Participated · Equity · Oct 2021

Academy Xi provides highly practical, employment-focused online courses developed with industry practitioners and employers to help students build future-ready careers. Launched in 2016, the company says it has helped thousands of students gain work-ready skills in high-demand disciplines. The platform emphasizes social opportunities and close support while positioning learners to meet Australia’s reported ICT workforce shortfall. Management intends to use new funding to bolster growth through acquisition and strategic partnerships. The company highlights a portfolio of courses and sector-leading talent built over the past five years as the basis for significant expansion. Milford described the broader sector as worth more than $700 million and growing at about 8% annually. Academy Xi is a Sydney-based reality edutech startup. The article identifies the company as operating in the edutech sector. It recently closed a $1.7 million (AUD2.25 million) Series A financing. The Series A was led by Perle Ventures and Alium Capital. The article does not provide further details on the company's core products, future plans, or operating metrics.

Participated · Equity · Aug 2018

Simple operates an upstream marketing platform focused on planning, budgeting, organization and analysis to improve marketing efficiency and value for money for large and global organizations. The product does not handle execution; it helps teams manage campaigns and complexity across enterprises. Simple recently launched an “intelligent market platform” built on Microsoft Azure with integrations to Microsoft Office, following a tie‑up with Microsoft unveiled at the Inspire partners’ conference. Its clients span industries including banking, retail, insurance and gambling. The company intends to scale its offering through Asia, the U.S. and Europe and will deploy local sales and marketing teams in target markets. Australia will remain Simple’s headquarters and technology center while it expands its international footprint. The company raised funds to support that global expansion. Simple is a four-year-old marketing technology firm that has developed a cloud-based platform to run and measure the success of campaigns. The platform lets marketing teams plan, produce and execute campaigns while measuring return on investment and providing analytics. The company has closed a $10 million funding round to support its platform. Investors in the round include Perle Ventures and US fund SparkLabs Global Ventures. The funding is tied directly to the platform that runs and measures campaign performance. The article did not disclose revenue, user numbers, or additional financial details.

Participated · Series B · Jul 2018

TradeGecko offers a cloud-based inventory and order management SaaS that automates workflow inefficiencies by integrating front-end eCommerce and POS software with back-end accounting and shipping systems. The platform targets SMB commerce brands and aims to provide a seamless commerce stack to thousands of merchants. TradeGecko is led by CEO Cameron Priest and operates with a North American headquarters in Toronto. Customers named in the article include memobottle, Dead Studios, Brooklyn Bicycle Company, Maui and Sons, and Paula’s Choice Skincare. The company intends to use the new funding to grow its product suite and expand to empower more commerce businesses around the world. To date the company has raised over $20M in total capital. TradeGecko offers a cloud-based platform (desktop and mobile) that helps retailers and wholesalers manage inventory, purchase orders and orders without ERP or spreadsheets, integrating with QuickBooks, Xero, Shopify, Bigcommerce and ShipStation. Its subscription pricing is based on number of customers served and feature set, targeting businesses that typically earn $1M–$30M annually (with some up to ~$95M). The Singapore-based startup serves “a few thousand” businesses across about 90 countries and says it has helped process nearly $1 billion in transactions. TradeGecko competes with Stitch Labs and Unleashed Software but focuses on customers adding e-commerce to an existing business. Planned product work includes analytics for demand forecasting and customer segmentation, plus industry-specific features like batch tracking for electronics and expiry-date tracking for pharma. The company also plans geographic expansion and integrations with marketplaces such as Alibaba, Taobao and Rakuten, and will hire staff (including customer support) to support U.S. and Australian growth. TradeGecko is a Singapore-based cloud inventory and sales management application that emphasizes user experience with clean, intuitive data displays. The system integrates order processing, inventory management and customer-relationship management with real-time customer and sales data and works on tablet browsers for mobile access. TradeGecko bundles these functions into an easy-to-use package and positions itself as UX-first compared with incumbents and other startups. The company offers four pricing tiers ranging from $49 to $499 per month and currently has accounts from 26 countries while targeting wholesalers, distributors and importers in Hong Kong, Singapore, New Zealand and Australia. Founder Carl Thompson and co-founders Cameron and Bradley Priest launched the product to the public in September. The startup closed a $650,000 seed round last week to support integrations with Xero, Shopify and Vend and to fund expansion, including planned U.S. marketing outreach early next year.

Participated · Equity · Aug 2017

Spriggy builds a Pocket Money product and related payments, investing and educational features to help families raise financially healthy children. The company says it serves more than 500,000 members. It plans to expand beyond Pocket Money into deeper practical experiences for teaching money habits, ways for families to invest for kids’ futures, and a payments experience for schools. Spriggy says it will grow its team to build the products and features families are requesting. The company positions itself for a more digital future for young Australians and intends for its offering to scale as children mature into young adults. Spriggy’s website and messaging target Aussie families. Spriggy offers a prepaid debit card and a joint mobile banking app that parents and 8–18 year-old children use together to pay allowances, monitor transactions and encourage saving. The platform lets parents supervise spending while allowing young people to make their own financial decisions in a controlled environment. Spriggy is co-founded by Alex Badran and Mario Hasanakos and is based in Sydney, Australia. The company reported having 35,000 users at the time of the article. It raised $2.5M in funding to support product development and user growth. Spriggy plans to use the proceeds to continue developing the app, expand operations and drive user adoption.

Participated · Equity · Nov 2016

MC Payment offers a suite of payment products supporting in-store, mobile, online and digital payments across industries such as non-profit, insurance, e-commerce and financial institutions. Its product lineup includes Xaavan, a B2B web-enabled supply chain payment and e-invoicing platform with a MasterCard-certified Level 3 enhanced data processing solution in Asia; MatchCab, a customizable platform for transport providers; and ffastpay, a B2C mobile payments (mPOS) solution. The company has developed partnerships and accreditations with major payments players including First Data, Global Payments, American Express, Visa and MasterCard to process transactions across multiple channels. MC Payment has recently opened a new office in Bali with a focus on merchant acquisition in the hospitality industry. Led by founder and Group CEO Anthony Koh, the company operates across markets in Southeast Asia and Oceania. The firm aims to expand its regional footprint and enhance its technology and capabilities to support growth.