Following Australian Startups and Tech Trends

We published an extensive report on Australia's local search market in April 2008. At that time we found there are 18 local players in this space. Now within 3 months, this list has grown from 18 to 25. All these players are competing in this market worth $235 million as reported last year (2007). It is expected to reach $532 million by 2010. We have now further updated this list and the following are the players competing in this space: AussieWeb Local Search Brownbook ClickFind dLook Docoloco FreeConnect HotFrog Google Maps Local Search Solutions Local.com.au Nook NineMSN - My Local OurPatch Phone Book Rave About It RAYV Start Local Street Directory True Local VirtualMap Yellow (Sensis, formerly YellowPages) Vouchorgrouch Womow WhitePages (Sensis) Yahoo!7 ReachLocal As f ar as the top p l ayers are concerned, this h asn't ch a nged much since we reported l ast time. So, the top 5 players in this market according to their market share/business listing s are . 1. Yellow, My

Today we are delighted to bring you a new venture from Sydney, Stripe - Australia’s first mobile radio subscription service and the first digital radio network to launch in Australia. It utilises broadband and 3G networks and allows you to listen to any Stripe radio station from your computer and most 3G mobile phones, wherever you are in Australia!. Their music stations are all genre-specific and commercial including 60s, 70s, 80s, 90s, disco, country, metal, rock, hip hop, Japanese pop and many more, all accessible from your 3G mobile phone. We will soon be covering their venture in more detail as part of our interview series , in the meantime this is what Stripe Management has to say in their press release. In a move which is expected to increase the take‐up of 3G mobile services in Australia, Stripe will launch over 30 new radio stations, Australia wide. The Stripe service will allow the Australian public to access 40 stations by Christmas and 100 by the end of 2009, via the int

Today we showcase an exciting and successful venture founded by, Alex in 2006 from Melbourne, Australia, Mostyle ! - comes from “Mobile” + “Lifestyle” - a telco-independent mobile ecosystem that not only provides the tools to build a mobile site but offers the distribution, community and multiple enablers for the monetising of mobile content through advertising or micropayments. In a recent email-based interview with Alex, 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 have a Computer Science degree from RMIT University and am nearly done with a Master of Entrepreneurship and Innovation from Swinburne University. Over the past 10 years, I’ve been working in different areas of mobile gaming and entertainment, dealing with content, portals, industry building and development. My range of professional experiences has mainly been with Nokia (Mobile Entertainment Platform)

Today we showcase an exciting and successful venture co-founded by, Mark Harbottle in 2008 from Melbourne, Australia, 99designs - it connects thousands of designers from around the world with clients who need design tasks completed fast, and without the usual high cost and limited choices you get from most traditional design firms. In a recent email-based interview with Mark, 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 34 years old. I have a degree in computer systems engineering. I started my wo rking life as a programmer, but I eventually found I was much better at online marketing, which back in 1995 was an area not many people had explored. I’ve worked with pure internet businesses for 13 years now. The first 4 years after I graduated I worked with one of Australia’s first internet companies, and the last 9 have been spent working on my own businesses. I started

Today we showcase an exciting and successful venture co-founded in 2000 by Ex-MD, Mal Jago, who now has a digital consultancy business Earworm Consulting, from Sydney, Australia, Coastal Watch - provides accurate surf reports for beaches around Australia and live streaming vision. In a recent email based interview with Mal, he gave insights into this venture. This is what he has to say: • Please tell us about yourself, your background and interests? Spent 15 years as a Foreign exchange Dealer before a sea change in 2000 into Coastalwatch • Please tell us about your venture/company? Surfcams at beaches to provide surf reports and conditions to surfers/boating/ Surf Life Savings • Who are the people behind this and how it started? Chris Lane- Surfer and IT guru wanting to avoid getting up at UNi and wasting his time getting to the beach and find no waves. • How long it took before it was up and running? 1-2 years established 1998. • What services it provides for consumers or customers?

Today we showcase an exciting and 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,

Its now becoming clear to me that the recent acquisition of EDS by HP is about 3 C’s - Consulting, Cloud & Computing. The IT industry is rapidly moving towards cloud computing, which is explained here in lay men terms, courtesy of Google and Amazon. EDS brings software development, management and consultin g practices, which HP doesn’t have as their software consulting business never made big. So this is a no brainier that by getting EDS its sending the message in marketplace th at they want to eng age in consulting , IBM is the target here. In addition to this the main/re al aspect of this deal is about Cloud Computing – which has 3 basic pillars , Software As A Service (SAAS – Made Popular By Salesforce), IAAS – Infrastructure As A Service (Made Popular By Amazon), PAAS – Platform As A Service, which is an emerging trend where Google and Amazon are leaders. Microsoft is way behind in this space but they are trying with no success yet(Yahoo’s massive search infrastructure

Today we showcase an exciting and pioneering technology startup from Australia, Emotiv Systems - Control Gameplay With Your Thoughts, Expressions & Emotions. It is co-founded by Nam Do, Professor Allan Snyder, Dr. Neil Weste and Tan Le, president of Emotiv Systems . I recently did an email based interview with president Tan Le on the progress of their venture. This is what she has to say: - Please tell us about yourself, your background and your interests? Before joining Emotiv, I, along with Emotiv Systems CEO, Nam Do, co-founded and ran SASme, a pioneer in providing SMPP platforms and one of the companies responsible for the creation of Australia's SMS application market. I’ve also worked with one of Australia's leading law firms, Freehills. In 1998, I was named Young Australian of the Year and voted one of Australia's 30 Most Successful Women Under 30. I graduated with a Bachelor of Commerce and a Bachelor of Laws (with Honors) from Monash University. I also was a

In our ongoing coverage of startups coming out of Australia and interviews with CEOs, Media Personalities, Philanthropists, and VCs, today we showcase an exciting venture and story of an entrepreneur from the building industry, Malcolm Lambert founder of Intresto - Software for Intelligent Rearrangement of Stones I did an email-based interview with Malcolm to explore his thoughts on the progress of his venture and new emerging trends. This is what he has to say: • What is the name of your venture/company? Intresto Pty Ltd. The name is derived from “intelligent rearrangement of stone”, something people have been doing for thousands of years but only now do we have the computing power and computer science techniques to allow software to take over the difficult part of the procedure which is the 3d geometric shape fitting of irregular objects. • Please tell us about your venture/company? A self-funded tech start-up company developing software for use in the construction industry. • Who

Today we showcase an exciting and interesting startup from Sydney, Australia, Sticky Tickets - an online ticketing and event registration web portal. It is co-founded by Matt Freedman, J ay Gaibisso and Dany Gruosso. I further explored Sticky Tickets and how Matt is progressing in a candid interview with him. This is what he has to say: • Please tell us about yourself, your background and interests? I’m Matt Freedman and I’m the CEO of Sticky Tickets , an online ticketing and event registration web portal. We are based in Sydney, Australia and our site currently services all of Australia. I am also the Chairman of eMarketing business Redback Solutions which I founded in 1999. • Who are the people behind this and how it started? The business was co-founded by myself and Sydney entrepreneurs Jay Gaibisso and Dany Gruosso. Jay hired the IMAX during the FIFA World Cup in 2006 to watch Australia v Brazil but couldn’t find a simple-to-use, self-service online system to

Today we showcase the story of another successful entrepreneur, Martin Dougiamas, Founder, Lead Developer and Managing Director of Moodle Pty Ltd Moodle is an open-source course management system (also called a learning management system). It's a completely Free web application that educators can install and use to manage all their online learning. The business model is based on services around the free software. It has 2 portals/sites, the open source community is at Moodle.org the business side is at Moodle.com Let us explore what Martin has to say about his venture Moodle and his thoughts on IT, Education and Innovation coming out of Australia. This is what he has to say: • Please tell us about yourself, your background and interests? I'm 38, live in Perth with my young family. Until I was 12 I lived in central Australia, learning via School of the Air (in those days we used shortwave radio). This probably had some influence on what I do now. • Who are the people behind

Today we showcase the story of a man who has been a successful angel investor and is now as a VC helping a lot of Australian businesses to realize their dreams. Nick McNaughton who is based in Canberra, ACT, Australia is running a VC portfolio, under the  Blue Cove Ventures umbrella. Let us explore a bit further how Nick is helping others and what he thinks about innovation coming out of Australia. This is what Nick has to say in his interview with me. • Please tell us about yourself, your background and interests? I am the CEO and Founder of Blue Cove Ventures . Blue Cove was established in 2007. I have a strong heritage in IT Investments and have a long track record of helping to build and grow software and web companies. Before founding Blue Cove Ventures, he was co-founder of the blog marketing company behind Zookoda . In March 2007 Zookoda was sold to PayPerPost Inc. the leading marketplace for Consumer Generated Advertising. From 2002-2004 I was Director - Asia/ Pacific for Wily