In the early 1990’s, Lloyd and two friends started PowerUp ISP modestly, in a house garage. PowerUp eventually grew to become Queensland’s largest ISP, this was his first company to be sold to Malcolm Turnbull and the OzEmail crew. Lloyd then went on to build Australia’s largest web hosting company, WebCentral. WebCentral became a leading innovator in web hosting and won various awards including Microsoft Global Hosting Company of the Year for 2003 and 2004.

After WebCentral, Lloyd focused on opportunities in the Asia-Pacific region. He was an early player in the outsourcing business in China and started with Beijing-based SinoCode Limited. His second Chinese business venture successfully localized and launched the Australian-developed Greentrac PC Fleet Management product and achieved robust sales to large state-owned enterprises, including China Mobile, in addition to winning the prestigious China PC Week Green Product of the Year.

In 2005, Lloyd joined the board of Pipe Networks which listed in the Australian Stock Exchange in May 2005 (ASX:PWK). In the next 3 years, PIPE Networks deployed over 600km of dark fibre, built Tier 1 data centre facilities and built PPC-1, the first competitive submarine fibre optic cable linking Australia to the US via Guam.

Presently, Lloyd is focused on Cloudstaff, a cloud-based staffing provider in the Philippines. Cloudstaff was recently named by the Australian Financial Review as one of the fastest growing Australian businesses of 2020 and received AUD $30 million in Series B investment.

Tech start-up investor Steve Baxter is a proud Queenslander, born in the remote town of Cloncurry.

In 1994, at the age of 23, Steve put his life savings of $11,000 on the line to launch his first start-up, the pioneering internet service provider SE Net, from the spare room of his Adelaide home.

Servicing more than 35,000 customers, SE Net was eventually acquired by Ozemail/UUNet under the stewardship of its founding Director and now Prime Minister, Malcolm Turnbull.

In 2001, Steve teamed with a schoolmate to launch his second start-up, PIPE Networks. Eight years later they sold it to the TPG Group for $373 million.

In the past three years he has become a major early-stage investor in Australian start-ups, helping to launch a host of companies which together boast a valuation of more than $100 million.

Three years ago, Steve launched River City Labs in Brisbane, a leading co-working community and startup hub in Queensland. In 2014, Steve underwrote the Startup Catalyst program, a mission to send 20 tech-savvy future entrepreneurs to the Silicon Valley and in November 2015, announced River City Lab’s imminent expansion plans.

Originally a content operations producer for Microsoft’s Sidewalk city guide startup, Alan was Yahoo!’s first technical hire in Australia and went on to become Product Director, South Asia for Yahoo! Inc. He then was a co-founder and head of content and product development for home entertainment tech startup HomeScreen Entertainment, backed by the Packer family’s CPH, acquired by Quickflix.

Alan was a founding investor in Pollenizer, Startmate and Blackbird Ventures. His startup services agency The New Agency built AAP MediaNet, Autogenie and EmploymentHero before being acquired by BlueChilli in 2012.

Alan’s previous investments include Bugcrowd, Buzzy, Biteable, Cardly, Chromasun, Elevio, GeoSnap, HappyCo, HowAboutEat, Macropod, Muru Music, Propeller Aero, Shoeboxed, TopMe, Tzukuri, Tyde, Workyard, UpGuard and Upperstory.

Alan has advised founders in startup accelerators BlueChilli, Startmate, Catalysr, Muru-D and Collider, as well as advising clients of KPMG’s High Growth Ventures team as an Entrepreneur in Residence.

Natalie is a silver economy entrepreneur. Collaborating with companies to meet their customers’ unmet needs while adapting to disruption has been a recurring theme throughout her career.

She has had an extensive career as a product innovator and plays an active role driving the diversity and inclusion agenda in Australia. She recently mentored Telstra’s Muru-D latest cohort of tech startups in their accelerator program as their product Entrepreneur-in-Residence.

On a more personal note, Natalie has been inspired to find a way for her baby-boomer parents to make a smooth transition from their full time work.

She has been applying a human-centred design approach to understand how to help pre-retirees and retirees lead meaningful and vibrant lives.

After leaving their careers many people lose their sense of purpose, identity and self worth. They have a greater risk of social isolation and depression if they have not planned out a meaningful retirement lifestyle.

With overwhelming evidence that this need is not being met well by corporates with ageing workforces, Natalie co-founded Full Time Lives.

In our Startup Grind workshop Natalie will share her most relevant and thought-provoking resources and tools based on the extensive research on the Blue Zones.

Natalie previously run private programs for CPA Australia, University of Sydney, BPAY and the CEO Institute among others.

Justin Dry is an Entrepreneur, Investor and Co-Founder + CEO of Vinomofo, one of Australia’s fastest-growing companies.

Launched in April 2011 from a little garage in Adelaide, Vinomofo now operates in Australia, NZ and Singapore where it has grown quickly to over $50m in annual revenue, 500,000 members, and a team of 100.

Winners of Fastest Growing Company at the Deloitte Tech Fast 50 Awards 2013, Online Business of the Year at the Australian Startup Awards 2014, Best Startup at the SmartCompany Startup Awards 2014, Online Retailer of the Year 2015 at the ORIA’s, Telstra Business of the Year - Victorian Telstra Business Awards 2016, Hot Innovator 2017 at the Power Retail awards and Hottest Aussie Online Retailer and the StartCon E-commerce Company of the Year 2018, Vinomofo is focused on expanding globally in 2018.

Justin is a proven game-changer in the wine industry, taking on retail giants and challenging the ‘Bowties and BS’ attitudes of elitist wine snobs.

Awarded Spotify Young Entrepreneur of the Year at The Australian Startup Awards and has been named one of the Top 50 People in E-Commerce 2016, 2017, 2018 and 2019 by Internet Retailing.

Justin is a regular on TV and radio shows which have included Squawk Box - CNBC Asia, Bloomberg Asia, Sky News Business, The Business - ABC, Channel 9 News, Insight – SBS, The Entrepreneurs Show – Sky Business and was one of the stars of the film ‘The New Hustle’ – a feature-length documentary that follows the personal journey of three of Australia's most successful startups.

Outside of his business endeavours, Justin is a self-confessed wine nerd and islomaniac.

Sally-Ann is an experienced strategist and executive program manager with a strong track record of creating and driving strategy and implementation nationally and internationally.

At Google Australia she leads efforts in CS/STEM education (K-12); research collaborations with universities; entrepreneurship and startup engagement.

Her work leading Google’s CS/STEM education engagement is focused on scalable and sustainable change in curriculum and teacher professional development to support national priorities in STEM education in Australia and New Zealand. Managing over 65 partnerships and programs she has created innovative platforms to deliver training to teachers on the Digital Technologies curriculum at scale and created new partnership models with equity and a goal of bridging the digital divide. She currently serves as a member of the COAG STEM Partnership Forum advising on Australia’s National STEM School Education Strategy.

In working with the startup community Sally-Ann has helped create and drive national engagement strategies on innovation and entrepreneurship including contributing to the foundation of StartupAUS, a non-profit working to transform Australia through tech entrepreneurship. She currently serves on the board of Fishburners, a non-profit co-working space in Sydney, the advisory board of Inspiring Rare Birds, and as a mentor in the Startmate program. She also works with a range of incubators, accelerators, universities and the public sector to grow and develop the startup ecosystem.

Guillaume de Smedt is the Global Community Director for Silicon Valley based Startup Grind. He manages the community team and overseas 300 international chapters. He has also been on the Silicon Cape board for over 2 years, where he is now the chairman of the Community Council. Although this doesn't really make use of his electronic engineering background, he loves what he does ;)

Passionate about promoting awesome people doing amazing things. Grinding daily to help unite the world by connecting people and businesses with internal fortitude and a shared mission to lead our fellow humans to a higher quality of life.

On a quest to enhance the positive social impact that technology is having on our lives. I'm an activist of the entrepreneur revolution empowering people to pursue our full potential. All about utilizing the gifts that we’ve been blessed with to live our best life, together, as a synerjized global community.

Steven A. Rodriguez is the Techstars Startup Programs Regional Manager for US and Canada, Founder / Managing Director of SUEGO™ and Chief Culture Officer at BloomShift™. He co-leads various ESHIP programs through his non-profit InnovateCoalition™; is a Business Development & Digital Marketing Mentor & Contributor for WeWork Labs and Coach for the DC Department of Employment Services Innovation Lab; and is a Board Member to the International Council on Trade and Development. He was Director of Community Engagement for 1863 Ventures, a business development program, and community strategist for the Global Entrepreneurship Network and NextGen Venture Partners. He is currently a community strategist leading various world renowned entrepreneurship programs and initiatives in the Greater Washington, D.C like the Global Entrepreneurship Week celebration and the Techstars Startup Programs through DC Startup Week, Startup Weekend DC and Startup Digest DC. Region. Rodriguez has a BA from CUNY The City College of New York and is currently pursuing an EMBA.

Andrew Parry, VP IT Application Development at Office Depot, working there for over 22 years across 2 continents. He has been on this side of the pond in South Florida since 2006, even in his short time he has seen the tech community continuously expand & grow. He has a passion for entrepreneurship and to helping startups succeed through mentorship, networking and learning together.