Following Startups & Tech Trends

Vishal Sharma Monday, July 14, 2008 Australia , Business , Entrepreneur , Innovation , Interview , Online , Service , Startup , Technology , Tools , Web 0 comments

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Vishal Sharma Tuesday, July 08, 2008 Australia , Business , Software Development , Startup , Ventures 0 comments

Today we showcase an exciting and a successful technology business co-founded by Keith Lang, from Canberra, Australia. plasq - Best known for “Comic Life”, is a software company that create applications for Mac and PC. It’s a bit over 3 years old and gained recognition in the Mac community when Comic Life was bundled with all new Macs for a period of a year. plasq has also won various awards for it’s software and works hard to design fun, intuitive and creative visual applications.
In a recent email based interview with Keith, he gave insights into his venture and how he is progressing with it. This is what he has to say:

• Please tell us about yourself, your background and interests?
Keith Lang, Co-Founder of plasq. I’m a musician by training, with a Bachelor Degree in Classical Music Composition. I was involved in audio software for quite some time, on the musicians side of things, before getting involved in the software side.

• Who are the people behind this and how it started?
Robert Grant, Cris Pearson and Keith Lang founded plasq – based initially around a project to release software developed by a community of people. Musolomo was actually the first release, an audio application plugin built for live performance – coded by Airy André who would join plasq officially at a later stage. The next release was Comic Life -- an application that lets users turn their digital pictures into comic strips and share the fun results.

• How long it took before it was up and running?
The first released product Comic Life had been in production for about 3 months prior, with the original idea by Robert Grant. Then Cris Pearson and Keith Lang joined Rob to improve the user experience.

• What is the main objective/mission behind your venture?
To create intuitive, meaningful software that lets people express themselves.

• What services it provides it for consumer or customers?
Fun Software!

• What type of customers you are targeting?
Anyone with a reasonably modern computer. And now also iPhones and iPod Touch’s.

• How many people are using your services?
Millions.

• What sort of marketing you are using to spread the word?
Some Google Adwords, some online sites. We’ve never bought magazine or other traditional media ads.

• How are you measuring the success of your venture? Are their any special mechanisms/tools in place to monitor the progress?
We have various ad tracking schemes to follow the initial click on an ad, to download.

• What is the monetizing/revenue model? Is their any new model, which is being tried?
We are mostly traditionally shareware based. That is, download the software, trial it for 30 days, if you like it then purchase a serial number or the software has its features reduced after the trial.

• Which are the main competitors or major players in this market segment?
We have many excellent competitors, from large companies with overlapping applications like Power Point with it’s callouts/balloons, to online sites which offer some of the features of Comic Life.

• What are the main technologies used behind this venture?
Most of our applications are coded in Cocoa, which is a Objective-C based language that Mac applications usually use. The PC ports (versions) of our software use C+, I believe.

• What has been the most easy to use, out of box and helpful technology?
Most of the Apple technology has really improved in leaps and bounds over the last 7 years, and so now offers a really pleasant and efficient development space.

• Are you using lot of open source tool sets for this?
Only for our website, and occasional ‘generic’ things in the applications.

• What is your operating environment (operating system) and what type of database you are using?
I’m not sure what kind of database actually – we have various things for different needs. We use Mac OS X primarily.

• What’s your thought on being an entrepreneur? How tough it is to start a venture in Australia?
plasq is an unusual company in that we work across continents. Only a small part of plasq is in Australia, and the company itself is an LLC in South Carolina, US. We have people in Norway, France, both sides of the US and work with artists in Austria, Japan and South America.

My personal thoughts on starting a venture in Australia is that people think locally too much. We set ourselves up using free online services like Skype, and have functioned for years using online collaboration tools. Of course, this does not suit every industry, but there are many functions of a company where better talent could be found around the world, or in another part of Australia.

• What’s your thought on the start-ups culture and innovation coming out of Australia especially in media and telecom?
There’s some startups in this country in the media and telco space – but to be honest I believe a lot of them eventually leave for the US, because it’s a hub for this kind of work. Another factor is that this country has such poor internet access. The fact we don’t have affordable broadband for everyone is hurting Australia, in my opinion.

• The conventional computing model is shifting to Cloud computing which is comprised of SAAS, PAAS and IAAS (infrastructure). This has resulted in changes to conventional monetising model? How do you see the future of business in terms of technology and revenue model?
Cloud and desktop/Mobile applications will continue to blur – but I’m not sure how the infrastructure will affect it.

• What do you think the government (federal and state) should do to improve the culture of innovation and the telecom industry?
Subsidise broadband for everyone.

• If you are given an opportunity to change the nation, what 3 things you will do?

• Subsidise Broadband so that everyone has access to it.
• Get kids involved in computer development early on, not just users
• Put serious money into Solar Power research

• You are a prolific and a well-established blogger and podscaster. How do you manage this with work?
Well, I’ve just changed my blog to UIandus.com, which is focussing much more on User Interaction design than my previous blog. The resulting overlap should help both my work and blogging.

• How often do you catch up with others trying similar things and where do you catch up? Do you have dedicated communities in your city?
I’ve recently moved to Canberra, from Melbourne for personal reasons. Melbourne has quite a good technical community, and they often meet for social lunches etc. under the umbrella of organizations like tequp.com Canberra has a much smaller community, and tends to focus on Government work, rather than entrepreneurship. I get to San Francisco about twice a year, and really enjoy meeting all the movers and shakers there.

• Do you have any advice for people who want to start their venture?
Don’t think you have to spend money to get started. Beg, borrow what you need and start making customers early on. Listen to what they say, and measure your results to improve your strategy. Trust yourself when designing – build the things you want to use and then also ‘eat your own dogfood’. We have found Government grants to not suit us, sometimes it seems better to just build something small you can sell, then scale up to the final idea. Software is great for this because you have very few material costs during the startup period. Build a team of positive, realistic people who are not too similar to one another. Try to find a business-minded person with some experience. Scale up slowly and always have a plan B. Talk to the people who have been successful in your industry as they’re often happy to share their insights. Remember that the customer experience is the main focus at all times. Whenever you spend effort or money, measure the results afterwards. Make sure you are enjoying it most of the time!

Thanks Keith for sharing your thoughts with us. All the best for future.

For coverage on other Australian startups, innovation, tech trends check this out and our coverage on interviews can be found here

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Vishal Sharma Monday, July 07, 2008 Australia , Business , Computers , ITIL , Software Development , Technology , Tools 0 comments

Today we showcase an exciting and a successful technology business co-founded by Aram Mirkazemi, from Tasmania, Australia. Morfik - a commercial vendor of professional software development tools. Morfik was established to address the need for an integrated high-end development tool that empowers software developers to leverage their existing skills to build Rich Internet Applications without the need to master Web technologies such as HTML/CSS/HTTP/SOAP etc.

In a recent email based interview with Aram, he gave insights into his venture and how he is progressing with it. This is what he has to say:

• Please tell us about yourself, your background and interests?
I am a professional software developer with many years of entrepreneurial experience in developing commercial CAD systems and Web Application Development tools. My interests are Rapid Application Development (RAD), Integrated Development Environments (IDE), Rich Internet Applications (RIA) Using Ajax and emerging technologies, protocols and standards.

• Who are the people behind this and how it started?
After a very successful venture in Electronic Design Automation (CAD) that resulted in an Initial Public Offering in 1999, myself and Sharam Besharati (another former Protel employee) started Morfik in 2000.

• How long it took before it was up and running?
Our vision of using the web technologies to develop applications that rival the desktop was considered by many as too radical and unachievable in year 2000. Developing an integrated professional tool to achieve our vision necessitated inventing several new techniques and enabling technologies without circumventing existing standards. It took five years of research and development before all pieces of the puzzle fitted together and we were ready to deliver the first public beta of our flagship product.

• What is the main objective/mission behind your venture?
To help software developers who have missed the professional Web development opportunities to join the game and leapfrog to the top.

• What type of customers you are targeting?
Software developers who are not active in web application development, as well as existing web developers who prefer to use a professional Integrated Development Environment (IDE).

• How many people are using your services?
We have had over 10,000 downloads to date

• What sort of marketing you are using to spread the word?
Internet marketing mainly

• How are you measuring the success of your venture? Are there any special mechanisms/tools in place to monitor the progress?
Number of licenses sold!

• What is the monetizing/revenue model? Is there any new model, which is being tried?
We prefer the simplicity of the long-established sale of software licenses. Should there be a demand we will also consider offering a simple subscription model similar to Microsoft’s MSDN.

• Which are the main competitors or major players in this market segment?
The main players are Microsoft, Adobe and Google. However, only Microsoft offers a commercial Integrated Development Environment. Microsoft, Adobe, and Google promote different exclusive technologies. As a development platform, Morfik follows the established standards and is more inclusive. Morfik applications can incorporate some of the technologies promoted by these players. So while commercially competitors, technologies offered by these vendors do not necessarily compete with the Morfik platform.

• What are the main technologies used behind this venture?
Compilers, Relational Database, Web Servers and W3C standards.

• Are you using lot of open source tool sets for this?
No

• What is your operating environment (operating system) and what type of database you are using?
The development environment is Microsoft Windows. Morfik web applications can run both on Windows or Linux based operating systems including Mac OSX.

• What’s your thought on being an entrepreneur? How tough it is to start a venture in Australia?
Being an entrepreneur is one of the greatest and most fulfilling journeys in life. It is very easy to be an entrepreneur; you just need to work hard!

• What’s your thought on the start-ups culture and innovation coming out of Australia especially in Software?
There are great Australian software start-ups that are world class. But unfortunately they go mostly unnoticed until they have success oversees. This has resulted in a cultural gap between start ups and the support infra-structure that helps them get started.

• The conventional computing model is shifting to Cloud computing which is comprised of SAAS, PAAS and IAAS (infrastructure). This has resulted in changes to conventional monetising model? How do you see the future of business in terms of technology and revenue model?
With cloud computing now being well on its way to deliver computing as a utility, businesses need to change their focus from IT infra-structure to business intelligence and automation. The market will no doubt experiment with new revenue models and over time the right model will emerge. In terms of software development tools no significant change in revenue model is necessary. The simplicity of either sale of licences or a subscription models will serve the purpose.

• What do you think the government (federal and state) should do to improve the culture of innovation and the telecom industry?
They are already doing a great job with the R&D tax rebate and export marketing grants. The federal and state governments are the largest user of ICT technologies. My advice to them is to look at home first otherwise in many cases you will be paying a lot more to buy Australian technology from overseas!

• If you are given an opportunity to change the nation, what 3 things you will do?
I will invest in that which will put Australia in the forefront of globalisation.
I will reward all innovation by assisting in its commercialisation.
I will reward productivity through profit sharing.

• How often do you catch up with others trying similar things and where do you catch up? Do you have dedicated communities in your city?
We are regular visitors and exhibitors in Information Technology conferences and forums around the world. There are no dedicated communities in our city.

• Do you have any advice for people who want to start their venture?
Don’t talk about it, just do it.

• Any external funding – from VC, Govt, Self funded
Morfik is self-funded

• Which City you are based in?
Hobart, Tasmania

Thanks Aram for sharing your thoughts with us. All the best for future.

For coverage on other Australian startups, innovation, tech trends check this out and our coverage on interviews can be found here

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Vishal Sharma Monday, June 30, 2008 Australia , Business , Interview , Online , Podcasting , Ventures , Web 0 comments

Today we showcase an exciting and a successful technology business co founded by Cameron Reilly , from Australia,The Podcast Network - World's First Podcasting Business.

In a recent email based interview with Cameron, he gave insights into his venture and how he is progressing with it. This is what he has to say:

Please tell us about yourself, your background and interests?
I'm 37, stunningly handsome, brilliant, and like long walks on the beach.

What is the name of your venture/company?
I'm the founder of The Podcast Network, MODM, Geeks Who Care, Twittories and The Church of LOTU.

Please tell us about your venture/company?
Where to start?The Podcast Network - the world's first podcasting business. We currently produce over 80 podcasts with a monthly audience of about 500,000 people from around the world.
MODM - a monthly networking event for the digital media industryGeeks Who Care - a charity based on getting geeks together to use their geekful powers for good in their local communities.
Twittories - an experiment to get 140 people to collaborate on writing a short story using Twitter
The Church of LOTU - a church for atheists and critical thinkers.

Who are the people behind this and how it started?
Let's focus on TPN. My co-founder was a guy called Mick Stanic but he left the business about a year after we started it in Feb 2005. TPN was formed off the back of the podcast Mick and I started doing in Nov2004 called "G'Day World", which was the first Australian podcast (which now makes it the longest running Australian podcast).

How long it took before it was up and running?
It took us about two months from the day we came up with the idea to start something to launching the site.

What is the main objective/mission behind your venture?
To build a 21st century global media company that can change the world.

What services it provides it for consumer or customers?
Audio and video podcasts mainly, but we recently published our first book (in both paperback and e-book formats).

What type of customers you are targeting?
Intelligent people who want to change the world.

How many people are using your services?
about 500,000.

What sort of marketing you are using to spread the word?
Just word of blog.

How are you measuring the success of your venture? Are their any special mechanisms/tools in place to monitor the progress?
We look at the stats.

What is the monetizing/revenue model? Is their any new model, which is being tried?
We're selling advertising. Not much of it yet, but that's the plan.

Which are the main competitors or major players in this market segment?
The entire radio industry, the entire television industry, and everyone with a podcast.

What are the main technologies used behind this venture?
The interwebs. And a microphone.

What has been the most easy to use, out of box and helpful technology
Wordpress rocks.

Are you using lot of open source tool sets for this?
Yes it's 100% open source.

What is your operating environment (operating system) and what type of database you are using?
Linux and MySQL.

What's your thought on being an entrepreneur? How tough it is to start a venture in Australia?
I love being an entrepreneur. Australia has advantages and disadvantages, the same as anywhere else.

What's your thought on the start-ups culture and innovation coming out of Australia especially in media and telecom?
There aren't enough of them.

How do you see the opportunity in mobile space? Do you think iPhone (closed) and Google's Android based (open) platform will be the two major players going forward?
I think mobile is huge and yes, Apple and Google will be the key players moving forwards.

The conventional computing model is shifting to Cloud computing which is comprised of SAAS, PAAS and IAAS (infrastructure). This has resulted in changes to conventional monetising model? How do you see the future of business in terms of technology and revenue model?I'm just a media guy. Software business models don't interest me much outside of what I have to pay for it. I think Microsoft are screwed though.

What do you think the government (federal and state) should do to improve the culture of innovation and the telecom industry?
Get out of the way, mostly. And perhaps create some incentives for start-ups (like a tax break or two).

If you are given an opportunity to change the nation, what 3 things you will do?
I am changing the nation (and the world) every day.
Here's my plan:
1. Run a large media company.
2. Start a new political party.
3. Use the media company to start a new political party.

You are a prolific and a well-established blogger and podcaster. How do you manage this with work?
It is my work.

How often do you catch up with others trying similar things and where do you catch up? Do you have dedicated communities in your city?
I started MODM about a year ago in Melbourne for that very reason. It was a monthly catch-up at various bars in Melbourne. This year I'm launching it nationally.

Do you have any advice for people who want to start their venture?Do it. Stop making bullshit excuses and stop listening to your spouse. Just pull your socks up and do it.

Thanks Cameron for sharing your thoughts with us. All the best for future.

For coverage on other Australian startups, innovation, tech trends check this out and our coverage on interviews can be found here

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Vishal Sharma Monday, June 23, 2008 Australia , Business , Jobs , Linkedin , Social Networking , Ventures , Web 0 comments

Today we showcase an exciting and interesting startup from Melbourne, Australia, 2Vouch - a social recruiting site that helps employers and recruiters find hard to reach people. It is founded by Riges Younan.

I further explored about 2Vouch and how Riges is progressing with his venture in a candid interview with him. This is what he has to say:

• Please tell us about yourself, your background and interests?
I am currently founder and CEO of 2Vouch a Social Recruiting site. I have over 12 years of professional executive search and recruiting experience gained in Sydney, Melbourne, London and New York. I have been responsible for the successful launch of five start-up recruiting offices for various firms as well as the development and deployment of sophisticated sourcing techniques & processes that lead to superior results for clients. I bring deep industry knowledge and extensive sales, marketing and management experience to 2Vouch.

• What is the name of your venture/company?
2Vouch – vouching is what we are asking our members to do when they recommend someone they know and trust for a job.

• Please tell us about your venture/company?
2Vouch is a social recruiting site that helps employers and recruiters find hard to reach people. It uses social networks to provide referrals to people who would consider a better opportunity if it is presented by someone they know and trust. Customers pay 2Vouch for successful placements, and 2Vouch rewards the referrer with cash incentives.

• Who are the people behind this and how it started?
Over a decade of executive recruiting experience has clearly shown that referrals are the best source of talent. Many firms having informal internal employee referral programs and every professional has received calls saying “Hey, I’m trying to find an xyz person, do you know anyone?”. The process, technology and tracking of those referrals, however, were ad hoc and inefficient. So we decided to help solve the problem of sourcing people in talent-short industries (like IT, engineering, etc) by building a web based system that uses referrals, social networks and rewards to bring employers & recruiters together with “passive candidates” automatically, quickly and cost effectively and 2Vouch was born!

About a year ago I met Jeremy Samuel via a ‘referral’ and after an hour lunch we decided to work together, Jeremy has made a extraordinary contribution to building 2Vouch and we make a great partnership.

Jeremy brings over 11 years experience in marketing, sales, product and project management and consulting in the information technology and telecommunications sector. He has launched three start-up businesses, delivering large scale projects, business strategies and has been responsible for selling complex technology solutions to leading corporate clients. Jeremy has a Master of Science in Cognitive Science and an MBA.

• How long it took before it was up and running?
2Vouch was incorporated in September of 2006 and is due to launch in July 2008.
What is the main objective/mission behind your venture?
Our Vision: 2Vouch will provide high quality & relevant referrals for every professional job vacancy in the world

• What services it provides it for consumer or customers?
2Vouch offers employers and recruiters the ability to reach passive candidates who come with personal recommendations. We deliver wide distribution of their job listings through blogs and social networks and provide tools to review and manage referrals. Best of all, client’s pay nothing until they hire or place someone.

For professionals, the offer is cash rewards (and enhanced social capital and network standing) for referring people they know and recommend to job opportunities. We allow members to automatically track their referrals and payments, manage their contacts, show interest in positions and apply directly if they wish. The system allows referrers to donate some or all of their referral reward to a charity of their choice.

• What type of customers you are targeting?
Companies wanting to hire skilled and professional talent, and recruiters looking for the same talent for their clients. Our focus initially will be the ICT community.
Professionals – People who like to help friends/colleagues (and be rewarded both financially & reputationally for it)

• How many people are using your services?
N/A launch in July 2008

• What sort of marketing you are using to spread the word?
2Vouch will be promoted primarily on line via email, pay-per-click advertising and content distribution to a wide range of publications and blogs. The online promotions will be supported by a tiered publicity campaign that will focus on reaching key influencers directly, providing targeted relevant stories to industry specific publications and general publicity to the business press. We have also built partnerships with key associations, charities and business schools.

• What is the monetizing/revenue model? Is their any new model, which is being tried?
We are introducing an innovative Pay Per Hire Model. If free to use and advertisers only pay when hire or place someone. We also provide a money back guarantee

• Which are the main competitors or major players in this market segment?
We have competitors in the UK and US

What are the main technologies used behind this venture?
Our platform is written in Python under the Django framework. We use a range of open-source development tools and databases along with some key commercial tools.
What has been the most easy to use, out of box and helpful technology? n/a – it’s all custom development

• What is your operating environment (operating system) and what type of database you are using?
We have a mix. Some of the platform runs on Linux and some tools use Windows. Our main database is on PostGRE.

• What’s your thought on being an entrepreneur? How tough it is to start a venture in Australia?
My view is that there is a major gap between the 3F / Angel round and the VC round when seeking funding in Australia. This is a very challenging growth stage and access to sufficient capital to get to scale and compete with global offerings is challenging.

• What’s your thought on the start-ups culture and innovation coming out of Australia especially in media and telecom?
I attended the Aussie top 100 Web 2.0 apps launch in Sydney recently, and I came away with a very reassuring sense of community with the Web 2 space. There are some very interesting businesses being built in Australia that are world class. There seems to be a great willingness among web2-preneurs at various stages to share ideas, lessons and information to help the community as a whole develop. Let’s hope that the investment community backs theses ventures.

• Do you have any advice for people who want to start their venture?
Talk to customers first, understand their problems, find out how much they would pay to solve that problem and then try and solve it. Fail fast, cheap and iterate.

• How many business partners you have?
None

• Any women business partners?
No

• Any external funding – from VC, Govt, Self funded
Received a COMET grant. Then self funded.

• Which City you are based in?
Melbourne.

• Do you have any business advisor/mentor?
Yes and we are about to announce some high profile people joining our team very soon.

Thanks Riges for sharing your thoughts with us. All the best for future.

For coverage on other Australian startups, innovation, tech trends check this out and our coverage on interviews can be found here

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Vishal Sharma Wednesday, June 11, 2008 Australia , Business , Local Online Search and Directory , Startup , Ventures , Web 0 comments

Today we showcase a showcase an exciting and interesting startup, in online business directory search market segment, from Sydney Australia, FreeConnect - Online business directory search with multichannel capability, including VOIP. It is started by John Kennedy and was lunched on May 28, 2008.

In my view FreeConnect is definitely a unique service in Australian business directories market segment as compared to other players. It has the huge potential to change market forces. It offers consumers a free way to connect with the business of their choice via (multichannel) telephone, email, sms and VOIP. It is also Australia’s first ever VOIP online directory service.

It allows businesses to post a wide array of information - everything from their address and contact details to product and service information, photographs, payment options, business history and more – all at no cost. The only payment businesses make is for the actual lead when it connects them with a customer looking for their service.

Let us explore what John has to say about his venture FreeConnect and his thoughts for future. This is what he has to say:


• Who are the people behind this and how it started?
John Kennedy

• What is your background?
Advertising Executive in Europe

• How long it took before it was up and running?
3 years

• What is the main objective/mission behind your venture?
Accurate pay per lead enquiries for the business and FreeConnects for the public

• How does FreeConnect Work?
For businesses wanting to purchase leads, FreeConnect operates the same way as a pre-paid mobile phone account, with a $99 advance payment giving the business up to $175 credit which reduces as leads are delivered. Leads range from 40c for an SMS up to $3.00 for a phone connection, with businesses able to specify how and when they are contacted, with options including telephone, email, SMS and more.

Consumers either search FreeConnect’s national online database for a business meeting their criteria or type in keywords specifying their location and the nature of the service they need. The service shifts the cost of the connection to the business, with FreeConnect either ringing the consumer back to link them with the business, or sending their details to the company for them to make contact. The service doesn’t cost the customer a cent – they get the right details from the FreeConect website, they don’t have to keep trying different numbers, they just click the FreeConnect button and they are connected to the business free.

With FreeConnect, businesses don’t pay to list or promote their products and services. They only pay for the leads that bring new business in the door, which is a results-driven approach that hasn’t been available before now.

“For Australian businesses not familiar with the internet and its innovations and those of you very familiar with generating business from the internet can now get calls instead of clicks. FreeConnect is the next logical step. Unlike major search engines that charge per click, businesses can’t lose – they can have a totally accurate and detailed listing, they can decide how many leads they want, when and how they want them, and how much they want to pay each month. They have total control.

The ability to specify the number of leads and available times to receive them allows businesses to grow at a rate they can sustain and ensures they don’t receive calls after hours or during holidays. The flexibility of the system enables business owners to suspend customer contact if they’re fully booked, or on vacation simply by changing their preferences online.

We know this approach works. We ran a two month beta test of the new service in Newcastle last October and saw our usage levels grow by a massive 126 per cent each day. If a consumer asks for a plumber in Balmain, it’s a reasonable assumption that there’s a job involved. Every connection represents a customer who is pre-qualified as wanting that particular product or service in that area.

• What type of customers you are targeting?
SME businesses

• What sort of marketing you are using to spread the word?
Viral right now and TV soon

• What is the monetizing/revenue model? Is their any new model, which is being tried?
Pay per call/SMS/Fax/Post/email

• Which are the main competitors or major players in this market segment?
Any one in local commercial search, yellowpages, whitepages, google, dlook etc....

• What are the main technologies used behind this venture?
Oracle, PHP 5 & IPPBX

• Are you using lot of open source tool sets for this?
YES

• What is your operating environment (operating system) and what type of database you are using?
Linux and Oracle

• What’s your thought on being an entrepreneur? How tough it is to start a venture in Australia?
Almost impossible, great employee's are hard to find

• What government resources have you used to help your business? And have they made an impact? Have you sought any funding?
Comet grant

• Which City you are based in?
Sydney

• Do you have any business advisor/mentor?
Yes

• Do you have any advice for people who want to start their venture?
Think about it longer, ask lots of questions to your mentor and then ask some more!!!!!!!

Thanks John for sharing your thoughts with us. All the best for future.

For coverage on other Australian startups, innovation, tech trends check this out and our coverage on interviews can be found here

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Vishal Sharma Wednesday, June 11, 2008 Australia , Business , Ecommerce , Online , Startup , Ventures , Web 0 comments

In our ongoing coverage of startups coming out of Australia and interviews with CEO's, Media Personalities, Philanthropists, and VC’s, today we showcase a startup in eCommerce segment from Manly, Tjoos.com - Compare Prices For Better Choice While Shopping. It is co-founded by Kim Chen and Bart Jellema.

Let us explore what Bart, co founder of Tjoos.com, is progressing with his venture. This is what he has to say:

• Who are the people behind this and how it started?
Back in July 2007 my partner and I were looking to purchase contact lenses online. Having done comparison shopping a few times I expected it to be easy to find the lowest price using one of the price comparison sites. We spend all day looking at every comparison site we could find and got some upsetting results. Shopping comparison engines rarely list the lowest price, and if they do it's merely a coincidence. Shopping comparison sites only list stores that pay them, making most sites nothing more than PPC product search sites. Basically the current function of comparison shopping engines is to give consumers the 'perception' of finding the lowest price and thereby facilitating the buying process. We believed there was a market for a quality online shopping portal and started plans for Tjoos.com (pronounced choose).

• How long it took before it was up and running?
In October 2007 we launched the site with the world's first real price comparison engine. The only category we listed was contact lenses, and to calculate the 'store to door' price we took into account volume discounts, shipping costs, hidden handling costs, taxes and available discount coupons. After successfully launching the contact lens price comparison feature we experimented for a few months and created an online store directory listing over 90,000 online stores, a clothing recommendation engine, some widgets and an extensive coupon code listing.

• What is the main mission behind your venture?
We have narrowed our focus to online coupon codes. Coupon codes are the online equivalent of grocery coupons. Many online stores such as Old Navy, Dell and Amazon issue coupon codes that give you instant discounts during checkout. This is a huge market with over 25 millions users looking for coupon codes each month, however there is no dominant player. This is
because the quality of coupon sites is so low that none of these sites can give consumers the confidence that they list all available coupons and that their coupons work. At Tjoos.com we are setting up a team of people that work 24/7 around the globe to collect, enter, organize and test coupon codes to provide the most comprehensive and highest quality coupon site on the
web. It's free to use and we don't display advertising.

• How many people are using your services?
More than a million people have already used our site and visitor numbers keep growing.

• What is the revenue model?
A number of the stores we list on our site provide us compensation for referrals. This means that if we refer a user to one of these stores and the user makes a purchase, we receive a percentage of the sale. Currently the sales we make through our partners are over US$100.000 per month. In line with our mission we naturally also list many stores that do not provide any
compensation for the referrals.

• How often do you catch up with others trying similar things and where do you catch up?
Over the last few months we've met many like-minded people and we try to go to at least one event every week. To help others find out what's happening around Australia I setup an open wiki where everyone can share their knowledge on starting up in Australia.

• What are your thoughts on being an entrepreneur?
We absolutely love it! We live and work in Manly, close to the beach and though we work long hours, we work when we feel like it. For me it is like doing what I would do as a hobby anyway, but now I get to do it full-time. When running your own business, there is none of the big company rubbish, no red tape, no politics. We get to decide what to do and just do it. It's also very exciting to create a successful company out of nothing. Less than a year ago we just had an idea and some crayon drawings. Now we have website with thousands of visitors every day.

• Any external funding?
We are a self funded company.

• Which City are you based in?
We are in the heart of Silicon Beach: Manly, NSW

• Do you have any advice for people who want to start their venture?
Start! Just get it out there as soon as you can. Don't be afraid someone will steal your idea and stuff like that. As long as you're small nobody will notice, when you're big you're already ahead of the pack. On top of that people tend to not believe in what you do until it works, so just get out there and do it, talk about, get feedback, go to social events such as OpenCoffee, BarCamp, friday night drinks, and many of the other regular meetups happening around Australia.


Thanks Bart for sharing your thoughts with us. All the best for future.

For coverage on other Australian startups, innovation, tech trends check this out and our coverage on interviews can be found here

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Vishal Sharma Tuesday, June 10, 2008 Australia , Business , Ecommerce , Startup , Ventures , Web 0 comments

In our ongoing coverage of startups coming out of Australia and interviews with CEO's, Media Personalities, Philanthropists, and VC’s, today we showcase a startup from Melbourne, Australia, to be lunched in October, 2008, Trickytix - an online event registration company.

Trickytix allows a customer to create an account, setup and style their event page and then begin selling tickets without any manual intervention from us. This is all achieved through a self-service interface. Typical events include lunches, meetings, fun runs, cycling or triathlon events, dinners, conferences, etc etc.
It will be running under closed beta trial with number of companies from July 2008.

Let us explore what Scott, co founder of Trickytix, has to say about his venture and innovation coming out of Australia. This is what he has to say:

• Please tell us about yourself, your background and interests?
My name is Scott Handsaker, and I am the Managing Director and co-founder of Trickytix, an online event registration startup from Melbourne, Australia. My previous experience was in managing IT call centres in Singapore and Malaysia, but I have been working on the web exclusively since 2004 in my role as MD of Hugeobject.

• Who are the people behind this and how it started?
Andrew Edwards and myself founded a web consulting company in 2004, and commenced Trickytix as part of that in mid 2007.

• How long it took before it was up and running?
Hah! Trickytix is the end result of a thousand and one ideas for a web application, some of which we actually started coding before dumping them in favour of Trickytix.

We commenced it in April 2007 with the aim of launching a beta within 8 weeks. The need to keep money coming in through consulting work put paid to that launch date, but the build continued throughout 2007 with a successful launch in Feb 2008.

• What services it provides it for consumer or customers?
Trickytix allows anyone to accept registrations and sell tickets for their event online, without the need to know computer code. It is a self service model aimed at small business, community groups, sporting organisations and not-for-profits in Australia.

Trickytix has a number of modules built in which make it easy for event organisers to accept registrations online quickly and easily, as well as make more money from each entrant. These include merchandise, donation and sponsorship modules.

Fundamentally we are aiming for Trickytix to do two things for our customers:

• Make accepting online event registrations easy and hassle free
• Extract more money per online registrant for them than any other previous method used

We have achieved both these objectives for our first two customers, and look forward to rolling out our solution to the rest of the country.

• How many people are using your services?
We launched to two larger customers in Feb 2008, with both the Mothers Day Classic and the Million Paws Walk (RSPCA) using our solution to run their online event registrations. Each event is the largest single fundraiser for their respective organisations.

Since then we have added another two smaller customers, with another five lined up to commence our closed beta testing program in July 2008. Trickytix has not yet fully launched as a product, but will do so in October 2008.

• What sort of marketing you are using to spread the word?
Since we commenced the build we have been blogging for Australian Anthill magazine, and have been featured a number of times in their pages over the last 12 months.

Each ticket/registration done through Trickytix is branded with our logo and URL, so many people have found out about us through both the Mothers Day Classic and the Million Paws Walk.

Once our full marketing plan kicks into gear we will be utilizing a combination of direct mail, pay-per-click, organic search, media releases, content provision and word of mouth.

• What is the monetizing/revenue model? Is their any new model, which is being tried?
We take a small percentage of all financial transactions put through the system. This service fee can either be absorbed by the event organiser, or passed onto the ticket buyer as a booking fee.

Once we launch in October 2008, free events will be able to use our system at no charge.

• What are the main technologies used behind this venture?
MySQL, Flex, Flash, PHP.

• What has been the most easy to use, out of box and helpful technology?
We use Basecamp extensively, as well as Trac

• What’s your thought on being an entrepreneur? How tough it is to start a venture in Australia?
Doing a start-up is not for everyone, although it is no more difficult in most respects in Australian than anywhere else. Where it gets harder when compared to places like the US is in access to capital, as well as the depth of recruitment resources available.

• What Government resources have you used to help your business? And have they made an impact? Have you sought any funding?
Our experience in seeking Government funding has been poor. The processes are difficult to navigate, while the amount of early stage funding available is quite small. The serious money (6 figures) only kicks in once you have an established, growing business with a few years of operating revenues behind you.

We are currently seeking private equity/VC money to fund the expansion of our business, and have teamed up with BSI to facilitate this. I have pitched in Sydney and Melbourne at investment breakfasts, one of which went quite well and one of which I would like to do over again!

Fund raising is a lengthy process with no promise of a return at the end of it. We are lucky in that we have a consulting business which can continue to fund us whether we receive funding or not, but yeah funding makes life easier.

• Do you have any advise for people who want to start their venture?
There are a lot of people more qualified than me to provide advice on doing a start up, so my best advice is to do what I do – read them extensively!

Blog suggestions are:

• Marc Andreessen
• Guy Kawasaki
• 37 Signals
• Dick Costolo
• Paul Graham
• OnStartups
• Ask the VC

And one book suggestion, which I highly recommend: The Four Steps to the Epiphany – Steven Blank

Thanks Scott for sharing your thoughts with us. All the best for future.

For coverage on other Australian startups, innovation, tech trends check this out and our coverage on interviews can be found here

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Vishal Sharma Tuesday, June 10, 2008 Australia , Business , Ecommerce , Retail , Startup , Ventures 0 comments

Today we showcase a story of another successful startup and entrepreneur, Phillip Kingston, Co Founder & CEO, Flogd

Flogd is an Australian based company which allows anyone to create a shop to sell stuff anywhere you can paste code. Sell from blogs, websites, social networking sites like MySpace. It provides its users with a shopping cart system which handles postage, taxes and processing of the sale. It also partners with other company’s to offer Flogd services natively in other applications.

Let us explore what Philip has to say about his venture Flogd and his thoughts on entrepreneurship and innovation coming out of Australia. This is what he has to say:

• Please tell us about yourself, your background and interests?
I am a 22 year old student at the University of Melbourne studying a Bachelor of Science/Bachelor of Commerce. I am interested in human behaviour, social and environmental sustainability, and, I suppose, technology. I am a programmer by trade but much prefer strategy and business problem solving - so I do more of it.

I am the CEO of Flogd and I am also the Vice-Chairman of the Centre for Sustainability Leadership

• Who are the people behind this and how it started?
Flogd was co-foundered by Edward Thomson and myself. It all started on a phone call between Ed and myself. Ed said to me “I have an idea..”

• How long it took before it was up and running?
6 months. We both took a semester off uni so we could pursue it full time. The main reason for this is because we kept changing (read: improving) our product and our service offering.

• What is the main objective/mission behind your venture?
To ultimately allow people to monetize their web traffic (blogs, websites, etc) with product sales and commissions.

• What services it provides it for consumer or customers?
Flogd is an integrated and full-feature portable shopping cart system. Flogd handles taxes and shipping costs and has a user-friendly control panel for product, tax and shipping management.

• What type of customers you are targeting?
Anyone who has web traffic can find products to sell with our partner sites and sell. Customers can also sell their own products either in isolation or with products from our partners. We are targeting people of average technical proficiency, it’s important they don’t need ay specialised computer skills.

• What sort of marketing you are using to spread the word?
We’ve tried a lot of different avenues, but the best is word of mouth, particularly through forums. We’ve used Google AdWords and fairly aggressive press strategies. Nothing competes with a recommendation from a faithful Flogd user to a forum.

• How are you measuring the success of your venture? Are their any special mechanisms/tools in place to monitor the progress?
We have a few metrics for this including: the number of users, the number of page views, press, and good-will.

• Which are the main competitors or major players in this market segment?
There are no Australian competitors. Our main competition comes from silicon valley. It’s challenging keeping up with Silicon Valley all the way out here - but it allows us to constantly improve our product and service for our consumers.

• What are the main technologies used behind this venture?
We use all the standard web-development programming languages and software. PHP, MySQL, JavaScript, HTML, Flash (ActionScript) and CSS. Everything is custom built - we don’t use any platforms.

• Are you using lot of open source tool sets for this?
Everything except Flash is open source.

• What is your operating environment (operating system) and what type of database you are using? Linux derivative operating system, Apache software, MySQL database

• What’s your thought on being an entrepreneur? How tough it is to start a venture in Australia?
Web start-ups are not too tough. You need to know the technology in-house. If you have to pay upfront for the initial technology development then it’s going to be expensive and the product will never be exactly as you want it. If you are not tech savvy, find someone who is and partner with them.

• What government resources have you used to help your business? And have they made an impact? Have you sought any funding?
We never thought of Government resources or funding.

• What do you think the government (federal and state) should do to improve the culture of innovation and the telecom industry?
Yes, although its easy to bash the government. Rudd seems to value innovation and entrepreneurship and seems to be trying to develop the Australia scene. Brumby is trying to establish Geelong as a new tech centre. We will have to wait and see on that one.

• How many business partners you have?
I have one business partner, Edward Thomson, and he is amazing. He is very intelligent and a good character, the two most important attributes. He keeps it fun when it gets tough. He is also a very creative fellow and works out hard things like design and usability.

• Any external funding – from VC, Govt, Self funded
Self-funded by my business partner coupled with a lot of free man hours

• Which City you are based in?
Melbourne

• Do you have any business advisor/mentor?
Initially, I made sure that I had a lot of people around that I could ask for guidance and advice. The real value of a mentor is knowing when you’ve actually made a mistake - most of the time mistakes are very hard to identify and attribute to yourself. Mentor’s can slingshot you up the learning curve.

• Do you have any advise for people who want to start their venture?
If you know what you are doing in the web technology scene, go for it. If you don’t, find someone who does. In any case, I’d also advice that people don’t do it alone.

Thanks Phillip for sharing your thoughts with us. All the best for future.


For coverage on other Australian startups, innovation, tech trends check this out and our coverage on interviews can be found here

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Vishal Sharma Sunday, June 08, 2008 Australia , Business , Online , Service , Sports , Startup , Web 1 comments

Today we showcase a story of another successful startup and entrepreneur, Stewart Whicker, Founder & CEO, NavSports Ltd

NavSports is an Australian based company focused on providing next generation tools to grass root sports clubs to promote to and communicate with existing and potential participants.

Let us explore what Stewart has to say about his venture NavSports and his thoughts on Sports as a industry and Innovation coming out of Australia. This is what he has to say:

• Please tell us about yourself, your background and interests?
My name is Stewart Whicker and my background is in Sports Facility Management and Elite Sports Coaching. My interests include sports promotion and playing tennis when I get the chance.

• Who are the people behind this and how it started?
Dean Viglione is Navsports Chairman and a former Australian Junior Judo Champion.
Marcelo Moraes is our Chief Information Officer lead software developer .
Navsports also has a small team of graphic designers and software engineers.
Navsports was started by Stewart Whicker (CEO/Founder) about three years ago.

• How long it took before it was up and running?
About 12 months

• What is the main objective/mission behind your venture?
Provide the most cutting edge applications to the world`s sports clubs and provide the largest sports social network in the world.


• What services it provides it for consumer or customers?
Club benefits

• Map location/Address.
• Customised logos and pictures.
• Contact phone numbers.
• Contact emails.
• Personal Profiles can display club`s logo.
• Additional website linking.
• List and edit coach profiles.
• Competitions, Tournaments, squads.
• Sports camps, coaching programs.
• Socials and Lots more.
• Latest competitions and tournaments are display right on you home page.
• Closest sports players / athletes are displayed right on your home page.
• Live event video streaming.
• Communications portal with associated members. (Navmail)
• Volunteer incentives.
• Much more.

Personal member benefits

• Upload photo of yourself.
• Personal blog about your interests.
• Shows a list of your local sporting clubs.
• Add your friends to your profile.
• Search for other people based on age and skill level.
• Search thousands of Australian sports clubs.
• Associate yourself with your favourite club by having their logo on your profile.
• Upload your own sports videos and have the public vote for you to be our video star.
• When you associate with a club, your profile will be on their club template under club members.
• Select your own skill level.
• Make your profile available in other sports.
• Create sporting groups.
• Much more.

• What type of customers you are targeting?
Sports minded people of all ages.

• How many people are using your services?
Last month we had over three hundred thousand unique searches on sports directory NavSports

• What sort of marketing you are using to spread the word?
We are working closely with National sporting bodies through our getting started program. You can view this program here

• How are you measuring the success of your venture? Are their any special mechanisms/tools in place to monitor the progress?
Yes we measure the growth of our site through member registrations, club registrations, visitors to our site and through advertising revenue, premium membership registrations and online statistical gathering.

• What is the monetizing/revenue model? Is their any new model, which is being tried?
Premium memberships, advertising models we are developing a new model but its under wraps for know.

• Which are the main competitors or major players in this market segment?
There are many players in this field. There are many national and international companies all vying for this market. You have players like (Nationally) Doubledrummer, 3eep, Sporting Central and the like and then you have (International) players like FanNation, Takkle and quite a few more.

• What are the main technologies used behind this venture?
We are a leading proponent of web2.0 technologies. Ajax, php, java, flash and a few newly developed technologies that are under wraps for the moment.

• What has been the most easy to use, out of box and helpful technology?
Gee we customise are own applications, we have partners for highly refine technologies but mainly believe in developing in house applications.

• Are you using lot of open source tool sets for this?
No we like to customise and develop our own apps

• What is your operating environment (operating system) and what type of database you are using?
Window server, and we are running MSQL database configurations

• How often do you catch up with others trying similar things and where do you catch up?
Absolutely, it’s very important to communicate with industry leaders we catch up online. Sportsmarketing20 is a great resource for budding entrepreneurs’

• Do you have dedicated communities in your city?
There are communities within Australia, but within Australia we mainly work with National sports bodies and local sporting clubs.

• What’s your thought on being an entrepreneur? How tough it is to start a venture in Australia?
If it was easy then everyone would be doing it, so I very much appreciate the difficulties and complexities of the industry. My background in elite sports coaching has given me insight to believe in yourself and your team.

• What government resources have you used to help your business? And have they made an impact?
I looked into Government resources. I must admit that for the time and effort in chasing Government funding as a resource you would be better off networking with industry peers.

• Have you sought any funding?
We have had fruitful meeting with venture capital firms, but at the moment continue to rely on our private backers. We see venture capital as imperative when we start to develop our hardware infrastructure further.

• What do you think the government (federal and state) should do to improve the culture of innovation and the telecom industry?
Stop wasting money by outsourcing funding pools to consultancy firms. They are out of touch and lack interest in innovation.

• Do you have any advice for people who want to start their venture?
Research, research and study. Know your industry. And don’t let people take your belief away (because they will try).

Thanks Stewart for sharing your thoughts with us. All the best for future.

For coverage on other Australian startups, innovation, tech trends check this out and our coverage on interviews can be found here

Image Credit PhotoWorx

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Vishal Sharma Thursday, June 05, 2008 Australia , Business , Local Online Search and Directory , Online , Regional , Rural , Startup , Ventures 1 comments

In our ongoing coverage of startups coming out of Australia and interviews with CEO's, Media Personalities, Philanthropists, and VC’s, to gauge the innovation and startups landscape in Australia, today we showcase our interview with, the co founder of OurPatch - Regional And Rural Business Directory, Simon Wyk .

I did this interview to know more about OurPatch, its offerings, its progress and what does it mean to regional and rural business of Australia. Let us explore what Simon has to say about the progress of OurPatch and state of affairs in this domain in Australia. This is what he has to say:

• Please tell us about yourself, your background and interests?
I was born in South Africa, came to Australia in my mid twenties. I started my career in marketing. Initially for a chemicals company and subsequently for a home improvements company.

I then found myself in Interactive Communications and built the first commercial CD-ROM is Australia. We migrated from commercial CD-ROM to CD-ROM titles and I co-founded Brilliant Interactive Ideas which later became Brilliant Digital Entertainment. I left BII to found Hothouse a web development company. Our first client was Microsoft. We also worked for Coca-Cola, McDonalds, Telstra, Lexus. NineMSN, I7.

I co-founded Stuff Auctions. We outlasted GoFish, Sold but finally could not get past eBay.

I’m interested in my family, horse riding, Burning Man, kayaking and the Internet.

• Please tell us about your venture/company?
The industry buzzword fanatics would say it’s a local search play. We think it’s a little more than that. We’re focused entirely on rural and regional Australia. We’re a directory of local business, we have community groups and events and we’re creating community with our blogs and forums. We think we’ve made a start on the local paper for 2008 and beyond

• Who are the people behind this and how it started?
Patrick Cusack and I had been tinkering with ideas for sometime. We both had a passion for rural and regional Australia. We found a model in the Southern Highlands run by Steve von Kohorn and started with that

• How long it took before it was up and running?
We started work in April 2007 but we were still working full time and it took until November before we had a working model. We launched officially on Australia Day 2008.

• What is the main objective/mission behind your venture?
We’re trying to connect business and customers in rural and regional Australia

• What services it provides it for consumer or customers?
We provide listings for business and community groups. We have a fully functioning jobs board, we have a comprehensive events calendar and we have community tools, forums, blogs and groups. We’re adding dating. All of this functionality is available down to the postcode.

• Wh