My guest for Ep220 of The Startup Playbook Podcast was Adam Ewart, the Co-founder & CEO of Send My Bag.

Send My Bag is the international luggage shipping and relocation platform used by travellers and businesses around the world.

Adam’s story is a fascinating one. From building a global company out of a small town in Northern Ireland, to turning PR into a powerful growth engine, to deliberately bootstrapping even when VCs came knocking, his journey is full of practical lessons and hard-earned insights.

In this episode we dive into:

A big shout out to our long-term partners for the show:

Scendar is the OG startup accounting firm in Australia catering to all stages of your business’ life. If you’re busy running your startup, you don’t have time to do your own books and forecast. Instead, fully outsource your finance function, giving you time and resources back to focus on what you do best in growing your business. Find out more at Scendar.com

Vanta helps businesses get — and stay — compliant by automating up to 90% of the work for the most in-demand compliance frameworks. And with over 300 integrations, you can easily monitor and secure the tools your business relies on.
Join over six thousand fast-growing companies that use Vanta to manage risk and prove security in real time.
The Startup Playbook Podcast listeners get access to an exclusive offer of USD$1000 off their plans. Head over to vanta.com/podcast to get access to this exclusive discount.

Music: Paycheck

Find all of the links for the podcast on Linktree here

The post Ep220 – Adam Ewart (Co-founder & CEO – Send My Bag) on bootstrapping Send My Bag from a uni side project to global service appeared first on Startup Playbook.

My guest for Ep219 of The Startup Playbook Podcast was Stirling Mortlock.

Stirling is one of Australia’s greatest ever Rugby players. He’s a former Wallabies Captain, World Cup player, and one of the few players to score over 1,000 points in Super Rugby.

But his story goes well beyond the field. After retiring, he’s built a career as a founder and investor. 

Today, he’s the Co-founder of XV Capital, where he’s backing the next generation of sports-tech and performance-led startups.

In this episode we dive into:

I’m also excited to announce that Stirling will be joining The Komo Club as a speaker for Cohort 2. The program is the world’s first human accelerator, designed to help high performing founders and executives implement the right system and frameworks to help them succeed in business and all areas of their life. You can find out more at thekomoclub.com

A big shout out to our long-term partners for the show:

Scendar is the OG startup accounting firm in Australia catering to all stages of your business’ life. If you’re busy running your startup, you don’t have time to do your own books and forecast. Instead, fully outsource your finance function, giving you time and resources back to focus on what you do best in growing your business. Find out more at Scendar.com

Vanta helps businesses get — and stay — compliant by automating up to 90% of the work for the most in-demand compliance frameworks. And with over 300 integrations, you can easily monitor and secure the tools your business relies on.
Join over six thousand fast-growing companies that use Vanta to manage risk and prove security in real time.
The Startup Playbook Podcast listeners get access to an exclusive offer of USD$1000 off their plans. Head over to vanta.com/podcast to get access to this exclusive discount.

Music: Paycheck

Find all of the links for the podcast on Linktree here

The post Ep219 – Stirling Mortlock (Co-founder – XV Capital) on the journey from Wallabies Captain to Sports-Tech Investor appeared first on Startup Playbook.

My guest for Ep218 of The Startup Playbook Podcast was Nipun Mehra.

Nipun has had an incredible track record in his career. At Amazon he launched their first ever real time inventory management system, was an early team member at Flipkart helping build and scale one of India’s most successful and iconic startups before joining Sequoia India as an investor.

In 2020, he Co-founded Ula, a B2B e-commerce platform that set out to modernise retail supply chains for millions of small businesses starting in Indonesia.

Ula quickly become one of South East Asia’s fastest growing startups. They went from $0 to $300M in revenue within 2 years. Ola also raised over $140M from leading investors including Sequoia, Lightspeed, Tencent and even raised capital from Jeff Bezos himself, his first investment into this part of the world.

But in a candid and deeply honest conversation, Nipun shares – for the first time publicly – the full story of what happened behind the scenes from Ula when he decided to shut down the company and return the remaining capital to investors.

From hypergrowth to hard calls, this episode dives into the reality of building a company at scale and the weight of leadership at challenging times.

In this episode we cover:

I’m also excited to announce that Nipun will be joining The Komo Club as a speaker for Cohort 2. The program is the world’s first human accelerator, designed to help high performing founders and executives implement the right system and frameworks to help them succeed in business and all areas of their life. You can find out more at thekomoclub.com

Thank you to Karl Noronha, Ganesh Rengaswamy and Prithvi Rajaram for their help with research for this interview!

A big shout out to our long-term partners for the show:

Scendar is the OG startup accounting firm in Australia catering to all stages of your business’ life. If you’re busy running your startup, you don’t have time to do your own books and forecast. Instead, fully outsource your finance function, giving you time and resources back to focus on what you do best in growing your business. Find out more at Scendar.com

Vanta helps businesses get — and stay — compliant by automating up to 90% of the work for the most in-demand compliance frameworks. And with over 300 integrations, you can easily monitor and secure the tools your business relies on.
Join over six thousand fast-growing companies that use Vanta to manage risk and prove security in real time.
The Startup Playbook Podcast listeners get access to an exclusive offer of USD$1000 off their plans. Head over to vanta.com/podcast to get access to this exclusive discount.

Music: Paycheck

Find all of the links for the podcast on Linktree here

The post Ep218 – Nipun Mehra (Co-founder & CEO – Ula) On Ula’s hypergrowth, Bezos backing & the hard call to shut down appeared first on Startup Playbook.

My guest for Ep217 of The Startup Playbook Podcast was Dr. Steven Lu.

Dr. Steven Lu is the Co-founder and Chief Medical Officer of Everlab, Australia’s leading preventative health and longevity startups.

With over 15 years of clinical experience, Steven specialised in the prevention and management of complex medical conditions including heart attacks and strokes. After years of treating late-stage illness, he shifted focus to building a proactive model of healthcare, one that empowers people to catch risks early and take control of their long-term health.

That idea became Everlab.

Since launching, Everlab has scaled rapidly across Australia, combining full-body diagnostics, personalised blood testing, and AI-driven insights to make preventative healthcare more accessible and actionable.

The company recently closed a $15M AUD Seed round led by New York based Left Lane Capital. I was proud to continue backing Steven and the Everlab team through Playbook Ventures in this latest round.

In addition to our investment, I’ve had the pleasure of working with Steven through The Komo Club, where he’s a featured speaker in both Cohort 1 and 2. The Komo Club has also partnered with Everlab who support our members directly with DEXA scans, blood testing, and 1:1 medical consultations as part of their cohort experience.

In this episode, we discuss:

Thank you to Sam Kothari, Chai Ng and Kelly Huang for their help with research for this interview!

A big shout out to our long-term partners for the show:

Scendar is the OG startup accounting firm in Australia catering to all stages of your business’ life. If you’re busy running your startup, you don’t have time to do your own books and forecast. Instead, fully outsource your finance function, giving you time and resources back to focus on what you do best in growing your business. Find out more at Scendar.com

Vanta helps businesses get — and stay — compliant by automating up to 90% of the work for the most in-demand compliance frameworks. And with over 300 integrations, you can easily monitor and secure the tools your business relies on.
Join over six thousand fast-growing companies that use Vanta to manage risk and prove security in real time.
The Startup Playbook Podcast listeners get access to an exclusive offer of USD$1000 off their plans. Head over to vanta.com/podcast to get access to this exclusive discount.

Music: Paycheck

Find all of the links for the podcast on Linktree here

The post Ep217 – Dr Steven Lu (Co-founder & CMO – Everlab) on building the future of preventative health appeared first on Startup Playbook.

My guest for Ep216 of The Startup Playbook Podcast was Chris Withers.

This week marks 9 years of The Startup Playbook Podcast.

What started as a side project in 2015 has now become a platform that’s shared the stories of 200+ founders, investors, and operators — and I’m so grateful to all of you who’ve tuned in, shared episodes, and supported the show along the way.

To mark the milestone, I couldn’t have asked for a better guest than Chris Withers, the Founder & CEO of Klikit, a platform helping merchants grow revenue, cut costs, and streamline operations through a powerful all-in-one operating system.

Before founding Klikit, Chris was part of the early Uber team in Australia & NZ, helped scale Uber Eats across Asia, and later became VP of Global Mobility at GoJek, giving him a front-row seat to some of the world’s most intense high-growth environments.

Chris is also someone I’ve personally backed through Playbook Ventures. Beyond the complexity of building in Southeast Asia, what’s inspired me most is his resilience, including his fight through a cancer diagnosis just months after raising capital as a solo founder.

In this episode, we dive into:

A big shout out to our long-term partners for the show:

Scendar is the OG startup accounting firm in Australia catering to all stages of your business’ life. If you’re busy running your startup, you don’t have time to do your own books and forecast. Instead, fully outsource your finance function, giving you time and resources back to focus on what you do best in growing your business. Find out more at Scendar.com

Vanta helps businesses get — and stay — compliant by automating up to 90% of the work for the most in-demand compliance frameworks. And with over 300 integrations, you can easily monitor and secure the tools your business relies on.
Join over six thousand fast-growing companies that use Vanta to manage risk and prove security in real time.
The Startup Playbook Podcast listeners get access to an exclusive offer of USD$1000 off their plans. Head over to vanta.com/podcast to get access to this exclusive discount.

Music: Paycheck

Find all of the links for the podcast on Linktree here

The post Ep216 – Chris Withers (Founder & CEO – Klikit) on lessons from Uber & Gojek, beating cancer & solving hard problems appeared first on Startup Playbook.

My guest for Ep215 of The Startup Playbook Podcast was Ben Dunphy.

Ben is the Co-Founder and Partner of January Capital, a VC fund that invests in early stage high growth startups in the Asia Pacific region. They also run an $85M growth credit fund, offering scale-stage companies access to non-dilutive capital.

I first had Ben on the show back in October 2016 and nearly a decade later, we revisit the journey and dive into:

Also a big shout out to our long-term partners for the show:

Scendar is the OG startup accounting firm in Australia catering to all stages of your business’ life. If you’re busy running your startup, you don’t have time to do your own books and forecast. Instead, fully outsource your finance function, giving you time and resources back to focus on what you do best in growing your business. Find out more at Scendar.com

Vanta helps businesses get — and stay — compliant by automating up to 90% of the work for the most in-demand compliance frameworks. And with over 300 integrations, you can easily monitor and secure the tools your business relies on.
Join over six thousand fast-growing companies that use Vanta to manage risk and prove security in real time.
The Startup Playbook Podcast listeners get access to an exclusive offer of USD$1000 off their plans. Head over to vanta.com/podcast to get access to this exclusive discount.

Music: Paycheck

Find all of the links for the podcast on Linktree here

The post Ep215 – Ben Dunphy (Co-founder & Partner – January Capital) on data-driven VC & leveraging both equity & credit for growth appeared first on Startup Playbook.

My guest for Ep214 of The Startup Playbook Podcast was Pan Koutlakis.

Pan is the Co-Founder and CEO of EatClub, a platform that uses dynamic pricing to help restaurants fill empty tables during off-peak hours, while passing on great deals to diners.

EatClub saw remarkable growth early on, but like many in the industry, the business came to a standstill when COVID hit, with revenue dropping to zero overnight. Pan responded by drastically downsizing overheads, restructuring the company, and rebuilding momentum recently leading the business to secure an impressive $18.2 million Series A round.

In this episode we covered a variety of topics including:

A big thank you to Dan Szekely, Jonte Shaw and David Hodges for their help with this interview!

Also a big shout out to our long-term partners for the show:

Scendar is the OG startup accounting firm in Australia catering to all stages of your business’ life. If you’re busy running your startup, you don’t have time to do your own books and forecast. Instead, fully outsource your finance function, giving you time and resources back to focus on what you do best in growing your business. Find out more at Scendar.com

Vanta helps businesses get — and stay — compliant by automating up to 90% of the work for the most in-demand compliance frameworks. And with over 300 integrations, you can easily monitor and secure the tools your business relies on.
Join over six thousand fast-growing companies that use Vanta to manage risk and prove security in real time.
The Startup Playbook Podcast listeners get access to an exclusive offer of USD$1000 off their plans. Head over to vanta.com/podcast to get access to this exclusive discount.

Music: Paycheck

Find all of the links for the podcast on Linktree here

The post Ep214 – Pan Koutlakis (Co-founder & CEO – EatClub) on rebuilding EatClub from $0 revenue to global expansion after COVID appeared first on Startup Playbook.

My guest for Ep213 of The Startup Playbook Podcast was Rob Phillpot.

Rob and his co-founder Leigh Jasper have played a huge part in shaping Australia’s tech landscape, building Aconex into one of the country’s most iconic companies, taking it public in 2014 and ultimately selling it to Oracle in 2017 for $1.6 billion.

Since then, Rob has dedicated his time to advising startups, supporting philanthropy, and investing through his family office, Gravel Road Ventures. Most recently, Rob, Leigh Jasper, and A Cloud Guru founder Sam Kroonenberg teamed up to launch Glitch Capital, a $50 million founders fund backing the next generation of global tech companies.

In this episode, we cover a lot of ground, including:

A big thank you to Ben Leach, Andrew Barron and Bill Phillpot for their help with this interview!

Also a big shout out to our long-term partners for the show:

Scendar is the OG startup accounting firm in Australia catering to all stages of your business’ life. If you’re busy running your startup, you don’t have time to do your own books and forecast. Instead, fully outsource your finance function, giving you time and resources back to focus on what you do best in growing your business. Find out more at Scendar.com

Vanta helps businesses get — and stay — compliant by automating up to 90% of the work for the most in-demand compliance frameworks. And with over 300 integrations, you can easily monitor and secure the tools your business relies on.
Join over six thousand fast-growing companies that use Vanta to manage risk and prove security in real time.
The Startup Playbook Podcast listeners get access to an exclusive offer of USD$1000 off their plans. Head over to vanta.com/podcast to get access to this exclusive discount.

The Komo Club – Details here

Music: Paycheck

Find all of the links for the podcast on Linktree here

The post Ep213 – Rob Phillpot (Co-founder – Aconex) on scaling Aconex to a $1.6B exit and launching a $50M founders fund appeared first on Startup Playbook.

My guest for Ep212 of The Startup Playbook Podcast was Matt Loop.

There are few people who’ve had as much influence in shaping the tech landscape in this region as Matt.

He began his career at Salesforce, where he was one of their earliest hires in Australia, before going on to lead sales at LinkedIn, first in ANZ, then later as Head of Enterprise in North America.

After that, he returned to Australia to take on the role of Head of Asia Pacific at Slack, helping the company scale its presence across the region.

Today, Matt is the VP and Head of Asia at Rippling, a workforce management platform that’s transforming how businesses manage their people, IT, and operations. Just last month, Rippling announced a $450 million Series G round, valuing the company at $16.8 billion.

In this episode, we dive into a range of topics, including:

A big thank you to Katrina Loop, James Demetrios and Andrew McCarthy for their help with this interview!

Also a big shout out to our long-term partners for the show:

Scendar is the OG startup accounting firm in Australia catering to all stages of your business’ life. If you’re busy running your startup, you don’t have time to do your own books and forecast. Instead, fully outsource your finance function, giving you time and resources back to focus on what you do best in growing your business. Find out more at Scendar.com

Vanta helps businesses get — and stay — compliant by automating up to 90% of the work for the most in-demand compliance frameworks. And with over 300 integrations, you can easily monitor and secure the tools your business relies on.
Join over six thousand fast-growing companies that use Vanta to manage risk and prove security in real time.
The Startup Playbook Podcast listeners get access to an exclusive offer of USD$1000 off their plans. Head over to vanta.com/podcast to get access to this exclusive discount.

The Komo Club – Details here

Music: Paycheck

Find all of the links for the podcast on Linktree here

The post Ep212 – Matt Loop (Head of Asia – Rippling) on Leadership, Hiring & Growing Iconic Tech Companies appeared first on Startup Playbook.

My guest for Ep211 of The Startup Playbook Podcast was Jodie Imam.

Jodie is the Co-founder & CEO of Tractor Ventures, which provides non dilutive capital (between $100,000 – $1.5M) to tech enabled companies.

Since launching in 2020, Tractor has deployed nearly $100M, has 230 customers and is tracking at $5M in annual revenue.

Prior to this, Jodie was the Co-founder of Occasional Butler which was acquired in 2020.

She was also a member of Cohort #1 of the Komo Club, and in this episode we dive into a range of areas including:

A big thank you to Olivia Doherty, Andrew Fitzpatrick and Matt Allen for their help with this interview!

Also a big shout out to our long-term partners for the show:

Scendar is the OG startup accounting firm in Australia catering to all stages of your business’ life. If you’re busy running your startup, you don’t have time to do your own books and forecast. Instead, fully outsource your finance function, giving you time and resources back to focus on what you do best in growing your business. Find out more at Scendar.com

Vanta helps businesses get — and stay — compliant by automating up to 90% of the work for the most in-demand compliance frameworks. And with over 300 integrations, you can easily monitor and secure the tools your business relies on.
Join over six thousand fast-growing companies that use Vanta to manage risk and prove security in real time.
The Startup Playbook Podcast listeners get access to an exclusive offer of USD$1000 off their plans. Head over to vanta.com/podcast to get access to this exclusive discount.

The Komo Club – Details here

Music: Paycheck

Find all of the links for the podcast on Linktree here

The post Ep211 – Jodie Imam (Co-founder & CEO – Tractor Ventures) on startup exits, scaling with content and life-changing personal systems appeared first on Startup Playbook.