Tech Scaleup Australia – Report 2023

After more than a decade of organic growth, Australia can now be considered a robust global scaleup ecosystem, able to effectively compete with other thriving and well-established innovation hubs worldwide.

As of 2023, Australia boasts 1,299 scaleups that have collectively raised $28.5B in funding. Despite the country’s relatively small population and huge geographical size, Australia’s scaleup ecosystem shows an exceptional innovation density.

With 5 scaleups for every 100,000 inhabitants and 1.75% of GDP invested in the local innovation community, Australia outperforms both established ecosystems like Germany and France and emerging innovation hubs such as South Korea and the UAE.

These remarkable results are not coincidental.
Several key factors contribute to Australia’s innovation performance:

Strong public support for entrepreneurship at both federal and state level.

The presence of world-class tech scaleups like Atlassian and Canva.

Active engagement of high-quality university institutions in shaping local ecosystems.

However, Australia’s physical distance from the global innovation epicenters poses a challenge to the growth of its scaleup ecosystem. It is now crucial to recognize the country’s potential and build bridges to establish stronger connections between Australia and other established and thriving global innovation hubs.
We at Mind the Bridge are betting on Australia’s innovation potential.

The first step is to host in Sydney, one of our Scaleup Summits, our scouting and matching format. This will be done in collaboration with Investment in New South Wales (the innovation promotion agency of the state of NSW) and with the first SXSW (South By South West) hosted outside US (another sign in the right direction).