operations despite $100m valuation (AFR)
Funding Rounds
Zyft, a price comparison app, has raised $7.5m from Angel Investors (BNA | Startup Daily | Capital Brief)
Fluency, which is building the OS for operations through an AI powered platform that documents, observes and catches bottlenecks and risks in real time, , has raised $1.5m in a Pre-Seed round from Archangel Ventures, 1MX.ai, Orvel Ventures, Swinburne University of Technology, NextGen Ventures, Exhort Ventures and Angel Investors (BNA | SmartCompany)
Finder, Australia's most-visited financial comparison site, has raised an undisclosed amount in a Media-for-Equity round from Scaleup Mediafund (Startup Daily | BNA)