Andrew Pitts

“Gatekeeper has exceeded what we were hoping for.” Explore Clayton Utz's collaboration with Gatekeeper. From leveraging data analytics for actionable insights to standardising contract templates for consistency, every aspect of their strategy fosters a robust supplier ecosystem and gives the business more control. Find out more in our joint case study: #LegalInsights #SupplierTransformation #GatekeeperPartnership https://lnkd.in/e-sMPsfv

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Many Aussie/Kiwi founders eventually face the decision of: what market should I go to next? Often, the answer they land on is the US. The key decision points then become: 1) when should I enter the US? 2) how should I break in? I spent the last 2 weeks with US VCs in San Francisco and New York, exploring those two questions and understanding what they've seen work and what they've seen fail. If you're in the early stages of building a venture scale business, I wrote the below as a simplified guide for thinking through those two decision points: https://lnkd.in/gY2JzByV

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Monetisation strategies for founders... that's what Square Peg and Airwallex will be tackling over an exclusive roundtable breakfast on July 3 in Melbourne. Despite the potential benefits of embedded finance to a SaaS or marketplace founder, a number of barriers to action - including education - still exist. That's why we have Airwallex's Global SVP of Product, Shannon Scott, and Square Peg's Principal Investor, Lucy Tan, joining forces to discuss the most effective financial model for scalable growth. Here are some of the questions that will be covered: 🏁 In today's competitive environment, speed to market is everything.... how can founders leverage embedded finance in their product roadmap? 🎓 Scalable growth is dependent on graduating from SaaS to monetised transactions, true or false? Why? 🔮 ​Jack Zhang, co-founder and CEO of Airwallex, often says: “every successful startup will become a FinTech” - what does that mean? Do you agree? 📈 Square Peg has a history of backing payments founders early in their journey... what makes this space so interesting to a VC? Has that interest shifted with changing market dynamics? Spaces are strictly limited. #startup #startupaus #community #vc

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This is the first time in 15 years, that I have felt the Innovation Ecosystem shrinking. Companies going into Administration are at a peak and every week, we are seeing new redundancies. Funding is still well down, and it feels like the majority of capital being raised is by 1 or 2 companies and are typcially follow-on rounds. The year started off with a bullish momentum, but now it feels like we are in limbo and going sideways. Interest Rates are not going down like expected, there is a lot of cash on the sidelines, and the US election is just around the corner. So where to from here? The truth is, this is probably one of the best times to be active in this space. Valuations are down, Gen AI and Low/no-code solutions are changing the game. Companies can now grow and scale with a lot less human resources and with new business models, which require less capital. For technical businesses, Governments recognise the need to invest in deeptech, life sciences and energy transition. International Governments are opening the doors for you and looking to assist with Funding and Partnerships. So what can it take to change it? If you are in this space, you are naturally optimistic. If interest rates start to come down in the US, or a few IPOs get away successfully, it will mean some money will start to come in from the sidelines and be recycled back in. Even Bitcoin moving through US$100k can make a difference at this point. From an ecosystem perspective, we need to be louder, more visible and more proactive. There have been some incredible transformations with companies, and they are not being shared. When this market turns bullish, the companies that have survived will thrive. The ones who are thriving are likely to go exponential. Tonight, we are hosting an Investor Meetup in Sydney. You are welcome to join us - https://lnkd.in/gAnPkhM3

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A valuable swan song report into New Zealand's SaaS sector by kiwiSaaS Community, summarised well here by Timothy. "4. Content is easily accessible, but knowledge from lived experience is scarce and its hampering our ability to produce more scale-ups." Letting my community know that from late July, I have 2 days' deep SaaS leadership knowledge and lived experience available for fractional or project hire. If you have a commercial acumen gap in your team; need to drive new pricing and packaging; improve your product positioning, value propositions and product marketing; or align your product and GTM teams and motions for revenue growth - let's talk. #growth #commercial #SaaS #leadership

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[HIRING] Help me out here LinkedIn - looking for a legend who will help hundreds of founders ❤️ 💥 FOUNDERS ASSOCIATE #1 Find the most ambitious early-stage founders to invest in ANZ #2 Your tools: run Launch Club and Buildmate to help hundreds of founders start and grow their startups every year >> which feeds back into #1 Link in the comments! Give this a like or tag a legend 🔥

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Decoding VC speak is often tough - many founders will hear a combo of “Come back to us when you have more revenue” or “Let me know once you have a lead investor” Much of this means “Tell me when it’s safe enough for me to make a decision because someone else has done the hard work” I talk about this and more in an article for our friends at Startup Daily https://lnkd.in/gnFvGFy8

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After six years of bootstrapping - I’m excited to share that Slice has raised a $17.5 million equity and debt round led by Peak XV Partners (formerly Sequoia Capital India & SEA) and Roadnight Capital. Our journey began over a decade ago - when I met my co-founder Yannick D. while working in a big bank's Collections and Hardship department. We spoke to numerous customers who had used credit cards to pay for a trip overseas - often for a family reunion or a cultural event. These customers wanted to be financially responsible, but because they had used a product with such a high interest rate, they were falling behind and feeling powerless. We wanted to create a product that would allow customers to book their flights, and then repay in manageable instalments before their trip. Our vision was to help customers access travel - while also helping them to budget sensibly and avoid financial hardship. In 2018, we launched our first product - PayLater Travel. In the beginning, we spoke to every customer on the phone - we manually made bookings, and paid upfront with our own credit cards (the irony!). Despite the janky product, our customers loved being able to lock in flight prices and having the ability to pay it off before they travel. We knew we were onto something! But behind the scenes, there have been plenty of unglamorous moments. When the pandemic hit in 2020, we lost 95% of our revenue overnight. We were terrified - but we were also too busy to feel sorry for ourselves. We hunkered down, made hundreds of calls to airlines, and ensured maximum refunds and credits for our customers. To survive COVID, we had to dig deep. Limping along wasn’t an option - unless we did something decisive, we’d slowly run out of cash.  With our backs against the wall, we decided to launch in the US. I had to sell my car and Yannick refinanced his home. In other words - we bet the farm. What happened next is… too long for a LinkedIN post! I’ve shared an expanded version of the story in our blog, Instalments by Slice (link in comments). Fast forward to 2024 - I feel deeply fortunate to have secured an additional $10 million debt facility from Roadnight Capital alongside a Seed investment led by Peak XV Partners. What's more - I feel blessed with a wonderful team, supportive friends, and to have helped 70,000 customers go on wonderful trips and create core memories. The best part - we’re only getting started! There are still millions of customers worldwide, falling into unsustainable debt and we’re here to do our part to change that! To read more about Slice and our first round of external funding, check out this article in The Australian Financial Review - #venturecapital #startup #fintech #funding #slice

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How much does a company waste on duplicated / unused technology? According to a report* NZ businesses are wasting $334M / year technology they don't use. For small business for $900 of spend, $600 of that was going to waste and when you scale.... phew.... it's not pretty! And while a 2022 report, I don't think this has got better. At STATE3 we see this a lot. A proliferation of similar technology all doing a similar job or technology subscriptions which were brought and used once if at all... why have one SaaS subscription / portal / CRM / app when you can have 6 that do the same thing and that are possibly never used! The reasons are pretty straight forward: Poor Processes IT Investment - The business goes off roading and buys something on a credit card without due diligence or engaging with the digital / technology team first. Shadow IT - total frustration with the processes in-house so someone gets a bright idea and buys something.... Mergers & Acquisitions - a company acquires another and they keep everything separate and ta dah! There will be others. In hard economic times, the belts get tightened so it makes perfect sense to aim for where the bloat is... in the spend that is duplicated or not used. And this means taking some steps, such as.... * Figure out what you have (Technology / capabilities audit) * Find out if its actually being used (surveying usage (if possible) * Standardise Technology Offerings via a menu of options * Move to a 'user pays' model * Undertake the very unsexy approach of strengthening technology Governance by making people accountable and responsible. We can help with this by showing you what you have, how integrated it is with the rest of your stack and what the TCO is. When you know what you have, you can optimise decision making and ditch the risk. #digitaltransformation #businessstrategy #success #state3enterprise * Report: https://lnkd.in/gRxU_7mC

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🌟 Australian Startups 2023: A Year of Strategic Shifts and Emerging Opportunities 🚀 In 2023, the Australian startup landscape navigated a cautious investment climate, recording a total of 413 deals with an overall investment value of $3.5 billion. Despite a significant drop in deal value from previous years, there was a notable shift towards robust activity in the early stages of investment. Angel and Pre-Seed rounds not only resisted the broader downturn but actually increased, highlighting a vibrant seed funding environment that underpins a dynamic market for emerging technologies. This heightened competition at the entry-level indicates a strategic pivot within our ecosystem, investing in the foundational potential of new ventures. Such insights are crucial as we steer towards nurturing a resilient and innovative startup community ready to tackle future challenges. Dive deeper into the full analysis and explore how these shifts are shaping the future of Australian innovation. https://lnkd.in/gc4gNtGc #AustralianStartups #VentureCapital #StartupEcosystem #Innovation

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🔥 Unpopular Opinion: Australia's Fractured Fintech Ecosystem As a Fintech founder or community member to go to all the major events this month you're looking at circa $1K minimum, even more if you're not a startup founder. 💰 Now it's not a HUGE amount of money but that's just June, there's multiple events throughout the year. 🤝 Now all of these events are great opportunities for networks to grow, deals to be done and partnerships to be formed and should be attended. They're organised by passionate and great people. 🤗 But there's lots of talk about Fintech struggles of late and how as a community we can band together and help increase funding, talent and growth of Fintech in Australia. 🤯 We have multiple communities, awards, summits (including a new one last week), newsletters, memberships and then there's other communities for cyber, regtech, proptech, insurtech, crypto and on and on and on the list goes. 👊 And I'm not naive as to how we got to where we are, and I'm certainly not diluting the value each community or event brings, we all love a good backslapping. It's just appears to be overly complex for our size of market. So it beggars the question, do we need micro communities, with different audiences, agendas, voices? And as a Founder how do you determine where to spend your hard earned $ and get the best bang for buck? #australia #fintech #events #community #networking

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According to the latest Stripe report 13% of transactions are now happening in cash across Australia. That’s all! Yet only 9% of over 65s in this country use a digital wallet, a massive contrast with every other agegroup. Banks project cash will be gone as a necessary currency in just seven years time. Many are apprehensive about and afraid of the change that is clearly coming. Academics point out a concerning trend: the financial literacy of even the most competent people declines as we get older, making adoption harder the later we leave it in our lives. So what are we waiting for? It surprises me that no one is helping seniors bridge this gap at scale. In fact, some are trying to feed off their pain, which, I think, is deeply irresponsible. So, my call today is twofold. If you’re an older Australian who isn’t using online banking, hasn’t embraced your digital wallet, and is anxious about the change to digital currency, it’s time to declare that resistance is futile - please! It’s time to ask for help, learn, and gradually embrace it. If you start now, it won’t have to happen overnight. And in this article I give you some ways to start. And to the government, the opposition, the banks, the peak bodies and the other organisations supporting seniors, it’s time to stand up and do this properly. Do it for the seniors. https://lnkd.in/g6CT5tRq

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Truth, right here. I am elated to have just hired See Me Please's first full-time employee. He just retired from a career as a professional athlete. I hired him because he has grit and works hard. He tells me, if given an opportunity, he will eat bricks for lunch. By choice, I'm bootstrapping See Me Please. At least for the first year. I'm of the view that proven demand and growth, based on the exceptional value we deliver to our early partners, is in the best interest of the business's long-term success. It provides choice, flexibility and negotiation leverage when (if) the time comes to explore potential investment partners. Time will tell if See Me Please will move at the velocity I'd like it to. But if it does, I care too much to give my business away. I have my eyes wide open, this approach means working VERY hard to get it out of the gates. There is absolutely nothing wrong with flexible work and work-life balance depending on your priorities. At the same time, there's immense value in hard work. Hard work can give a sense of purpose and direction, helping a team feel like they are contributing meaningfully to something larger than themselves. Richard Joffe you're singing to me. Thanks for sharing Claudia Levi Pat Jensen

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Such a simple practice. Yet few founders do it. Back at Eleven <20% of founders we talked to kept us in the loop in the months to come. If you are: - not raising at all at the moment - or warming up for a round - or actively raising Send frequent updates to investors. Even the ones who said NO. Keep it simple: - Write one email - Make it short and friendly - Include your monthly highlights - Leave several personalized fields - Send it to all investors you keep updated Rinse.  Repeat. I know unicorn founders who update dozens of VCs. They do this every month. Become top 10% in relationship building. It will make you stand out. P.S. Founders, do you do this? Does it work? Share with me in the comments. ⬇️

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The co-founder and CEO from one of Australia's leading VC firm told me last year "𝗪𝗵𝗮𝘁 𝘆𝗼𝘂'𝘃𝗲 𝗹𝗼𝘀𝘁 𝗶𝗻 𝗰𝗼𝗻𝗳𝗶𝗱𝗲𝗻𝗰𝗲, 𝘆𝗼𝘂'𝘃𝗲 𝗺𝗮𝗱𝗲 𝘂𝗽 𝗶𝗻 𝗰𝗼𝗺𝗽𝗲𝘁𝗲𝗻𝗰𝗲." The CEO is Rohan W. and the VC is Skalata. Since then I've thought about the relationship between confidence and competence. Both are vital. And can't afford to lose either. How to increase both Confidence and Competence: 𝗥𝗲𝗮𝗱 𝘄𝗶𝗱𝗲𝗹𝘆 Read biographies, history, philosophy, economics. Get a base level of how the world works. You'll never gain enough experience on your own. Books allow you to live a thousands lives in one. Learn from others. *Avoid books with the "F" word in the title and bright covers. 𝗦𝘁𝘂𝗺𝗯𝗹𝗲 𝘆𝗼𝘂 𝘄𝗮𝘆 Your first pitch will be lousy. Your first draft will be rubbish. Your first of anything will be well below your standard. Stumble your way through things. Review your learnings and refine your process. Get a little better each time. 𝗥𝗲𝘃𝗶𝗲𝘄 𝘆𝗼𝘂𝗿 𝘄𝗲𝗲𝗸 Write yourself a weekly update. I have a folder with over 120 weekly updates that touch on all things sales, marketing, product, finances, operations, triumphs and tragedies. I share these with our investors and co-founder. When re-reading these you'll look back and realise how far you've come. 80/20 𝗥𝘂𝗹𝗲 Use the 80/20 principle when approaching new skills. All skills can be boiled down to fundamentals. What are the top 20% of the fundamentals you need to master to develop 80% off the skills. Focus on and nail those few things. 𝗗𝗼𝗻'𝘁 𝗼𝘃𝗲𝗿 𝗰𝗼𝗺𝗽𝗹𝗶𝗰𝗮𝘁𝗲 𝘁𝗵𝗶𝗻𝗴𝘀 Keep things simple, the more complicated you make things the messier they will become. Nietzsche said: they muddy the water to make it seem deep. Focusing on the 80/20 principle helps with this. 𝗥𝗲𝗾𝘂𝗲𝘀𝘁 𝗳𝗲𝗲𝗱𝗯𝗮𝗰𝗸 Find someone who's been-there-done-that. Your "Plus" (from my post last week) who can walk you through the darkness. More importantly they can highlight what you're doing well and where you need to improve. This will solidify your confidence and increase your competence. 𝗦𝘁𝗮𝗿𝘁 𝗦𝘁𝗮𝗰𝗸𝗶𝗻𝗴 Each new skill increases your competence. The feeling of knowing how to do something fuels confidence. These two stack upon each other. Keep the momentum. - If you found this helpful, give it a reshare and follow me for more startup, entrepreneurship, and founder advice.

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"𝗧𝗵𝗮𝘁'𝘀 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝘀𝗰𝗮𝗿𝗰𝗲 𝗰𝗼𝗺𝗺𝗼𝗱𝗶𝘁𝘆, 𝗻𝗼𝘁 𝗺𝗼𝗻𝗲𝘆. 𝗧𝗵𝗲 𝘄𝗼𝗿𝗹𝗱 𝗶𝘀 𝗮𝘄𝗮𝘀𝗵 𝗶𝗻 𝗺𝗼𝗻𝗲𝘆." There's a reason Kairos works with Start-Ups! There's even more of that same reason, that got me building Aussie Founders Club. And while I think a lot of the time, Elon is a knob, he's articulated it here. I've worked with large enterprise, I've spoken to many big business hiring managers, I have placed 100s of candidates into mature businesses. 𝐍𝐨𝐧𝐞 𝐨𝐟 𝐢𝐭 𝐡𝐚𝐬 𝐞𝐱𝐜𝐢𝐭𝐞𝐝 𝐦𝐞 𝐥𝐢𝐤𝐞 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐦𝐞𝐞𝐭𝐢𝐧𝐠𝐬 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐜𝐨𝐧𝐯𝐞𝐫𝐬𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧𝐬 𝐈 𝐡𝐚𝐯𝐞 𝐧𝐨𝐰 𝐰𝐢𝐭𝐡 𝐨𝐮𝐫 𝐒𝐭𝐚𝐫𝐭-𝐔𝐩 𝐜𝐨𝐦𝐦𝐮𝐧𝐢𝐭𝐲 & 𝐜𝐥𝐢𝐞𝐧𝐭𝐬. And we need smaller companies to lead the way! Because, as perfectly said by Elon, what is the constraint for innovation? Its not money, money is not a scarce commodity - the world is awash with money. The scarce commodity is the ability and willingness to take risks. Which leads me to think: 1) 𝐇𝐎𝐖 𝐁𝐋𝐎𝐎𝐃𝐘 𝐂𝐎𝐎𝐋 𝐀𝐑𝐄 𝐒𝐓𝐀𝐑𝐓-𝐔𝐏𝐒 𝒂𝒏𝒅 𝒕𝒉𝒆 𝒑𝒆𝒐𝒑𝒍𝒆 𝒘𝒉𝒐 𝒋𝒐𝒊𝒏 𝒕𝒉𝒆𝒔𝒆 𝒃𝒖𝒔𝒊𝒏𝒆𝒔𝒔𝒆𝒔 2) Start-Ups are important and we need to be supporting them

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💸 One of the biggest benefits I've found since joining Antler is how much of a one-stop-shop we can be with respect to funding. We're not just the Residency program, we're there and willing through seed, Series A and beyond. James McClure speaks to this much more eloquently than me in the article.

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In the midst of budget allocation challenges, it's crucial to reflect on strategic decisions for the future. Australia's recent budget choices highlight significant disparities in investment, with $56 million designated for Reproductive assistance juxtaposed against a $22 billion commitment to the "made in Australia" fund, alongside a notable surge in Aged Care expenditure. These allocations, coupled with declining migration intake, raise concerns about the sustainability of Australia's financial trajectory over the next decade and beyond. The necessity of prioritizing national defense is undeniable, yet the lack of emphasis on large-scale digital transformation within the SME sector is a noteworthy omission. Rather than conventional investments, there's a compelling argument for equipping SME owners with AI capabilities to enhance productivity and adapt to evolving economic landscapes. With declining birth rates impacting employment and tax revenues, accelerating automation and digitalization becomes imperative to bolster Australia's productivity, which has been on a downward trend for years. As we navigate these complex dynamics, it's evident that fostering innovation and efficiency through digital transformation is pivotal for Australia's economic resilience. The evolving landscape underscores the pressing need for proactive measures to address productivity challenges and steer the country towards sustainable growth amidst changing demographic and economic realities. #distiai #productivity #budget #digitalchange #transformation #challenges

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"Consumer expectations level up every year." Wise words from my friend Adam Sharon-Zipser as he kicked off a panel at Elephant Room's 10th birthday event with pretty much every incredible Australian fashion label in one room celebrating him, his business partner Matthew Ding and the team. A few more key takeaways from an incredibly experienced panel: "Your product is your best retention tool" said Shaun Greenblo from Boody. It was then interesting to hear him talk about the rise of Temu and I thought to myself, how will this not impact his best retention tool in 2024? Suzy Nicoletti talked about her time at Google where she spent her days convincing customers Google was a thing! When I look back, I feel this is not too far from those who still need convincing that AI is going to change our world as we know it. Leonie Faddy from Go-To Skincare Pty Ltd was joined with a lot of head nodding when she talked about how competition is more than 20x today what it was pre-covid and the barriers to entry are now non-existent. Discussion then turned to the future and I had two key takeaways outside of the obvious AI: 1. A consolidated single customer view across channels that is simple to use, understand and achieve ROI with is an area ripe for disruption. -> I couldn't agree more, why should you have to pay 6 figures to understand how your customer shops across channel in your business? 2. The fastest growing ecommerce businesses on Meta are run by analysts not product centric operators. -> What's the difference? Analysts are focused on unit economics and aren't tied to selling any particular product tomorrow or in the future. They are nimble and focused on being a profitable business. What do you think the future holds from ecommerce?

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