💌 Aussie start-up & Venture Capital Retro! 3rd of September

G'day and welcome to Overnight Success, the weekly newsletter that levels you up on Aussie start-ups. GM to the 13 new subscribers who join 278 other legends learning about Aussie start-ups. 

Welcome to an exciting edition. This week I teased on Twitter a new hat design for readers of Overnight Success! These bad boys are custom-made and will keep your melon sun-smart, and looking great. Best of all, the hat is free! All you need to do is share Overnight Success with your 20 friends who love start-ups. Please don't force your grandma to subscribe like I did when I started writing. There's more information at the bottom of the email with your custom referral link! 

Headlines: 

• 😇 Angel Investment syndicates are growing in numbers and capital. (The Australian)

  • Investment syndicates allow investors to get exposure to high growth (and high risk) investments. 

  • Syndicates can build a big list of investors who could potentially aid a start-up with advice and introductions.

  • Large syndicates have exceptional deal flow and utilise their network of investors to source and share deals. 

• 🛬 The Tech Council of Australia argued that migration is key to building the sector and there should be changes to immigration quotas. (AFR)

1. Start-up retro: Australia's start-up raises with a smidge of context.

2. New Fund, Who's this? New VC Funds!

3. Notice Board: Signposting key events and opportunities in the ecosystem.

4. Gigs: Hand picked opportunities at start-ups or investment firms.

5. Accredited Tweeters: Snippets from Twitter!

6. (KaaS) Knowledge as a Services: Articles to make you smarter. Or share with co-workers to make them think you’re smart.

Start-up Retro! 

MarTech

🚴‍♀️ Lumos

News: Don’t be a walking billboard, be a riding billboard. LUMOS, the Martech platform that outs advertising space on delivery gig drivers, has raised an $800K pre-seed round. The cash came from Claremont Capital and Orcas Capital with various angels contributing. LUMOS digitizes the space on backpack boxes that your Indian takeaway sits in. The mini-digital billboards are connected via an IoT network. They can display various advertisements which depend on the people they're near. Presently, LUMOS works with larger brands like Sushi Hub and Crust Pizza. The team sees a pathway to smaller brands with geo-targeted advertising. Imagine, leaving a nightclub and seeing the local kebab shop advertised on all the delivery drivers in the area. The capital will be used to scale in Australia and improve the platform for advertisers. The platform hopes to bring a rich data set to marketing managers for larger brands.  

Read more about it: (Business News Australia)

Climate Tech

⚖️ NetNada

News: NetNada, a platform that allows business to measure their carbon output, has raised $200K from Skalata Ventures. Taking advantage of growing tailwinds in ESG reporting requirements. NetNadas platform takes your Xero accounting receipts and spits out an actionable report. SMEs can then utilise these insights to take action on their net neutrality journey. The start-up also has partnered with Climate Active. This partnership allows NetNada to provide a carbon-neutral business with a certificate. A business may leverage this certificate with its customers or key stakeholders. NetNada is far cheaper than expensive ESG consultants and provides actionable recommendations which cut through “greenwashing solutions”. The capital will be used to grow the customer base and invest in the platform. 

Read more about it: (Start-up Daily)

IT Security

💻 Devicie

News: The Sydney-based IT Security start-up Devicie, has raised $14MUSD. The cash is a Series A led by Insight Partners (New York) with participation from CyberCX. Previously, Devicie raised a $30K pre-seed in 2020 and a $1.3MUSD Seed in early 2022. The platform is built on Microsoft Intune and enables IT, teams, to control and maintain entire device fleets at scale. Devicie leans on automation to remove monotonous IT workflows and targets enterprise organisations. Investment from CyberCX is a positive signal as they’re a leader in combatting cyber threats. Interestingly, the terms sheet for the capital was signed in April, but due to the election, the Foreign Investment Review Board took till now to approve the deal. Devicie will look to secure more large clients in Australia with eyes looking internationally for new clients. 

Read more about it: (AFR)

MarTech / Development

📱 Atomic.io

News: Wellington-based Martech company, Atomic.io, has raised $5M to target the Australian market. Atomic.io has built a low-code development platform. This platform helps marketing and digital teams optimize very small customer interactions. The platform feeds customers small card questionnaires which can improve conversions and information gathering. Other use cases include multi-step user journeys that feel simpler than they really are. The SaaS business has a foothold in NZ with the likes of three banks and a supermarket chain. Australia is the next target for Atomic.io with the business likely targeting similar opportunities. 

Read more about it: (RNZ)

FinTech

🧮 Anility

News: Anility, the Sydney-based FinTech that automates the extraction and consolidation of financial data has raised a $600K seed round. The platform takes out expensive and time-consuming work done by accounting professionals. This helps finance teams collect and analyse financial statements, quickly. Currently, the platform targets businesses in lending, insurance and procurement. The technology utilises a single API. Anility can also be used by banks, lenders and insurers to assess the financial health of a business they’re lending to. While the funding environment may be hard to raise capital, it may be perfect for Anility to grow. It's an easy sell when you can save a company on expensive wages and time. The cash will be used for further development and headcount growth. 

Read more about it:  (Australian Fintech)

HealthTech

👩‍⚕️ Midnight.Health

News: Midnight.health has raised a $12M Series A led by nib. The platform centralises patient health information which improves their outcomes and speed. Nib, the health insurance company, led the round which follows on from their previous $4M investment in November 2021. The platform offers the usual gamut of services from a modern HealthTech. Telehealth and prescription delivery come as standard. The differentiation comes with men's and women's brands called Stagger and Youly, respectively. The customer base has surpassed 30,000. The platform, hub.health, is particularly helpful for regional Australias. These Aussies can be referred for services via telehealth rather than waiting. Nib's investment is strategic with aims to make Australians healthier. Their sizable investment values the business at $48M.  

Read more about it: ((Start-up Daily)

New Fund, Who's this?

• Matt Berriman, the cofounder of Adtech business Unlockd, starts new venture fund called RealVC.

  • RealVC will kick off with a $50M venture fund targeting pre-seed and seed stage tech start-ups.

  • In particular, the fund will target areas its team have experience in including health tech, media and proptech.

Notice Board

• 🧑‍🤝‍🧑Friends of the newsletter, the community collective are launching their 7-week cohort. It's shaping up to be a great group learning about community building. Check it out here!

• 💰Love Fintech? Chris Titley has put together Sub11, a FinTech-focused digital publication that covers everything from capital raises to revenue growth. He's building something pretty epic over there and gets pretty deep with company updates. Check it out here.

• 🥝Blackbird.vc is hosting Sunrise Aotearoa next week. Don't be surprised when a few VC's take slightly longer to reply to your emails. At least they're not at burning man...

Gigs

• Square Peg is hiring an investor in global tech. Apply here.

  • Based in Melbourne or Sydney,

• Sprint Ventures is hiring an onsite junior marketing consultant in Brisbane. Apply here.

Accredited Tweeters

(KaaS) Knowledge as a Service 

• The notion guide of first principles thinking.

• How the Economic Machine Works by Ray Dalio. (30min video)

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