Five ANZ startups that raised $36.4 million this week

The local startups to raise funding this week may be a geographically dispersed lot — from Perth, to regional New South Wales, to New Zealand — but what they have in common is ambitious plans to transform their industries.

Take a look at five Australian and New Zealand startups that raised millions this week.

Marmalade: $16 million

Marmalade co-founder and CEO Luke Trickett. Source: Supplied.

An invoice payment platform targeted at SMEs leads the funding round-up this week, with $16 million in fresh funding to continue developing its product suite and bring on more customers.

Marmalade was founded by Luke Trickett, David Whiteman, and Richard Johnson in 2019. It offers SMEs a payment solution to help them get their invoices paid on-demand, freeing up cash flow within their businesses.

To date, Marmalade has raised more than $32 million over the past four years.

The latest funding round was led by Blue Stamp Company, with participation from existing investors Paloma Capital and several family offices.

Marmalade, which integrates directly with cloud accounting platforms such as Xero, Quickbooks, and MYOB, says more than half a billion dollars is being transacted via its platform each year.

The platform was developed in collaboration with Australian venture studio Paloma and launched its first product in October 2020. Since then, key members from Paloma’s tech team have joined Marmalade to bolster its technological and engineering capabilities.

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Cauldron: $9.5 million

Cauldron co-founder and CEO Michele Stansfield. Source: Cauldron

Also raising a significant amount of fresh capital this week was precision fermentation startup Cauldron, which has locked in $9.5 million in Series A funding.

The round was led by Horizons Ventures and joined by SOSV and In-Q-Tel (IQT), alongside existing investor Main Sequence.

It comes only 12 months after the regional NSW-based startup raised a historic $10.5 million seed round. To date, Cauldron has now raised $20 million in funding at an undisclosed valuation.

“Cauldron has proven its precision fermentation at an industrially relevant scale, unlocking a significant decrease — between 30 and 50% — in the cost of goods for our customers vs traditional batch fermentation,” Cauldron CEO and co-founder Michele Stansfield said in a statement this week.

“From biofuels and agriculture to cosmetics and chemicals, the opportunities are immense, and with the support of our incredible investors, we’re poised to capitalise on them.”

Cauldron counts a number of other leading Australian startups among the users of its precision fermentation services, including Eden Brew, ULUU, and Nourish Ingredients – all of which have also raised substantial capital over the last 18 months.

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Prophet: $5 million

L-R: Prophet co-founders Jordan Taylor-Bartels (CEO), Sean Taylor (executive chairman) and Paul Veltman (CCO). Source: Supplied.

Marketing tech startup Prophet has secured $5 million in seed funding to help it on its mission to help businesses dramatically improve their digital advertising strategies.

The funding comes from prominent members of Australia’s media and advertising sector, including Antony Catalano of Australian Community Media, Matt Rockman, co-founder of Seek, and Cheuk Chiang, the former chief executive of Dentsu.

Prophet was launched in 2020 by digital marketing professionals Jordan Taylor-Bartels and Sean Taylor and uses advanced mathematics and predictive intelligence to help companies target consumers with the need for invasive tracking cookies.

The startup currently has 10 employees but plans to direct some of the new funding towards growing its headcount, according to Taylor-Bartels.

“We’ve packaged the world’s most sophisticated mathematics and data analysis into a living, breathing platform that any brand decision-maker can use to optimise every brand dollar, without having to be tech-savvy,” Taylor-Bartels said this week.

“Our testing to date has demonstrated Prophet can save businesses anywhere from 10 to 50% on marketing and ad spend by accurately demonstrating what’s working, and where budgets should be diverted for maximum impact. There’s clearly an appetite for this breakthrough, too; raising $5 million for a new platform in this market is hard at the best of times, and we’ve managed to achieve that pre-revenue.”

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Hola Health: $4.5 million

Hola Health co-founders Lenin Rajendran, Thiru Rajendran, Dr Vishnu Gopalan. Source: Supplied.

Perth-based telehealth startup Hola Health has raised $4.5 million in pre-series A funding in a round led by M8 Ventures, along with FundWA and several angel investors.

Hola Health was founded in 2020 by Lenin Rajendran, Thiru Rajendran, Dr Vishnu Gopalan, and is on a mission to make on-demand healthcare services available to all Australians, regardless of where they live.

The startup promises to deliver fast, value-for-money healthcare services within 15 minutes, 24/7, helping to address long wait times for GP appointments, as well as the healthcare divide between urban and rural communities.

Hola Health says it will use its new funding to accelerate its expansion plans, both within Australia and international markets — efforts that will be bolstered by Emily Rich, general partner at M8 Ventures, joining the Hola Health board.

“This investment is not just a financial boost but a strong vote of confidence in our vision to make primary healthcare accessible and immediate for all Australians,” said Lenin Rajendran, co-founder and CEO of Hola Health.

“We’re now set to fast-track our growth, bringing our services to even more people across the country, and preparing for our first international markets.”

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Buddy: $1.4 million

Buddy founders. Source: supplied.

New Zealand-based startup Buddy has raised $1.4 million (NZ$1.5 million) from GD1 for its metal recyclables marketplace.

Buddy says buyers in 19 countries have already signed up to use the B2B marketplace for scrap metals, which is aiming to replace transactions that are often done via email, spreadsheets and WhatsApp, The goal is to reduce wasted resources and eliminate risk and errors for both buyers and sellers.

Billing itself as “for scrappies, by scrappies”, Buddy was founded by Stuart and Lisa Kagan, who have three decades’ experience in the industry and built in partnership with Australasian venture studio Paloma.

Buddy plans to launch its app to metal recyclers from North America, Australia and New Zealand at two industry events from April onwards.

“Most companies use WhatsApp, email and spreadsheets as their trading tech stack to collectively trade hundreds of billions of dollars,” co-founder Lisa Kagan said in a statement this week.

“The industry is missing out on the efficiencies and accuracy that come with end-to-end process digitisation. What’s more, without comprehensive and integrous data sets, the industry has no basis to leverage the latest in technological advances such as machine learning and AI.”