Australia’s future is deep!

Over ten years ago – when the GFC was looming and the Federal Government’s support for innovation was ‘under review’  – Tech23 was born. At the time, Cicada was the main game in town, Sydney Angels was just forming, and the University of Sydney’s Incubate and the University of Melbourne’s MAP were still a few years away from being established.

We saw great examples of local innovation every day and, motivated by the belief that these ideas deserved more attention, we created Tech23! The idea was simple. We wanted to showcase the best examples of how we, as Australians, were chipping away at wicked problems with clever tech. Deeptech was not what we called it then – actually we nicknamed it “ugly tech” and boasted it would “hurt your head”! The team at Slatterys was always passionate about showcasing companies that were tackling big problems and planning to make a contribution to our planet.

Deeptech startups are hard work and take time. Most of them begin with a relationship with publicly funded R&D organisations. Over the years many of the +250 stories shared by founders at Tech23 are about how to make real impact –  improving our health and well-being (Inventia, Presagen, ResApp); increasing food security (AgWorld, AgriDigital, AgriWebb, Flurosat); bringing about quality education (Practera, Smart Sparrow) reducing our footprint (BuildingIQ, Gelion, Redback) while others are about transforming industry (Fleet, MorseMicro, Myriota).