Pollenizer seeks to raise $5 million for Aussie and Asian start-ups

Online venture builder Pollenizer has launched an Information Memorandum in a bid to raise $5 million from investors, as it seeks to fund more start-ups in Australia and south-east Asia.

The funding bid comes just a few months after Pollenizer raised $1.1 million from investors in Australia, the United States and Singapore, including the founder of Pandora.

The Information Memorandum is only available to “sophisticated or professional investors”, excluding retail investors.

No disclosure document has been, or will be, prepared in connection with the investment opportunity.

The investment capital will be used to launch new tech start-ups, fund the growth of Pollenizer’s existing start-ups, and support the expansion of Pollenizer’s activities in south-east Asia.

According to Pollenizer co-founder Phil Morle, it has received positive interest from investors based locally as well as in Asia.

“It’s our aim to introduce a wider range of investors to the potential of tech start-ups than what the industry has previously seen,” Morle says.

“Global investors are increasingly paying more attention to the Australian start-up space as they can see the high investment value on offer.”

Morle says while investment options are slowly improving, citing Blackbird Ventures’ $30 million fund as an example, it’s not enough to “stem the flood” of great start-ups seeking funding from global investors.

“Lost entrepreneurs are a loss of innovation, lost value creation, lost employment, lost export dollars, lost returns for investors and, most importantly, lost hope,” Morle says.

Pollenizer isn’t the only Australian business keen to invest in the Asia-Pacific region.

Beacon New Ventures, a new private equity firm based in Melbourne, has invested $500,000 in Jooix.com, a lifestyle and gifts eCommerce start-up based in Singapore.

Jooix is the first investment for Beacon, founded in 2012 by John Neal and Tim Stanford. It has since expanded its operations, investment and marketing advisory business to Singapore.

Neal previously founded media agency Carat in a joint venture with Aegis Group PLC. The business quickly grew to $150 million capitalised billings and was acquired by Aegis in 2005.

Over the next 12 months, Jooix will be expanding its market presence from Singapore to Indonesia and likely Thailand.

“We are thrilled to help realise Jooix’s multichannel strategy through creative pop-ups and a more engaging platform, so potential customers in South East Asia will experience Jooix holistically,” Neal says.

Neal says the expansion into Singapore makes a lot of sense.

“We took the decision at the end of last year that Singapore was a good hub for us to set up in,” he says.

“It provides a launching pad into all the south-east Asian markets, with both a deep capital and talent base.

“It also gives us the perfect opportunity to bring some of our Australian-based investment interests into the region.

“It is early days but we think our business in Singapore will grow very strongly over the next year or so.”