Loved meeting the young enthusiastic entrepreneurs

I had the best time last night. It was so enjoyable and uplifting to watch so many young people helping each other to start up their ideas.

Developers, designers, industry specific employees, and business and marketing specialists all teamed up together to compliment each others skill sets.

Their presentations were skilful and fun.

Adelaide has come a long way since the 1980’s when there were only a handle full of us who were entrepreneurs, and we had to just befriend each other and do the best we could, without advice, mentors or the Internet as it exists now.

I am so excited to be involved. And it was great meeting the other judges.

Judges

Robyn Taylor
Co-Founder, Internode
Robyn has founded 5 successful startups, the most well known being Internode. Starting in a spare room in Clarence Park in 1990, Internode grew to over 500 employees and later sold to iiNet in December 2012 for $105million. Robyn has vast experience in business development, contract negotiations, sales and investor relations. Speaking on entrepreneurship, Robyn believes that “entrepreneurship is a mixture of vision, creativity, sound business skills and good judgement. There are many interesting lessons to learn on the way, but it is rewarding for a lifetime.”

Dr Jana Matthews
Managing Director – ANZ Innovyz Start
Jana has worked with companies all over the world, helping them grow their companies. She has written seven books and over 50 articles, has been a global thought leader for SAP and has been identified as one of 18 women business gurus, the only one in the area of entrepreneurial leadership and growth.

Jana has also been an entrepreneur, having founded four companies, but her passion is helping CEOs and their executive teams unlock their growth potential. Her breadth of experience working with diverse sectors (e.g., manufacturing, high-tech, retail, and services) and helping companies go global. She has the breadth and depth of experience that enables her to add value to almost any company.

Brad Moran
Managing Director, Founder – NoQ
Entrepreneur and founder of one of Adelaide’s most recent tech start up companies ‘NoQ’, Brad has been able to take concept to commercialisation in less than 12 months with no prior business or IT background.
The young entrepreneur raised more than $2.5million for his mobile platform technology including a recent strategic investment from Bendigo Bank. Brad proves that it does not require a PHD in computer science nor Business Management in order to raise capital and creating a market leading product. Just passion and an eye for innovation.

Finn Peacock
Founder – SolarQuotes
Finn is an expert in PPC advertising and creating & communicating business USPs. He runs a range of on-line businesses and was featured in The Four Hour Work Week by Tim Ferriss. He loves bike riding too!