TWISTA - This Week in Startups Australia

The robots are coming! Led by former Young Australian of the Year Marita Cheng, TWISTA takes a tour of our robot-driven future. Marita runs two startups - including famed accessibility app AIPoly - and she's all about how robots will be transforming our world for the better. Then TWISTA talks to the founders of new muru-D inductee Abyss Solutions, about one very promising future for robots -- beneath the waves.

Co-founder of Melbourne startup Hava, Pete Gatt, makes the most of the migration to the cloud, producing SaaS visualisation tools that any cloud computing customer can use to save money. More than that, Hava has been funded - via Melbourne Matt Allen, who joins us on the show - through the new Blackbird 'Flock' fund, which favours close relationships between VC partners and Australian startups. Then TWISTA has another chat with Startup Muster CEO Monica Wulff, who has some big plans in store for this year's survey. Clouds and community, on this episode of TWISTA!

As executive chairman of Catapult Sports, Adir Shifman has created a SaaS monster in the sports space that's worth a quarter of a billion dollars. After taking the company public on the ASX late in 2014, Adir has quardrupled shareholder value - and he tells TWISTA why he's just getting started. Then TWISTA speaks with Yvonne Everett, who reveals the inner secrets of how to be an effective director for a startup - it's all about relationships! Getting big and doing it right, on this episode of TWISTA.

The founders of Eora3D tell TWISTA how the search for a better paraboic reflector led them to accidentially build a cheap and 3D scanner that went on to become a huge success on Kickstarter. Then TWISTA pops out to Perth to chat with Newton Labs founder Simon Vincent. As the name implies, Newton Labs helps mining companies deal with the consequences of gravity - and very large boulders!

The Innovation Policy mooted by the Federal Government has radically changed the startup scene. TWISTA talks to StartupAUS CEO Peter Bradd to find out what it really means. Then we chat with Monica Wulff, CEO of Startup Muster, who shares some of the results of their 2015 survey of the Australian startup community. Finally, Santa's coming - well, sort of. We talk to Rory Cunningham of the ASX, who tells TWISTA it's a lot easier to raise money through a public offering than you might think!

TWISTA takes a deep dive into the hot new zone for tech startups - fintech. Will the banks be disrupted? Will the 14 billion dollars invested this year bear any fruit? TWISTA talks to Stone and Chalk founder and CEO Alex Scandurra about his long-term vision for Australia's fintech ecosystem. Then we turn Eric Frost, who's SimpleKYC is one of the first companies to be mentored in Stone and Chalk.

Brisbane - it's long overdue, but TWISTA makes up for a lack of attention with a killer episode. We start with tech legend Steve Baxter, founder of River City Labs and the biggest booster of Queensland's startup ecosystem. Then TWISTA talks to Aaron Birkby, who runs the muru-D accelerator out of Baxter's River City Labs. Finally, we speak to Wayne Gerard, founder and CEO of Red Eye - has Wayne started Australia's next unicorn? All of that - and a first-class rant from Steve Baxter - on this special episode.

The oldest business - agriculture - meets the newest tech in data analytics and robotics on this special episode of TWISTA. We talk to Ros Harvey of The Yield about how her firm uses data to drive better outcomes for oyster farmers, then Doug Fitch from Agworld talks about going global in agtech. Finally, Andrew Bate of Swarmfarm Robots predicts a future for farmers that's just around the corner and nearly unrecogniseable. TWISTA goes to ground - and finds gold there.

A huge pivot toward startups and innovation by Malcolm Turnbull, huge policy outcomes from Wyatt Roy's Policy Hack event, a huge IPO from Australia's most-beloved tech startup, Atlassian, a huge new $200M fund from Blackbird ventures, and huge issues with diversity still plague tech. TWISTA's huge news special pairs SCALE Investors managing director Laura McKenzie and Austrlia's snarkiest tech journo, Stilgherrian, with the biggest news issues in our biggest news special yet!

With the recent change of leadership the whole language of Australia has changed. We're talking lean, agile, flexible, and responsive government - all traits of startups. But governments around Australia have realised startups as equally potent engines of job and wealth creation, so they're working on improving the startup environment. NSW Minister for Innovation Victor Dominello tells us about NSW's new Data Analytics Centre, Charnelle Mondy tells us about the City of Sydney's draft plan for promoting startups, and Michelle Williams gives us a peek into the forthcoming StartupWeek Australia. Find out if government can play a role in Australia's startup community, on this episode of TWISTA.