Last Thursday, we organised a Startup&Angels event in Sydney – an amazing night with inspiring startup pitches, insightful discussions and great conversations with like-minded people.
The 19th edition of Startup&Angels Sydney event series was delivered in the format of a Pitch and Networking Night on May 13, with the focus on one of the most visible trends in the startup world – Social Entrepreneurship and Impact Investing. More than 80 virtual and in-person attendees joined the event, most of whom are startup enthusiasts, entrepreneurs, business leaders and investors (we had people fly all the way from Melbourne as well!).
The night started with a panel discussion featuring speakers from Birchal (an equity crowdfunding platform), Black Nova Group (a venture capital fund), and Atlassian Foundation. The business benefits of social entrepreneurship, the tension and trade-offs between impact and profit, the best practices of social startups when approaching early-stage venture capitalists, were presented thoroughly. The three speakers affirmed that the huge benefits of embracing social impact are not only in terms of employee side, but also gaining much positive response from customers and prospects, hence creating business profits. “Be authentic. Genuinely try to maximise the impact. Then the business benefits will look after themselves”. Shared Mark Reading, Head of Atlassian Foundation.
“I joined the event at the last minute, and I’m glad I did!”. Said Amanda from Ambiata. “I’ve pulled many good insights from the panel discussion. I had no idea the reason why Australian businesses are focused on social impact more than other countries is simply because the consumers here demand it!”.
The following was the pitches from 3 social startups SoCoPreneur (tackle transportation and farming issues in developing countries), Good On You (a world’s leading source for fashion brand ratings), and Alt Saints (a food and wellness brand supporting grassroots environmental organisations).
The event opened up opportunities for the attendees to establish personal connection with each other in the networking session. “I absolutely enjoyed learning from everyone, and appreciate the opportunities to collaborate with many other startups and like-minded founders and investors!”. Said Callum – Managing Partner at AI Ventures.
“It was a real pleasure to see many people looking to make positive impacts”. Leo Denes – Co-founder of Startup&Angels expressed his gratitude for entrepreneurs and investors’ joining the event amid Covid-19 restrictions in Sydney. “I feel we are very privileged to be able to connect in-person. Thanks all for making this moment possible and together entrepreneurs will make the world a better place”.
We are much grateful to have been able to organise such a successful startup event while adhering to the COVID Safety plan. We’d like to send a huge thank you to all of our speakers and startup founders for delivering crazy-good sharing and pitches, as well as our sponsors who have made this happen Australiance, Black Nova Group, OVHcloud, Pledge 1%, Fundsquire, Birchal, Tank Stream Labs, and La French Tech.
Watch event video
For those who are interested in joining similar events, keep your eyes on our future announcements on upcoming events. Stay in touch with us on social media or simply become a member of Startup&Angels community!
About Startup&Angels:
Founded in 2016 as an event series, Startup&Angels is now a community of 3000+ startup founders, angel investors, corporate innovators and startup advisors from over 20 countries. Through networking sessions, events and special offers, we bring together the most innovative and ambitious founders with curious angels and investors locally.
Join our online community: https://startupsandangels.ramenlife.co/
Listen to our podcasts: www.startupandangels.com/podcast (available on all streaming platforms)
