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Welcome to this week’s standup! On the board today:
Our podcast is live - Dom Pym on building Up from nothing
The Rundown - a record funding week that wasn't
Five raises, two open programs, and a tool pick
12 new Founders and operators in the Slack
In Her Company - last seats for Thursday night
21 events, Melbourne to Perth
AFC’S LIFE AFTER LAUNCH POD IS HERE!!!!
We've been working on this one for a while now (we may have been cursed - so it’s been literally over a year) but TODAY’S THE DAY!
Life After Launch is our new podcast - me and Geo George from Mayfly Ventures, sitting down with the Founders who built before us. The business lessons, the life lessons, and everything in between. The full founder journey!
For episode one, we were joined by the incredible Dom Pym. He co-founded Up, he's put $85 million of his own money into the Australian ecosystem, and he grew up in a family that lost everything. We get into the golden purse his mum kept that somehow always had money in it, the day he and his co-founder walked into Bendigo Bank asking for a loan and walked out bidding to rebuild the bank's entire system with a team of two and no banking experience, and the two policy changes he reckons would make Australia a world superpower.
Out today, Go listen!!
🎧 Listen on Spotify · Apple Podcasts · lifeafterlaunchpod.com
The Standup
The Week in review, as of Tuesday the 27th of July 2026
Morning. Here's what mattered in the Aussie startup world this past week – the money, the news, and where to put your hand up!!
📰 Ecosystem news
A record week on paper, a squeeze underneath. The week to 19 July was the biggest funding week of 2026 – $606.5m across seven rounds. But nearly all of it (97.8%) came from just two deals: AdvanCell's $450m Series D and Cover Genius's $143.3m. Strip those out and the other five rounds shared $13.2m. The headline is loud; the base is quiet.
Early-stage is where the pain is. Just 31 sub-$5m rounds closed in the three months to 30 June – the lowest seed/pre-seed count since 2020 and down 44% on last year's quarterly average. If you're raising early right now, you're not imagining that it's harder.
Australia's world-first AI framework has landed. Albanese has set up an Office of AI inside PM&C, will make large data centres add as much power to the grid as they draw, and introduced world-first copyright rules that give artists control and payment when their work trains AI models. Worth watching if you build with or on AI.
Anthropic is dangling ~US$15b. The AI lab is pressing for a large local investment, explicitly tied to getting copyright clarity under the new rules.
A couple of standout operator moves. Health AI scribe Heidi was named sole ambient-voice supplier under an NHS England Midlands framework – a serious offshore win. TechnologyOne lifted FY26 guidance to 18–20% profit growth. WA put $6.5m over four years behind its space sector (AROSE and Curtin's Binar program). And zooming out: Australia was just named the world's fastest-growing venture ecosystem of the past decade, now ranked #9 globally.
💰 Raises & funding
- AdvanCell – $450m (US$315m) Series D. Sydney targeted-cancer-therapy (radiopharmaceuticals) scaleup. The year's biggest AU round.
- Cover Genius – $143.3m (US$100m). Embedded insurance unicorn.
- BlueNexus – $2m seed. Sydney no-code "agent management platform" – build and deploy AI agents in ~20 minutes. Led by M31 Capital.
- Hyades – $910k pre-seed. Auckland startup turning satellite, drone and radar data into AI-ready risk models. Led by Icehouse Ventures (plus a $332k govt R&D grant).
- ESGAgent.ai – $725k seed. Brisbane startup automating climate, safety and governance reporting for heavy industry. Led by DNX Ventures.
🚀 Opportunities (open now)
- Startmate Accelerator – the flagship 12-week ANZ program, A$120k investment, hybrid. Applications close ~8–10 Nov 2026 for the January 2027 cohort. Plenty of runway, but worth prepping now.
- CSIRO Kick-Start – rolling grants plus access to CSIRO's research muscle for early-stage startups and small businesses. No fixed deadline – apply when ready.
🔧 Tool pick
Lovable – AI full-stack app builder that ships a working web app (auth, database, payments) from plain-language prompts. Handy for spinning up landing pages, internal tools and MVPs fast. I use it for all of my website builds!
Curated from Startup Daily, SmartCompany, Cut Through Venture, This Week in Australian Startups and the broader AU startup press.
Meet AFC’s Newest Members this week!
Pulled straight from the intros over in our Slack, here are the founders, operators, and builders who joined AFC this week.
Nhien Dinh - Founder, Soothe and Hope / Backyard Catio Builder / HeadsUp (Melbourne) - Juggling three side businesses (cat enclosures, adaptive clothing for male chemo patients, and a party-invite app) and looking for meaningful connections.
Daniel Page - Founder, Psyche Innovations (relocating to Australia) - Psychology PhD who built and wound down a digital mental health platform used in 90+ countries, now hunting research/product/operator roles in digital health.
Bella Nolan - Founder, Hello Smart (Melbourne) - Building a tutoring company and running Stripe founder meetups, keen to meet fellow education founders.
Gareth Adams - Founder, Aviatr & Shenanigan.app (Melbourne) - VC/PE investor of 15 years now launching two startups and building out their teams.
Dorian Detragiache - Founder, Unanimas (Ballarat/Melbourne) - First-time founder building Harmony, an email tone tool, in early traction and keen to learn how others convert pilots to MRR.
Aubrey Blanche - Founder, The Mathpath (Sydney) - Trained AI ethicist helping organisations with values-aligned AI adoption and ethical governance.
Kristy Bayley - Operations Leader & Fractional Advisor (Melbourne) - 15 years scaling startups, now looking for an embedded ops role or Board Director seats.
Yichen Cao - Product Generalist, MLAI (Melbourne) - UX/PM/AI builder behind founder tool vibe-raising, seeking a product designer/PM/founder-associate role.
Fernanda Sassiotto - Ops & Engineering Leader, ex-VP Easy Agile (Melbourne) - Consulting on operating-model transformation while seeking a VP/Head of Ops or Engineering / COO role.
Nicole Karagiannis - Founder, People Purpose HR Solutions - Executive coach helping businesses with people, culture and process.
Richard Serpell - Founder, Smart Start Consulting - Building an ERP coaching practice in early traction and looking for help nailing his marketing approach.
Rudra Keshwani - Founder & CEO, intelliGIS (Brisbane) - Building AI tools for geospatial intelligence and urban planning at early MVP stage.
Not in there yet? Join Slack - this is where they're all hanging out.
Thursday night, Hap Cafe in Carlton North. Dinner for women and non-binary Founders and startup leaders. One long table, no name tags, no pitch round - just a proper conversation with people carrying the same load.
We're down to the last eight seats, and the room doesn't fit more than that. Which is the point.
If you've been meaning to get to one of these, this is the one.
💌 Know someone building something great?
Founder, operator, or just getting started - if they're on the startup path, they'll get value here.
Forward this email their way. Aussie Founders Club is for the whole startup journey.
Upcoming Events in the Ecosystem
🎉 AI SYD - hosted by Vercel Events
📅 Tuesday 28 July 2026, 6:00 PM AEST
📍 Sydney, NSW
💻 Live Build: Competitive Analysis for Early Startups - hosted by The Product Bus
📅 Wednesday 29 July 2026, 12:00 PM AEST
📍 Online
💬 First Block Live - The Lorikeet Story - hosted by Notion for Startups
📅 Wednesday 29 July 2026, 5:30 PM AEST
📍 Surry Hills, NSW
🎉 AFC Presents: Startup Sips - Coffee Edition! - hosted by Aussie Founders Club
📅 Thursday 30 July 2026, 9:00 AM AEST
📍 Astros Cafe, Melbourne
🎉 In Her Company - A dinner for women and non-binary founders & start-up leaders - hosted by Aussie Founders Club
📅 Thursday 30 July 2026, 6:00 PM AEST
📍 Hap Cafe, Carlton North
🎉 Coffee + Code - hosted by Stripe
📅 Friday 31 July 2026, 12:00 PM AEST
📍 Krimper Cafe, Melbourne
🎉 Community Collective Melbourne Birthday Party - hosted by The Community Collective
📅 Wednesday 5 August 2026, 6:00 PM AEST
📍 The Commons, Collingwood
💬 Claude for Business: A Full-Day Hands-On Intensive - hosted by Andrew Gargiulo
📅 Thursday 6 August 2026, 9:00 AM AEST
📍 Melbourne Convention & Exhibition Centre, Melbourne
💬 Nedd & Mates - hosted by We Are Mobilise
📅 Sunday 9 August 2026, 8:00 PM AEST
📍 Sydney Opera House, Sydney
💬 LUNA x Mighty: How to Stay Capital Efficient as you Grow - hosted by LUNA & Mighty Partners
📅 Wednesday 12 August 2026, 8:30 AM AEST
📍 Work Club Barangaroo, Sydney
💬 AFC Presents: Before the Job Ad - How Founders Build Companies People Want to Work For - hosted by Aussie Founders Club
📅 Thursday 13 August 2026, 5:30 PM AEST
📍 Everest Engineering, Melbourne
One spot open for a Fast Growing Tech founder - hit me up if this is you!
🎉 Community Collective Sydney Birthday Party - hosted by The Community Collective
📅 Thursday 13 August 2026, 6:00 PM AEST
📍 The Pillars, Sydney
🎉 Startup Lunch Club - hosted by Aussie Founders Club
📅 Thursday 14 August 2026, 12:30 PM AEST
📍 Collingwood, Melbourne
🤝 Preparing for U.S. Expansion: A 2-Hour Interactive Masterclass & Tactical Workshop (Melbourne) - hosted by Oz2US Ventures
📅 Tuesday 18 August 2026, 6:00 PM AEST
📍 Stone & Chalk, Melbourne
🎉 Community Collective Adelaide Birthday Party - hosted by The Community Collective
📅 Wednesday 19 August 2026, 6:30 PM AEST
📍 Stone & Chalk, Adelaide
🎉 Community Collective Torquay Birthday Party - hosted by The Community Collective
📅 Saturday 22 August 2026, 6:00 PM AEST
📍 Happy Spaces, Torquay
🤝 Preparing for U.S. Expansion: A 2-Hour Interactive Masterclass & Tactical Workshop (Adelaide) - hosted by Oz2US Ventures
📅 Tuesday 25 August 2026, 6:00 PM AEST
📍 Stone & Chalk, Adelaide
🎉 Community Collective Brisbane Birthday Party - hosted by The Community Collective
📅 Wednesday 26 August 2026, 8:00 AM AEST
📍 The Precinct, Fortitude Valley
🤝 Preparing for U.S. Expansion: A 2-Hour Interactive Masterclass & Tactical Workshop (Sydney) - hosted by Oz2US Ventures
📅 Tuesday 1 September 2026, 6:00 PM AEST
📍 Stone & Chalk Tech Central, Haymarket
🤝 Preparing for U.S. Expansion: A 2-Hour Interactive Masterclass & Tactical Workshop (Brisbane) - hosted by Oz2US Ventures
📅 Monday 7 September 2026, 5:30 PM AEST
📍 The Precinct, Fortitude Valley
🤝 Preparing for U.S. Expansion: A 2-Hour Interactive Masterclass & Tactical Workshop (Perth) - hosted by Oz2US Ventures
📅 Wednesday 16 September 2026, 7:30 PM AEST
📍 Riff (Spacecubed), Perth
Before you go, you could be in this newsletter - reach 4500+ Australian Founders & Operators!
The Standup and The Startup Shortlist go out twice a week to founders, operators, and startup talent across Australia and New Zealand. Whether you're looking for a sponsored placement, want to share a job with startup talent, or have an offer or discount worth putting in front of this community - there's a spot with your name on it.
That's a wrap for this week - see you in Slack in the meantime.
Catch you Thursday!
Megan 🚀