G’day and welcome to your weekly edition of Overnight Success - your download on all the important things that have happened in the Aussie startup ecosystem. 🚀 Heads up, this will be the last newsletter for several weeks until early January!
I wanted to take a moment to acknowledge the events that unfolded on Sunday in Bondi.
My thoughts are with the Jewish community, the families affected, and everyone hurting right now in the wider community.
On Sunday, we saw the worst of society, full of hate and ignorance. But in the moments during the event and the hours and days following. We saw some of the best of Australia, too. Heroes running toward the danger, putting themselves at risk to save others. Heroes donating blood, money, time, and making changes for a safer Australia.
If you are reading this and hurting, please know you are loved and supported by so many across this country and within this community.
👀 Headlines 👀
🩺 Australia’s largest GP booking platform, HotDoc, is expected to sign a deal before Christmas, with the auction tipped to value the business at more than $200 million. (AFR)
Two private equity heavyweights are vying for the asset. Potentia Capital and Pacific Equity Partners are in the final round, with a decision on exclusivity expected in the coming days.
PEP is bidding via its healthcare software platform. Pacific Equity Partners is pursuing HotDoc through Magentus, its $2.5 billion Fund VI portfolio company focused on specialised clinical software.
HotDoc is a highly profitable market leader. The platform serves more than 13 million Australians, processes 25 million GP appointments annually, generates around $30 million in ARR, and claims a 70% market share with 25% EBITDA margins.
Founded in 2012, HotDoc became one of Australia’s most downloaded apps during the pandemic and has since expanded into prescriptions, referrals and urgent appointment matching. Airtree remains a cornerstone investor, having backed the seed round in 2015. The venture capital firm has backed HotDoc for more than four years, alongside founder and management ownership.
✅ ASX-listed Bailador Technology Investments booked a $13.3m uplift across two portfolio companies, driven by sharp valuation increases in telehealth platform Updoc and proptech PropHero. (Investor Update)
PropHero’s valuation jumped 45.6% in 10 months, lifting Bailador’s $12.5m Series A stake to a carrying value of $18.2m, up $5.7m since February.
Updoc continues to outperform, with its carrying value rising 20.5% to $44.8m, a 124% uplift since Bailador’s original $20m investment, and $700k in cash dividends paid this year.
Despite a flat share price in 2025, Bailador delivered a strong FY25, posting a 7.8% portfolio return after fees and tax and paying a fully franked 3.6c final dividend, equating to an 8.1% grossed-up yield.
🟢 Hong Kong–based PE firm Audacy is launching its first climate tech fund, targeting up to $US100m ($151m) to deploy capital into underfunded Australian and APAC climate technology companies. (Capital Brief)
The fund will launch with five investments, including Melbourne-based Conry Tech, an HVAC startup, and will deploy at least 50% of capital across APAC, with Australia flagged as a key deal source.
Audacy has already invested $US25m into 12 climate tech startups, three of them Australian, Conry Tech, Jet Zero and Edge Zero, using primarily principal capital to date.
The raise targets institutional and family office capital, with a soft commitment already secured from an Australian climate-focused fund-of-funds investor.
Audacy is backing commercially viable deep tech, prioritising solutions without a “green premium” and favouring deployable technologies like sustainable aviation fuel and energy-efficient data centre infrastructure.
✂️ The federal government will inject $233M into CSIRO over two years, but the agency still plans to shed 350 roles. (Startup Daily)
Startups and commercialisation programs are footing the bill, with $102m cut from the Industry Growth Program and $147.6m in broader savings taken from industry and innovation initiatives.
The Mid-Year Economic and Fiscal Outlook report (MYEFO) reveals innovation funding is being “reprioritised”, including cuts to the Modern Manufacturing Initiative ($31.3m), Entrepreneurs’ Programme, STEM initiatives, and the Global Science and Technology Diplomacy Fund.
Labor’s startup policy reset continues, following earlier cuts to the Entrepreneurs’ Programme and the scrapping of Boosting Female Founders, with IGP funding now being shaved back despite launching just two years ago.
Researchers warn the cuts are shortsighted, with science leaders arguing reduced support for international collaboration undermines Australia’s strength in AI, quantum, advanced manufacturing and clean tech.
💰 January Capital, the Asia-Pacific VC fund, has closed a $US130m ($196m) Growth Credit Fund. (Capital Brief)
The new credit fund is backed by Japanese institutional investors, including SBI Holdings, GMO Payment Gateway, Orient Growth Ventures, plus Australia’s Australian Philanthropic Services Foundation.
The January Capital Australian portfolio includes Heidi, Cortical Labs and Go1.
The fund targets a structural funding gap in Asia-Pacific, a region that January Capital estimates accounts for just 2% of global growth-stage credit capital despite a growing cohort of high-quality tech companies.
January Capital says investor demand reflects confidence in growth credit as an asset class, with founding partner Benjamin Dunphy pointing to strong appetite for “disciplined, risk-managed exposure” to high-growth businesses.
📆 We’ve also put together a top 10 countdown of the most iconic moments of Australian starutps for some fun reflection! Check it out here.
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⚡ Startup Retro ⚡
IND Technology lands $50M to detect faults in powerlines and prevent bushfires
Founders: Alan Wong and Kokwai Leu
Melbourne-based grid intelligence startup IND Technology has raised $50 million to scale its early fault detection system designed to prevent powerline failures and bushfires, a growing risk as grids age and climates heat up.
Founded in 2013 by RMIT professor Alan Wong and Kokwai Leu in the aftermath of the 2009 Black Saturday fires, IND develops Early Fault Detection (EFD) technology that identifies precursors to electrical failures before they escalate into outages or wildfires. The company had been seeking up to $60 million at an estimated valuation of $200–300 million earlier this year.
The round was co-led by Angeleno Group and Energy Impact Partners, with participation from Edison International and local investor Virescent Ventures. The capital will be used to expand IND’s machine-learning engineering team and further improve its ability to analyse complex grid fault data in real time.
IND’s system uses sensors mounted on power poles kilometres apart to capture radio-frequency signals emitted by stressed infrastructure. These signals are analysed instantly, pinpointing faults to within 10 metres so utilities can intervene early. The company now operates across Australia, the US, Canada and Malaysia, has deployed 15,000 units in six countries, and claims its technology has helped prevent more than 500 fire events globally. Clients include AusNet, Powercor, Western Power and Endeavour Energy.
Due Diligence: Startup Daily
MEQ Solutions raises $23M Series A to better measure red-meat yields and quality
Founder: Remo Carbone
Melbourne-based startup MEQ Solutions has raised A$23 million (US$15m) in Series A funding to scale its AI-powered measurement technology across the global red-meat supply chain, an industry worth more than US$1 trillion annually.
The round was led by Insight Partners, marking a major institutional vote of confidence in MEQ’s push to replace subjective meat grading with data-driven verification. The company is building what it calls “truth infrastructure” — a system designed to objectively measure quality, yield and eating attributes from the live animal through to the processing plant.
MEQ’s platform combines hardware and software, including the MEQ Probe, MEQ Camera and MEQ Live, using proprietary imaging and AI models to analyse meat in real time. Its MEQ Camera recently became the first video-based beef grading technology certified by the USDA, positioning it as a global benchmark for objective measurement.
The capital will be used to expand MEQ’s team and deepen partnerships across Australia, New Zealand, Brazil and the United States, as the company accelerates global rollout. For producers and processors, MEQ promises clear economic upside: more accurate pricing, optimised yields and reduced waste by replacing the traditional “eye test” with verifiable data.
Already deployed across three continents, MEQ is betting that transparency and AI-driven measurement will become foundational infrastructure for modern food production.
Due Diligence: Overnight Success
Ferronova secures another $6M in its now $17M Series A to better detect cancer cells after surgery
Founders:
Adelaide-based medtech Ferronova has raised a further $6 million to push its image-guided cancer surgery technology closer to commercialisation, as it targets one of oncology’s most persistent problems: undetected cancer cells left behind after surgery.
Ferronova is developing super-paramagnetic iron oxide nanoparticles that bind to lymph node cells, helping surgeons identify tissue that may contain cancer and remove it more precisely. Current imaging often misses these cells, contributing to high recurrence rates, particularly in stomach and oesophageal cancers.
The round was led by existing backers Uniseed/UniSuper, the South Australian Venture Capital Fund, Artesian, and Renew Pharmaceuticals, a subsidiary of Singapore-listed UltraGreen.ai. The raise brings Ferronova’s total Series A funding to $17.5 million.
Ferronova is midway through a 60-patient, two-year clinical trial in stomach and oesophageal cancers, with 54 patients enrolled across leading Australian hospitals, including Peter MacCallum and Royal Adelaide Hospital. Completion is expected in early 2026, with US-based research planned to follow.
CEO Stewart Bartlett says surgery remains the only curative option for most patients, yet attracts just 0.1% of global cancer research funding, despite recurrence rates exceeding 60% in some cancers.
With approximately 1.8 million diagnoses annually across its initial target indications, Ferronova believes that improved surgical guidance could materially improve survival outcomes and position image-guided surgery as the new standard of care.
Due Diligence: Press Release
Atrium secures $1.3M per-seed to build an AI-powered Chief of Staff platform for leaders
Founders: Kevin Lu, Gerry Lu and Daniel Lum
Atrium has raised $1.3 million in pre-seed funding to build what it calls an AI-powered personal chief of staff, a relationship intelligence platform designed for investors, founders and senior executives drowning in contacts, emails and meetings.
Founded by former Airtree investor Kevin Lu, alongside Gerry Lu (ex-Immutable) and data engineer Daniel Lum, Atrium is rethinking CRM from the individual up, rather than the enterprise down. The round was backed by Airtree, TEN13, and a group of Australian and US angel investors.
The idea was born inside Airtree itself, after partners struggled to manage tens of thousands of contacts spread across multiple CRMs and communication tools. Lu says existing systems are optimised for reporting, not for helping people understand and act on their networks. Atrium’s ambition is to become a “personal chief of staff”, using AI to cut through noise, surface relevant relationships, and consolidate emails, notes and contact data into a single view. The platform pulls together pre-meeting context, supports network analysis, and helps users prioritise the people that matter most.
The target market includes investors, founders, executives and recruiters, as professional networks become more valuable earlier in careers and junior support roles are increasingly automated.
With the fresh capital, Atrium plans to grow its sales and engineering teams, expand into the US, and accelerate product development ahead of a formal launch in 2026.
Due Diligence: Capital Brief
Hnry secures $26M Series C to scale its PAYG accounting software for sole traders
Founders: James Fuller (CEO), Claire Fuller and Richard Freestone
New Zealand–founded Hnry has raised $26.1 million in an oversubscribed Series C as it looks to scale its pay-as-you-go accounting platform for sole traders across Australia and the UK.
The round was led by Movac’s Growth Fund, with participation from existing backer Icehouse Ventures, taking Hnry’s total capital raised since launch in 2018 to more than $87 million. The platform automates tax for sole traders by calculating, deducting and paying income tax, GST and Medicare levies at the moment users are paid, before transferring the remainder into their bank account.
Hnry positions itself as a full-stack alternative in a crowded market that includes Thriday, MYOB’s Solo and entry-level Xero plans. Alongside automated tax, the app lets users invoice customers, allocate super contributions, track mileage and lodge returns through in-house accountants.
Around 35–40% of new sign-ups now come via referrals, prompting a marketing push in Australia, home to roughly 1.7 million sole traders.
The company is also accelerating its UK expansion, where it has been live for just months but is already growing six times faster than its early rollout in Australia and New Zealand. Movac says upcoming digital tax reforms in the UK create a major opportunity for scale.
Due Diligence: SmartCompany
Midkey lands $100M debt warehouse for unconventional home-equity lending model
Founders: Richard Young and Scott Collison
Midkey has secured up to $100 million in wholesale funding from funds managed by UK-based Insight Investment, giving the Sydney-founded scale-up fresh firepower to expand its unconventional home-equity lending model across Australia
Founded in 2021 by former banking executives Richard Young and Scott Collison, Midkey offers an Australian-first “no monthly payments” home loan aimed at asset-rich but cash-flow-constrained homeowners. Unlike traditional mortgages, the loan has no fixed term and no regular repayments, instead being repaid when a triggering event occurs, such as selling the property.
The model targets mid-life Australians, typically aged 35 to 60, who have built up housing equity but are locked out of conventional lending due to serviceability tests that haven’t kept pace with property prices. Midkey says wage growth lagging behind housing values has left many borrowers unable to access their own equity through banks.
While the product shares some characteristics with reverse mortgages, Midkey positions itself as fundamentally different: loans are available to borrowers of any age over 18, can sit as either a first or second mortgage, and charge simple (not compounding) interest, alongside a deferral fee linked to property price growth.
To date, Midkey has helped more than 270 borrowers unlock home equity, with the new facility set to fund further loan book growth and partnerships with mortgage brokers nationwide.
Due Diligence: AFR
Real Flow Finance raises $3.5M for short-term financing options for homeowners
Founders: Justin Steer
Sydney-based property lending startup Real Flow Finance has raised $3.5 million from Singaporean real estate fintech Lyte.
Founded in 2013 by CEO Justin Steer, Real Flow focuses on easing cashflow pain points in property transactions. The platform offers short-term financing to homeowners to cover upfront selling costs, such as listing fees, styling, and minor renovations, and to real estate agents for commission advances.
Those costs typically range from $5,000 to $10,000, a friction Real Flow says often slows or complicates property sales. Since launch, the company has written 30,000 loans worth $250 million, generating $7.5 million in revenue in FY25.
Lyte’s investment will enable the Singaporean fintech to integrate its technology into Real Flow’s platform and provide growth capital to support product development. Lyte currently provides commission advances to more than 8,000 agents across the top 10 real estate agencies in Singapore and Malaysia, with the Real Flow deal marking its entry into Australia.
Real Flow now counts a network of 40,000 agents through partnerships with 2,000 property brokers across Australia and New Zealand.
Due Diligence: AFR
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🤝 M&A 🤝
🤝 ASX-listed Tyro Payments is snapping up Thriday to build an all-in-one SME finance stack with the deal set to complete in January 2026. (Startup Daily)
Thriday brings “CFO-in-your-pocket” software to Tyro: The Melbourne startup automates invoicing, expenses, accounting and banking, positioning itself as a Xero and MYOB rival for SMEs.
Founder Michael Nuciforo joins Tyro as part of the deal: The former Lloyds, RBS and ANZ banking exec cofounded Thriday in 2020 with Ben Winford, raising capital from NAB Ventures and via record-setting equity crowdfunding.
The acquisition adds financial admin tools to Tyro’s payments and banking platform, accelerating its push into integrated cash-flow management for small businesses.
🥳 Wins 🥳
💽 Silicon Quantum Computing has hit a major milestone. Sydney-based SQC has published results in Nature revealing a multi-qubit, multi-register silicon quantum processor whose performance improves as it scales.
The processor sets a new benchmark for fidelity at scale. SQC reports fidelities of up to 99.99%, defying the industry norm where quantum systems typically lose quality as more qubits are added.
SQC’s edge lies in atom-level chip manufacturing. The company is the only private quantum firm that manufactures its own QPUs, placing individual phosphorus atoms into silicon with 0.13-nanometre precision.
The breakthrough is translating into real-world traction. SQC has progressed to Stage B of DARPA’s Quantum Benchmarking Initiative, delivered quantum machine learning gains for Telstra, and sold a rack-mounted system to Australian Defence.
Leadership says the path to commercial-scale quantum is now clear. Founder and CEO Michelle Simmons says the system’s ability to increase in quality as it scales puts SQC on track to deliver the world’s first commercial-scale quantum computer.
🎥 Live streaming BLOB, the ‘Canva for real-time engagement’, has taken out the top prize at the Sydney Genesis accelerator. (Sydney Uni)
Founders Jasmine Li and Stefan Naja won $30,000 in equity-free funding for their platform that lets streamers create dynamic graphics to boost audience engagement.
The win caps an eight-year remote collaboration. Li and Naja had worked together online for years before meeting in person for the first time during the Genesis program, just days before the final pitch.
BackPro AI claimed the inaugural MLC Financial Clarity Prize. The startup, founded by University of Sydney students, builds bespoke large language model solutions for regulated industries and took home $5,000 for excellence in financial modelling.
Carers Corner and Aether Diagnostics also featured among the winners. Carers Corner, supporting unpaid carers, secured the runner-up prize, while Aether Diagnostics won the People’s Choice Award for its at-home diagnostic test.
The Genesis program continues to feed Australia’s startup pipeline. Now in its 19th year, the University of Sydney accelerator has supported more than 1,000 startups and helped founders raise over $80 million.
🚀 Build Club has launched Solaris AI to accelerate enterprise AI adoption. The Sydney-founded, US-based AI community says the new accelerator can compress organisational AI transformation timelines from roughly a year to a month. (Startup Daily)
Solaris replaces generic AI training with a desktop agent. Instead of abstract use cases, the platform deploys an agent that sits on employees’ desktops to observe workflows, identify bottlenecks and pinpoint where AI can deliver real productivity gains.
The product targets the enterprise adoption gap. Founder Annie Liao points to research showing around 95% of enterprise AI pilots fail, arguing the core problem is not model quality but poor day-to-day adoption.
The platform follows a diagnose–build–deploy model. Solaris maps role-specific workflows, upskills teams through hands-on projects and then deploys AI to production with measurable outcomes and defined review points.
Founded in 2023, the community now operates in 50 cities worldwide and raised a $1.75 million pre-seed round in 2024 led by Airtree and Blackbird.
📆 Notice Board 📆
👩💼 EY Entrepreneurial Winning Women Australia have opened applications to identify ambitious women entrepreneurs and provide them with advice, resources and access to unlock their full potential.
Participants will join the WW Asia-Pacific Conference in Korea in May 2026 and get a bunch of training, knowledge-sharing, and peer-to-peer sessions to scale their businesses. You can apply here for free, but be aware that it takes 30 to 45 minutes.
Would you like to promote an event or an opportunity? Enquire about a Notice Board promotion by replying to this email.
🧠 KaaS (Knowledge as a Service)
Will’s Pick 💁 Here's the pitch deck that Point72-backed Heidi Health used to raise $65 million to battle in the AI scribe race - Business Insider
In a special version of KaaS, I’ve reviewed the data and selected the highest-engaged KaaS link of the year: this Business Insider article featuring Heidi Health's pitch deck. Just some comments on what I think the deck does particularly well.
Visually demonstrates the pain point they’re trying to solve: Clinician burnout. → Hair on fire problem.
Consumer-focused solution, speaks to a potential moat. Reinforces this through the PLG of the product.
It let me buy into a much bigger vision. Yes, it's just a scribe today, but it will soon be a much bigger product suite.
Have we missed something? Got some feedback? We love emails, so send one over!
👔 Connect with me on LinkedIn: Overnight Success, Will Richards
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Thank you for an excellent 2025. Overnight Success has undergone significant changes. We launched 3 products, including a database, a jobs board and a syndicate! Looking forward to more amazing content next year!
‘Til next time,
👋 Will