Benjamin Chong is a partner at the Sydney-based VC firm Right Click Capital, as well as the Managing Director for the Founder Institute’s Sydney chapter.
And according to Chong, Australia is one of the best places in the world to start a new business - as long as founders are prepared to think globally from the start.
Technology and Tech-Enabled Businesses Are Going to Be a Larger Part of [the Australian] Economy in the Future.
In terms of required precursors for building a dynamic entrepreneurial ecosystem that unleashes value into the world, Australia has all of the critical ingredients: talent, wealth, and a plethora of unique opportunities to leverage. Framing the developments happening across the Australian startup ecosystem, Chong points to a confluence of rising interest in startups, coming from both new would-be Australian entrepreneurs as well as new and inexperienced investors, while also emphasizing that institutional knowledge has a critical role to play in the ecosystem.
To fill the supporting role in developing the country’s startup ecosystem, Chong says there has been a proliferation of entrepreneurial organizations and programs popping up across Australia over the past decade, providing training for the rising crop of entrepreneurs building new companies across the country. According to Chong,
We realized in Sydney that we needed an organization like the Founder Institute to help founders connect with mentors who had built companies before, and to assist those founders through that process of developing their ideas.
And this new economic development is not limited to just in the major cities in Australia. While capital is still concentrated in the urban hubs, Chong says that new business development is happening everywhere.
Since 2011, there has been a huge increase in the number of startup activities across Australia--not just in the capital cities like Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, Adelaide, and Perth--but even in smaller towns and regions across Australia.
In addition to organizations and programs like the Founder Institute that work to train the entrepreneurs starting new companies, institutional knowledge also importantly comes from firms like Right Click Capital. In a capital landscape where Australian founders are likely to interact with beginner angel investors who are less sophisticated in their knowledge of investment, Venture Capital can offers founders a more discriminating and disciplined set of guidelines as they work to scale their businesses. Chong says,
The opportunity to spend time with investors or people who have raised money before is critical… And the more things a founder can do to de-risk the investment, the more likely it is to be appealing to an investor.
Chong also notes Australia’s uniqueness in where it sits geographic and culturally within the world. Nations across the Asia-Pacific region have created a highly competitive landscape, where the governments of countries from Singapore to New Zealand all offer attractive levels of support for entrepreneurial talent, and are willing to act aggressively to attract and retain those future businesses as part of their own domestic economies.
However, international competition presents at least as much of an opportunity as it does a challenge for entrepreneurs in the region. Chong says that because the population of Australia is quite small at just 25 million people,
Australian Founders have had to realize that to grow a big business, they need to go overseas.
This is a bit different in contrast to the US domestic startup ecosystem, where a country more than 10x the size of Australia can often allow startup founders to concentrate exclusively on the domestic market for a longer period of time, before needing to look internationally for further growth opportunities. In Australia however, having that global focus is absolutely necessary from the get-go of launching a new venture.
Geographically, Chong also identifies a technological advantage fairly unique to the island continent, positing that at least 60% of the world’s internet population can be serviced from within Australia’s three time zones. While the US West Coast can be serviced by the Australian East Coast as it is waking up, Australia is also situated such that it reaches many of the large and developing Asian markets located even closer to country’s three time zones.
Beyond the scope of Australia’s own geography, Chong also emphasizes that the country’s multiculturalism is another advantage in building domestic companies poised for international growth, saying,
There are linkages, there are languages, there are understandings of different cultures that can be used as people are building these businesses, to come up with a product or service that can serve people not only locally, but people abroad.
And from the perspective of a venture capitalist, this early and deliberate Australian focus on the international markets beyond its borders also illustrates a major advantage for Aussie investors seeking opportunities with startups showing potential for rapid growth. Speaking to the types of companies he most likes to see, Chong says,
We love founders who have an ambition and a desire to serve many thousands, millions, of customers around the world.
Checkout the video below to see Adeo's complete conversation with Benjamin Chong.
The Founder Institute is the world's premier pre-seed accelerator, with chapters across 200+ cities and Graduate companies that have raised over $1.85BN in funding. The company's mission is to “Globalize Silicon Valley” and empower communities of talented and motivated people to build impactful technology-enabled companies worldwide.
Learn more about the program at FI.co/overview.
