Co Ventures

Dear Co Ventures Community, As 2024 winds down, I wanted to take a moment to reflect on everything we've seen, built and learned together this year from our corner of the startup ecosystem. This was Year 2 for Co Ventures—a year when the ecosystem started to regain its risk appetite, and founders stepped back onto the field with big, ambitious visions. Join me as I reflect on the shifting market landscape, the incredible founders stepping into the arena, a drumbeat I want to hit for Australia's venture ecosystem and a snapshot of our year in review. As always, my perspective is shaped by what I’m seeing at pre-seed: https://lnkd.in/gruvM_j4 Enjoy some well-earned R&R over the break, and I’ll see you back here in 2025. Happy holidays!

Final chance to join our last Co Ventures Community Syndicate deal of 2024:

IPOs, one-person billion-dollar startups, bubble cycles, and a high-profile AI company collapse: What's next for 2025? Join Cheryl Mack and me as we reflect on the highs, lows, and surprises of 2024—and build into our First Cheque Podcast-official predictions for 2025. Here’s the link to the episode: https://lnkd.in/gAnt-jBD

Your chance to co-invest in Nate Spiteri and Drew Flaherty from Shopfront at pre-seed 👗🧢 If you're passionate about the second-hand retail market, this deal's for you. McKinsey & Company estimates that in the US alone, retailers are sitting on approximately $740 billion worth of unsold goods every year (source: https://lnkd.in/gsUQZiaX). 10-40% of garments produced annually remain unsold (source: https://lnkd.in/gth_jGFR), contributing to 92 million tonnes of textile waste ending up in landfills each year (https://lnkd.in/gzn_pPst). Until today, there's never been an easy way for brands to list their unsold stock on secondhand marketplaces to give them a way to recoup these costs and reduce their waste. Enter Shopfront—an AI-powered API designed to streamline how brands, super sellers, and charity shops list second-hand products across multiple platforms. Join our Co Ventures Community Syndicate on Aussie Angels to co-invest in what this team are building alongside Co Ventures Fund 1, Antler, Inhouse Ventures and experienced retail angel Paul Greenberg—and meet the founders at our Q&A TOMORROW at 3pm (AEDT) 🎉 Questions? Keen to know more? Here's how: 1. Join Co Ventures Community Syndicate: https://lnkd.in/gV9XRpxB 2. Access the official deal note and Q&A deets: https://lnkd.in/gJTBtyNX Laura Nicol and I will see you at the Q&A tomorrow! Disclaimer: Please always consider Aussie Angels Risks and Disclosures in conjunction with the Deal note before making an investment decision.

An incredible milestone to end the year 🍿

It takes a village to build a company, so we're gifting 5% of our Co Ventures Fund 1 carry to the founders we work for. Here's why: Building an early-stage company is inherently risky. Even if you make all the right calls—assemble the perfect team, nail the product, and hustle every waking hour—it might not work. But that’s also why it matters. Early-stage companies are the foundation for generational companies that shape industries, create opportunities, and, sometimes, even change the world. Take Turnto, helping people with health conditions find cures and live easier lives. Or Matilda, empowering individuals to build better lives in Australia. These founders are tackling complex, deeply meaningful challenges, and when they succeed, their impact ripples far beyond their businesses. This work isn’t just valuable for Australia but for the world. But here’s the hard truth: founders shoulder most of the risk in the current model. They dedicate decades of their lives, pour every waking hour (and some unwoken ones), and make sacrifices most of us can’t imagine. They’re the ones building, leading, and solving the problems that matter most. We can’t change this dynamic entirely—but we can share it. And we believe we'll be better if we do this together, share the risk a little, and pledge to share a percentage of our future profits with all the founders we work for. We’re excited to announce Co Founders, our founder carry grant—gifted to every founder in Fund 1. To every founder we work for, thank you for planting the seeds for the future. To founding partners Rachael Neumann and Kylie Frazer at Flying Fox Ventures, thank you for leading the way (they launched a similar initiative in 2022). Happy holidays from Co Ventures 🎄 cc Maxine Minter, Laura Nicol #CoVentures #venturecapital #startups #fundraising #earlystagestartups

Annie Liao 🇦🇺, one of the incredible founders we work for, reflected on her first three months going all-in on Build Club. To quote her post (https://lnkd.in/gzGGihgr): "Taking some steps back to reflect, some of my biggest learnings so far: 👇 Environment really matters - since relocating to SF we have closed five new partnerships through being in the right place e.g. we worked with Rahul from Julius AI from the same coworking space. Getting the team right is an iterative process - the team is the second product of the startup. Learning that this will take iteration and isn’t something we will get right on the first try was an exciting surprise. Clarity on direction is the most valuable thing to provide as a founder - having clear metrics and goals to sprint towards is invaluable for team morale. Rejection is standard - whether in sales calls, hiring, partnerships, etc, it’s continuous. It’s all about mindset, fuel to the fire, and not taking it personally. There will always be things out of contr.ol It’s been an insane journey." Laura Nicol sat down with her for a Calling Operator episode to hear what's next for her and the team—and Build Club 2.0 🪄✨

Last chance to join us for our Co Ventures Community Syndicate x StoryTribe deal:

This stealth team is creating a game-changer for product orgs, with a shipping pace for new updates and features that’s unmatched. They're 🔥. It’s a chance to build alongside a founding engineering team from Amazon, Canva, and Dropbox. If you're in my network and looking for your next early-stage and founding engineer opportunity, I’d happily facilitate an intro to Nathan.

Operators bring immense value to founders as angel investors, and Yunmie Kim 🏝's working on something special in the visual communication space. Don’t miss this chance to join the Co Ventures Community Syndicate and support Yunmie in scaling her product worldwide. Details below: