In this episode of Give It A Nudge, Steve sits down with Dr. Mariam Martin-Mnatsakanyan, the Founder and CEO of AirLabOne. They talk about the reality of digitizing physical assets for complex, high-risk industries like healthcare, mining, and space exploration.

Mariam explains exactly how her embedded technology takes existing legacy machinery and makes it intelligent and self-regulating. This autonomy is crucial for environments that are harsh or completely isolated, like microgravity, where human intervention just isn't possible.

Building deep-tech hardware is notoriously hard. Mariam spent over five years bootstrapping the business entirely on her own, without traditional funding. She explains why she deliberately ignored early investors who didn't understand her vision, choosing instead to follow her own structured path.

This resilience paid off when she secured a global patent for remotely accessing real and virtual scientific instrumentations, and later won major validation from tech giants at the Select USA Investor Summit. She also walks through her plans to expand into Southern California while waiting on a major grant that could see her technology manufactured in local clean rooms and sent into space.

We get into Mariam's personal story, too. She traces her early career as an analytical chemist and pharmacology researcher , from hunting for male contraceptive drugs at the University of Geneva to breast cancer drug discovery at the University of Sydney.

She opens up about the exact moment her own frustration with accessing lab equipment sparked the idea for her global collaborative platform. Steve and Mariam also trade thoughts on the loneliness of being a solo founder, the critical importance of industry validation over random advice, and why building new technology that pairs with old equipment is the ultimate sustainable business model.

Timestamps:

00:00 – Intro: From pharmacology researcher to deep-tech founder

02:50 – The origin of AirLabOne: Making legacy machinery intelligent

04:53 – Microgravity: Why space is the ultimate test for autonomous tech

08:06 – How the frustration of drug discovery sparked a global patent

13:03 – The lonely road: 5 years of bootstrapping without co-founders

16:24 – Ignoring the noise: Why you shouldn't take advice from outside your industry

19:00 – Winning validation at the Select USA Investor Summit

23:20 – The pivot to scaling: Expanding to California and raising capital

29:56 – Sustainability: Pairing cutting-edge AI with old infrastructure

34:11 – Manufacturing locally and the wait for a major space grant

Links:

Connect with Mariam → https://www.linkedin.com/in/mariam-martin-mnatsakanyan-phd-4b0310104/

AirLabOne → https://airlabone.com/

Connect with Steve → https://www.linkedin.com/in/stevegrace/

The Nudge Group → https://thenudgegroup.com/

Give It A Nudge Podcast → https://www.youtube.com/@giveitanudge/

The Trouble With People → https://thetroublewithpeople.substack.com/

In this episode of Give It A Nudge, Steve sits down with Tom, co-founder and CMO of Lawpath. They talk about the reality of scaling a legal tech platform to over 600,000 small businesses. Tom shares a staggering statistic: up to 120,000 new companies are registered in Australia every single month. He explains exactly how Lawpath built a system to capture that massive audience.

Starting a business is hard. The standard three-year survival rate sits at a grim 51%. Most founders get completely crushed by the administrative burden of running a company. Tom explains why taking the legal and compliance work off their plates frees them up to actually build their products. This shift has pushed the survival rate of Lawpath users up to 65%. He also walks through their massive $10 million investment from Westpac, and why they doubled down on advertising during the COVID-19 lockdowns while their competitors froze.

We get into Tom's personal story, too. He traces his early career from Spritz—a startup that went through a wild $40 million acquisition by Yahoo7—to learning strict brand discipline at Tom Waterhouse. He opens up about the painful jump from being an individual contributor to a scale-up executive. He even admits that the sudden birth of his first child right before Black Friday finally forced him to stop micromanaging his team. Steve and Tom also trade stories about maintaining an 11-year co-founder relationship, and why loyalty always beats cheap pricing in the Australian market.

Timestamps:

00:00 – Intro: Surviving Spritz’s $40M Yahoo7 acquisition

05:47 – Learning strict brand discipline at Tom Waterhouse

08:31 – The origin of Lawpath: Fixing the headache of business setups

11:48 – Reaching 600,000 customers and the roadmap to 1 million

13:51 – How to secure a $10M strategic investment from Westpac

16:24 – Why 120,000 Aussies register new businesses every month

18:56 – Market quirks: Why Australian clients value loyalty over a cheap price

20:39 – The COVID pivot: Doubling ad spend while everyone else panicked

26:19 – Leadership realities: How a Black Friday baby cured his micromanaging

30:00 – Co-founder survival: 11 years together without imploding

37:01 – The 65% survival rate: Why automating the back-office keeps startups alive

Links:

Connect with Tom → https://www.linkedin.com/in/tomwillisweb/

Lawpath → https://lawpath.com.au/

Connect with Steve → https://www.linkedin.com/in/stevegrace/

The Nudge Group → https://thenudgegroup.com/

Give It A Nudge Podcast → https://www.youtube.com/@giveitanudge/

The Trouble With People → https://thetroublewithpeople.substack.com/

In this episode of Give It A Nudge, Steve sits down with Jacqui Clarke, ex-Deloitte Private Partner and author of Stop Worrying About Money, to talk about the single most important number 95% of people don't know: "What does it cost to open your front door?"

With the cost of living skyrocketing and "inheritance impatience" on the rise, financial stress is no longer just for those struggling to make ends meet. Jacqui explains why earning more money rarely solves a spending problem and why even high-net-worth individuals are terrified of their own bank accounts. She breaks down the "Toyota vs. Porsche" mindset trap and why smart women often find themselves financially vulnerable after a divorce.

Jacqui shares her background advising Australia’s wealthiest families and the brutal reality of the "ghosts" that come out of the woodwork when you leave a major firm. She also opens up about the "Orphan Club"—losing both parents in six months—and how it reshaped her view on legacy. Together, they prove that financial freedom isn't about how much you make, but about clarity, control, and honest conversations.

Timestamps:

00:00 – Intro: Steve’s 15-year history with Jacqui

02:00 – The "Orphan Club": Losing both parents in 6 months

08:00 – The secrecy of money & why families don't talk

12:15 – Divorce & financial literacy: Why smart women get stuck

17:45 – Leaving Deloitte: Bad leadership & the decision to jump

21:30 – The exit: Non-competes and the relief of walking away

24:40 – The "Ghosts": When former colleagues circle back

30:30 – The Big 4 Model: Why the "magic" is fading

36:00 – Writing a bestseller in 12 weeks (The 5am routine)

49:15 – The 95% Stat: Knowing the cost to open your front door

52:10 – The Toyota vs. Porsche mindset for young adults

56:30 – Longevity Risk: Can you afford to live to 100?

58:30 – Closing thoughts

LINKS

Connect with Jacqui → https://www.linkedin.com/in/jacquiclarke/

Stop Worrying about Money → https://www.jacquiclarke.me/stop-worrying-about-money

Connect with Steve → https://www.linkedin.com/in/stevegrace/

The Nudge Group → https://thenudgegroup.com/

Give It A Nudge Podcast → https://www.youtube.com/@giveitanudge/

The Trouble With People → https://thetroublewithpeople.substack.com/

In this episode of Give It A Nudge, Steve sits down with Jevon Le Roux (CEO) and Tahir Rauf (CTO), co-founders of Keeyu, to talk about the single most expensive question in e-commerce: "Where's my order?"

With 40% of all support tickets relating to delivery status and 56% of customers churning after just one bad post-purchase experience, the stakes have never been higher. Jevon and Tahir explain how they built a system to monitor 28 different failure points across fragmented software systems. This moves the industry from reactive resolution to proactive prevention.

The results? A massive 90% reduction in complaints and a 29% drop in workforce costs for their pilot customers.

Jevon shares his background in high-pressure retail ops where he saw teams spending half their day manually searching for orders. Tahir breaks down the technical challenge of connecting a "spaghetti stack" of legacy systems. Together, they are proving that while it takes 4 hours to fix a problem, it only takes 1 hour to prevent it.

Timestamps:

• 00:00 – Intro: The 56% Churn Stat & The Where’s My Order Nightmare
• 01:58 – Jevon & Tahir’s background: From Fintech & Retail to Founders
• 06:58 – The Problem: 28 failure points across 8 different systems
• 08:35 – How Keeyu Works: Moving from Reactive to Proactive
• 12:00 – The “4 Hours vs 1 Hour” Efficiency Rule
• 15:15 – It Can’t Be Done: Tackling the integration spaghetti
• 18:15 – The Pilot Results: 90% less complaints, 29% lower costs
• 21:00 – Raising Capital & The Plug-and-Play Architecture
• 34:00 – Steve’s horror story (and why manual support is dying)
• 38:15 – Services as Software: Redefining the industry standard
• 40:00 – The Founder Dynamic: Why Jevon said “I’m in” in one second
• 42:50 – Closing thoughts

Links:

Connect with Jevon → https://www.linkedin.com/in/jevonleroux/

Connect with Tahir → https://www.linkedin.com/in/tahirrauf/

Keeyu → https://www.keeyu.com/

Connect with Steve → https://www.linkedin.com/in/stevegrace/

The Nudge Group → https://thenudgegroup.com/

Give It A Nudge Podcast → https://www.youtube.com/@giveitanudge/

The Trouble With People → https://thetroublewithpeople.substack.com/

In this episode of Give It A Nudge, Steve sits down with Crystal McGregor, General Manager at Tech Ready Women Academy, to talk about what it really takes to help more women start, grow, and fund businesses — and why the investment numbers still don’t reflect the performance data.

Crystal shares a career path that starts in local government in Central Queensland (building skateparks, pools, and community programs), then moves into entrepreneurship through an 18-year consulting business, and eventually into the startup world via a fashion-tech company where she raised funding (including a friends-and-family round) and learned, in her words, by “making every mistake possible.”

Now, she’s focused on scaling Tech Ready Women’s impact nationally after the business’s acquisition by Scolari, helping founders build traction, revenue, and confidence — without drowning in contradictory advice.

In this episode, we cover:

Crystal’s move from government to entrepreneurship — and why she “got sick of saying no.”

The youth entrepreneurship program that taught teens how to problem-solve (including twins who learned to read using audiobooks + physical books).

Raising a friends-and-family round ($100k) — how those conversations actually happen.

Why VC data says “invest in women” and the market still doesn’t follow it.

How AI is changing the game for non-technical founders.

Tech Ready Women’s three-step pathway: Ideation → Customers → Investment Readiness.

The “1 to 1000 customers” sprints — and founders making their first sales fast (e.g., $300 in 24 hours).

The worst advice founders hear: “Take every piece of advice.”

Timestamps:

00:00 – Intro: Why this topic still isn’t shifting fast enough

00:52 – Crystal’s start in local government (sport & recreation)

03:20 – Leaving government + building an 18-year consulting business

04:30 – Youth entrepreneurship program: how it worked + the outcomes

08:52 – Fashion-tech startup: virtual try-on, grants, angels, and reality

10:33 – Friends-and-family round: how they raised $100k

11:25 – “We made every mistake possible” + lessons from the experience

13:00 – Tech Ready Women + the Scolari acquisition

15:10 – Has the environment changed for women founders?

16:14 – Why the VC model doesn’t match the data

17:18 – AI and the rise of the non-technical founder

22:14 – Program breakdown: Female Founders Startup Program

24:19 – “1 to 1000 customers” sprints + first sales momentum

26:38 – Investment Ready program (5 months) + capital options beyond VC

31:12 – Free resources, scholarships, and low-cost options

32:55 – Worst advice founders get: “Take every piece of advice”

33:23 – Closing thoughts

LINKS

Connect with Crystal → https://www.linkedin.com/in/crystal-mcgregor-86201068/

Tech Ready Women Academy → https://www.techreadywomen.academy/

Connect with Steve → https://www.linkedin.com/in/stevegrace/

The Nudge Group → https://thenudgegroup.com/

Give It A Nudge Podcast → https://www.youtube.com/@giveitanudge/

The Trouble With People → https://thetroublewithpeople.substack.com/

In this episode of Give It A Nudge, Steve finally sits down with Brendan Malone, Managing Director and Group CEO of Raiz Invest (ASX:RZI), after six years of trying to get him on the show!

Brendan takes us through his fascinating career journey, transitioning from a traditional background in investment banking (RBS) in London and Asia to owning a pub in Newcastle, and finally leading one of Australia’s most successful FinTechs.

They dive deep into the evolution of Raiz (formerly Acorns Australia), managing over $2 billion in funds, and the lessons learned from their expansion into (and withdrawal from) the Asian market. Brendan also discusses the power of "round-ups," the importance of financial literacy, and how Raiz is helping Aussies—and their kids—build wealth during tough economic times.

In this episode, we cover:

* Brendan’s shift from corporate banking to startup founder.

* The "sustainable growth" philosophy vs. burning cash.

* The mechanics of Raiz Rewards and reinvesting $10M+ back to users.

* Lessons learned from listing on the ASX and expanding into Indonesia & Malaysia.

* New features: From Bitcoin allocations to "Jars" for specific savings goals.

* How user behavior changes during market volatility (Brexit vs. Trump vs. Now).

Timestamps:

00:00 – Intro: Finally getting Brendan on the show

02:00 – Brendan’s Background: From Newcastle to Investment Banking in London/Asia

05:00 – The pivot: Owning a pub & discovering Acorns

06:00 – Launching Acorns Grow in 2016

09:00 – The strategy of sustainable growth

12:00 – Explaining the “Round-Up” technology

14:00 – Adding Bitcoin & custom portfolios

16:00 – Raiz Rewards: $10M reinvested into user accounts

17:00 – Rebranding to Raiz & Listing on the ASX

19:00 – The Asian Expansion: Challenges in Indonesia & Malaysia

24:00 – Branding consistency & App design

30:00 – The power of Dividends & Financial Literacy

32:00 – Raiz Kids & Intergenerational wealth

35:00 – Data insights: Raiz Jars & saving for haircuts

46:00 – How Raiz educates users through market volatility

49:00 – What’s next for Raiz?

LINKS

Connect with Brendan → https://www.linkedin.com/in/brendanmalone/

Raiz Invest Australia → https://raizinvest.com.au/

Connect with Steve → https://www.linkedin.com/in/stevegrace/

The Nudge Group → https://thenudgegroup.com/

Give It A Nudge Podcast → https://www.youtube.com/@giveitanudge/

The Trouble With People → https://thetroublewithpeople.substack.com/

In this episode of Give It A Nudge, Steve chats with James Sneddon, the founder of Hyphen Health, Australia’s largest network of sexual health and harm minimization telemedicine clinics.

James didn’t start in medicine; he started in hospitality. The idea for Hyphen Health was born while owning a café across the street from a GP clinic, watching patients wait hours just to get a simple script. He realized the system was broken, and he built a digital solution to fix it.

Steve and James dive deep into the reality of scaling a business in a high-stigma industry. They discuss why doctors are legally refusing to treat steroid users (and why James steps in to help), the "cooking medication for grandma" privacy problem, and how COVID finally forced the public health sector to ditch fax machines and join the 21st century.

They also cover the massive shifts in the business—from buying out a co-founder and acquiring competitors to landing a world-first partnership with the public health sector.

TIMESTAMPS:

00:00 Intro: Taboo subjects and "Hyphen" Health

00:55 Steroids & Stigma: Why doctors refuse to treat users

02:25 From Hospitality to Healthcare: The "Founder Mindset"

06:10 The Epiphany: Watching the doctor's waiting room from a cafe window 08:40 How COVID killed the fax machine

09:50 Navigating regulatory panic & buying out a co-founder

14:40 "Cooking meds for Grandma": The need for absolute privacy

15:50 The reality of HIV today (vs Diabetes)

20:35 The "Work From Home" impact on testing trends

23:00 Acquiring "Hey Fella" & navigating growth

29:20 The World-First Public Health partnership

33:22 The 84% Statistic: Why you need to get tested

QUOTES FROM THIS EPISODE:

"HIV has less of an impact on your life now than diabetes."

"The same reason you don't see a doctor... You're cooking your medication for the next grandma."

"Covid ended the trust. It also encouraged public health to stop in line with fax machines and allow emails to work."

"16% of Australians from 16 to 49 have never been tested... So 84% of the population have never been tested."

ABOUT JAMES:

James Sneddon is the founder of Hyphen Health, a group of digital health brands focused on removing barriers to healthcare. His portfolio includes Stigma Health (sexual health), PrEP Health (HIV prevention), and other harm-minimization platforms.

Starting his career as an accountant before building a hospitality empire in Newcastle, James pivoted to health tech to solve the inefficiencies he saw in the traditional medical system. He has since grown Hyphen Health into a profitable, multi-brand ecosystem that is reshaping how Australians access sensitive healthcare.

LINKS

Connect with James → https://www.linkedin.com/in/james-sneddon-a3a4b52b/

Hyphen Health → https://hyphen.health/

Connect with Steve → https://www.linkedin.com/in/stevegrace/

The Nudge Group → https://thenudgegroup.com/

Give It A Nudge Podcast → https://www.youtube.com/@giveitanudge/

The Trouble With People → https://thetroublewithpeople.substack.com/

In this episode of Give It A Nudge, Steve chats with Yash Varma, a seasoned tech founder, investor at Empress Capital, and high-performance coach.

While Yash has a massive background in tech (founding Spaarks, investing in Tesla and Moderna, and studying AI at Stanford), this conversation is not about code. It is about code for the human body. Steve and Yash dive deep into the concept of Longevity to debate why the "retire at 65" model is broken and why health is officially the new wealth.

Yash opens up about the health scare that forced him to stop the "founder grind," the specific habits he uses to optimize his energy (including a live demonstration of a Tony Robbins style state change), and why eating food that "goes off" is actually the secret to living longer.

If you are a founder, business leader, or just someone looking to add more life to your years, this is a must-watch.

TIMESTAMPS:

00:00 Intro: Why we need a "grown-up" conversation about longevity

01:18 Defining Longevity: It is about quality of life rather than just years

03:55 Why retirement is an outdated concept

05:00 State Management: Jumping off bridges with Tony Robbins

07:06 LIVE DEMO: Yash teaches Steve the "Power Move" to change energy instantly

12:00 The 3 Pillars of Performance: Work, Purpose, and Health

16:30 "You can’t do anything if you’re dead": Prioritizing founder health

19:00 The Wake-Up Call: Yash’s hospitalization story

23:15 Parenting: Why kids do what you do, not what you say

25:00 The widening gap between the healthy and unhealthy

26:45 AI, Technology, and the "Glasshole" story

36:55 The pros and cons of wearable health tech (Whoop, etc.)

40:00 Yash’s Sleep Routine: Same time, dark room, and "sleepy tea"

46:50 Blue Zones & The "Centenarian Olympics" (Getting up without hands)

50:40 Yash’s advice: Move heavy things, eat fresh food, and connect with people

QUOTES FROM THIS EPISODE:

"It's not about living more years, it's about the life in your years."

"I prioritize my health over everyone else’s because if I want to give to my family and my business, I can’t do anything if I’m dead."

"Health is wealth. You can have as much money as anyone in the world, but without your health, you're on a hollow vision of performance."

"People do what you do, not what you say."

ABOUT YASH:

Yash Varma is a global citizen, tech founder, and high-performance coach. After founding and exiting the global software consultancy Spaarks (with offices in London, Glasgow, and Canberra), Yash shifted his focus to empowering other founders.

He is currently a Principal at Empress Capital and an active Angel investor with early stakes in companies like Tesla and Moderna. Beyond business, Yash is a certified high-performance coach, a mentor with Energy Labs, and a dedicated philanthropist leading the Canberra Chapter of Room to Read. He lives by three words: Love, Joy, and Contribute.

LINKS:

Connect with Yash → https://www.linkedin.com/in/yashvarma/

Connect with Steve → https://www.linkedin.com/in/stevegrace/

The Nudge Group → https://thenudgegroup.com/

Give It A Nudge Podcast → https://www.youtube.com/@giveitanudge/

The Trouble With People → https://thetroublewithpeople.substack.com/

In this episode, Steve Grace sits down with Albert Patajo, VP Strategy & Operations at Nexl, to unpack one of the rarest outcomes in Australian tech right now: a local startup hitting Series B, and what it actually takes to get there.

Albert shares his non-founder path into the operator seat, from Deloitte to early-stage startups to capital raise advisory, before joining Nexl with one urgent mandate: raise money and build a more capital-efficient business in a market that had tightened overnight. He breaks down why focus beats ambition, how Nexl went deep in the US Northeast instead of trying to launch everywhere, and what changed when top US investors started coming inbound with term sheets.

They also dig into the founder-operator partnership: trust, low ego, and working like co-founders without the title. Plus why Albert thinks AI’s biggest immediate impact in legal won’t be the practice of law, but everything around it, relationships, BD, and operations.

Timestamps:

0:00 – Intro: Nexl and the Series B milestone

0:40 – Darwin to Canberra to Sydney (and the culture shock)

3:20 – Why consulting is startup training in disguise

6:30 – First startup lessons: being employee #6 and doing everything

9:15 – Capital raise advisory in the 2020–21 boom

10:45 – How Albert met Phil (Nexl’s founder) and why the role existed

12:25 – Why Series B is "escape velocity"

13:55 – The first six months: raising with limited runway

15:30 – Capital efficiency: small bets, incremental hires

16:20 – The focus move: winning the US Northeast (not launching the US)

18:45 – What Nexl does: relationship-first CRM for law firms

20:35 – Inbound term sheets and testing the waters for Series B

22:00 – Bringing in the "dream" investor and why it was worth it

23:05 – Founder-operator dynamic: low ego, high trust

26:55 – Australia as the timezone bridge for US and Europe teams

28:50 – Post-Series B: hiring leaders who’ve "seen the movie"

33:25 – The big ambition: category leadership and deep penetration

35:10 – AI in legal: where it actually changes firms first

Links:

Connect with Albert → https://www.linkedin.com/in/albertpatajo/

Connect with Steve → https://www.linkedin.com/in/stevegrace/

The Nudge Group → https://thenudgegroup.com/

Give It A Nudge Podcast → https://www.youtube.com/@giveitanudge/

The Trouble With People → https://thetroublewithpeople.substack.com/

In this episode, Steve Grace sits down with Kevin Lu, founder of Atrium, to unpack the "reverse journey" of leaving a prestigious career in Venture Capital to enter the trenches as a founder.

Kevin reveals why he walked away from investing in some of Australia's most successful tech companies to solve a problem that haunted him for years, which was the absolute chaos of managing professional relationships.

Kevin breaks down the "Founder Hierarchy" used by top VCs to spot unicorns (and why having a "chip on your shoulder" is the ultimate competitive advantage), the 100-year-old secret from Rockefeller’s Rolodex that inspired his new AI startup, and why he believes constraints rather than massive funding rounds are the true drivers of innovation.

Timestamps:

0:00 – The “Reverse Journey”: Investor to Founder

1:47 – Escaping the “Lawyer Trap” into Tech

6:11 – Corporate VC (Reinventure) vs. Pure Play (AirTree)

10:07 – The 2021 Funding Craze: “It was nuts”

14:10 – The Founder Hierarchy: Why you need a chip on your shoulder

22:42 – REVEAL: What is Atrium?

25:18 – Rockefeller’s 120,000-card secret

30:17 – The joy of co-founding with a sibling

33:17 – Why constraints create value (Bootstrapping vs. VC)

37:47 – US vs. Australia: Risk appetite and hiring bias

40:47 – Where have all the young founders gone?

Links:

Connect with Kevin → https://www.linkedin.com/in/kevin-lu-514420112/

Connect with Steve → https://www.linkedin.com/in/stevegrace/

The Nudge Group → https://thenudgegroup.com/

Give It A Nudge Podcast → https://www.youtube.com/@giveitanudge/

The Trouble With People → https://thetroublewithpeople.substack.com/