
Melbourne Startups to Watch - gonsanchezs
https://www.themartec.com/insidelook/40-melbourne-startups-to-watch-in-2017
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laktek
Can anyone share their experiences in building an early stage startup in
Melbourne?

\- Where were you based? Near to the city or a suburb?

\- How was the internet speed?

\- From where did you work? Co-working spaces / coffee shops?

\- Is it easy get connected with VCs?

\- Is it easy for someone moving from outside to blend in?

\- Are other founders are helpful to each other and share their experiences?

~~~
jwilliams
I'm from one of the companies listed (Culture Amp).

I'm now based in SF, but was based in Melbourne with my other co-founders for
many years - my cofounders and a large chunk of the company are still based in
our Melbourne HQ.

\- We were based in Richmond, now the CBD (city). The city or any of the
surrounding areas are good areas and easily accessible. Public transport is
pretty great. Pretty do-able to live there without a car.

\- Meh. Not that great. You count your home connection as fast if it's over
10Mbs. A few lucky areas have NBN, which is fast, but it's not that widespread
yet. It's also expensive. However, the thing that gets me is the latency.
Chatty protocols (Like Rubygems) are really terrible. That said, it's more in
the irritating category than unworkable.

\- We were in the Inspire9 co-working space for a (long) long time. I think we
were almost 40 employees there when we moved out. Inspire9 was one of the
first. There are now a lot to choose from.

\- It was pretty grim a while back, but there are a raft of very credible VCs
based in Australia now. We work with Blackbird, who are fantastic. It's along
flight, but jumping on a plane to SF is probably still a good idea.

\- Melbourne is a very multi-cultural city. I'm biased, but really terrific
city. I think most people would have a great time there.

\- Very much so and it's growing exponentially lately.

If you or any other founders out there are in or considering visiting
Melbourne and want to connect, feel free to email me (email is in my profile).

~~~
cylinder
Hijacking this to share this "job" posting in Melbourne:
[https://www.seek.com.au/job/30699443?type=standout&userquery...](https://www.seek.com.au/job/30699443?type=standout&userqueryid=a14633c5f72a34e5bf203ad790c05a32-0018427)

Funded PhD Big Data position in Melbourne I just came across doing my own job
hunt.

CS people seeking a sea change might want to take a look.

If you are fed up with the SF Bay I would recommend Melbourne. A very well-
rounded city that has as much to do as any big city but on a more moderate
level imo.

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kfjg980
Thinking of moving a small startup/consultancy to Melbourne from London.

Would be interested to know about \- real estate prices

\- How does healthcare compare to UK

\- is it as painful as in UK to get kids into kindergartens/schools

\- corporate taxes and regulations, anything one needs to pay special
attention too

\- is the market for jobs/contracts similarly fluid as London, where I find it
relatively easy and quick to find clients

\- are there a lot of different tech niches in AU or is mining/finance where
most jobs come from

~~~
askvictor
Real estate is bad. Renting is very expensive, house prices too. There are,
however, a few affordable pockets here and there.

Health care is pretty good, though not quite as good as UK (dental, for
example is not covered by Medicare). Some doctors charge more than the govt
rebate, so you may be out of pocket if you have a particular doctor you want
to see. YMMV.

Schools are pretty good. There will be at least one state school in your zone
which you are entitled to enroll your child in; beyond that it depends on
demand. Childcare (i.e. the years before school) is a different matter, and
you sometimes wait for a year or so for a place in a particular centre (apply
early). Private childcare providers tend to be pretty bad; community/council
centres tend to be good.

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Apocryphon
Obligatory SV-centric question: can anyone who's worked in both Australia and
in the U.S. tech scenes share their experiences comparing both?

~~~
brad0
Sure. I'm an Aussie that has lived in both Melbourne and Seattle.

Melbourne is a great tech hub, but nothing compared to SF, SEA Aand NY. There
is no real way to get funding from public investors, you have to talk to "old
money" (though this was a couple of years ago, this may have changed).

There was a great article I read a while back talking about Atlassian's move
from AUS to USA.

When they were starting up JIRA they had to do it from $10k credit card debt.
No investors in Australia wanted to touch them. So they moved to the USA and
got funding almost immediately.

From memory Atlassian was profitable very early on. I'm not sure what's wrong
with investors there. A lot of our economy is run from raw materials, so maybe
they just don't get it?

EDIT:

My experience is that software engineers are very intelligent there. I've
worked with a lot of smart people in the gaming industry and mobile.

The issue is a lack of leadership and funding.

~~~
farkas
We didn't move to the USA to take funding.

Both founders still live in Australia. Roughly half our global staff are
Australian.

These days with local VC funds you can get funding much easier than when we
started. That said, for later rounds (>150m+ valuation, tens of millions of
dollars in), you are likely to get a better deal from the USA firms.

Scott, founder Atlassian

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opportune
Am I correct in assuming that Unlockd's business model is paying people to
watch ads?

How is this company raising so much funding?

~~~
gonsanchezs
In a way, yes. But they do it in a "fancy" way. They raised $40m, so they MUST
have some traction....

~~~
opportune
I mean if someone pitched that idea to me I'd probably laugh in their face,
but I agree that you can't argue with that amount of funding. I guess I'm just
really surprised that they've been as successful (at least in the funding
world) as they are. No harm meant to them; clearly they understand their
sphere of business much better than I do.

~~~
shrewduser
I think there's a lot of markets that people from wealthy cities like SF or
Melbourne don't really understand.

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vorian
Someone should tell Passel they are far from the world's first crowd-sourced
delivery company

