It’s been a hellava year - and yet we are resilient and optimistic

It’s Rosh Hashannah and our Jewish New Year.

Looking back at the last year….. we’ve gone through the ringer!!!

What, with the bushfires, the pandemic, melting ice caps, climate change, travel bans and lockdowns - it feels like we’ve been thrown every type of curveball under the sun - and yet we have still emerged as a country with hope and a positive outlook of the future !!!

So why are entrepreneurs so bullish about the future? 

It’s about finding a problem in the world, and dreaming up ways to fix it…… and by golly - are there problems!!

Hunkered  down in bedrooms, and sprawled over kitchen tables all over Australia – itching to get back into their co-working spaces - our innovators and entrepreneurs are busy finding solutions to our biggest problems.

And with the right connections, with supportive VCs who’ve been there and done that - getting the support - there’s money to invest….. people are certainly not getting the returns from interest rates! 

So here are some exciting innovations , companies and ventures that are out there ….

• Spinergy  an energy solutions coming out of a South Australian accelerator .

• A1 G foods - fake burgers with a difference - just raised $16m

• my recruitment plus is beavering away - Anwar Khalil creating virtual recruitment firms within organisations -  finding the right people for the right job

• Refundit - finding a way to find retailers by sitting immediate payments to clients wanting refunds - could it be the next Afterpay or Zip 

• The Yarning circle’s #bbgforum - getting people to connect, learn,  collaborate and grow around a theme of diversity equity and inclusion.

• The  Great Wrap: the world’s first biodegradable stretch wrap that leaves no trace of plastics - potentially stopping Australia using 150,000 tonnes of cling wrap every year.”

• Homie and Mendel solving the homeless problem - On any given night in Australia, some 116,000 people are estimated to be sleeping rough - HoMie uses the profits it makes selling clothes to fund a program that gives employment opportunities, education and life skills to at-risk young people. Mendel has created a homeless app - enabling the public to help identify the homeless and alert the relevant Charity

• Seabin Project – a business dedicated to cleaning up our oceans (which are currently home to an estimated 5 trillion pieces of wayward plastic) – Pete Ceglinski, CEO and co-founder hopes  that one day his business doesn’t even need to exist. “That’s our mission statement,”

• Nexttech Learning - Education is what’s going to solve our problems, and Cass Parton is creating the Amazon of Nexttech  - getting the mindset of the worker to that of a lifelong learner - getting them ready for the NextTech Revolution! 

Looking forward to starting the New Year with a mindset of looking to solve some of the wicked problems out there!

The bigger the problem - the bigger the opportunity 

שנה טובה במתוקה Shana Tova Bemetukah 

Have a Sweet New Year 

Chazak Chazak V’nitzchazek; 

Be Strong, Be Strong, Let Us Be Strengthened

Feel free to add more potential innovations and opportunities in the comments below 

👇🏽👇🏻👇👇🏻👇🏽