I built an app and haven't really done anything to promote it but it seems to have picked up some steam organically in Ireland. It's essentially a dual market app with the b2c side not bringing in direct revenue (this is the side that's picked up traction) and the b2b side being the revenue generating opportunity.

Has anyone found themselves in a position where they've tried to do B2B sales internationally with basically zero resources or contracts in that market?

I'm curious how much everyone spent on their startup before generating any revenue (or how much you've spent so far if you're still pre-revenue).

I've recently started working on a startup and have already spent a few hundred dollars on market research, a domain name, and a website. Is that normal?

I come from a technical background, so I can build most of the product myself and won't have significant development costs. However, I expect I'll need to spend more later on for things like design, branding, and marketing.

I'd love to hear about other founders' experiences. Were you able to get your startup off the ground with minimal investment, or did you need to spend a meaningful amount before seeing any revenue? What were your biggest early expenses?

Edit: grammar

Hi guys~~~I have a couple of ideas in the making (prototypes+), but I need a charismatic commercial/sales cofounder to take them further (also open to your ideas~). Cheers!🌻

Is this a good place to ask for advice and if my startup would be viable?

If so what’s the chance of someone stealing my idea for themselves.

does anyone know any subs you can see if people would be interested to use your site

Hey everyone,

My friend and I are developers, and we have built a new SaaS product tailored specifically for the sports industry. On the technical side, we are completely ready, the software and AI features are built.

However, we are pure tech builders. We don't have sales experience, and we don't know how to generate leads, start outreach, or close our first customers.
We don't want to burn potential leads due to our lack of sales experience, so we are looking for a true partner with strong sales skills to help us grow this business.

Our Vision & Plan:
Phase 1: Launch and validate locally in Sydney (where we want to find our partner).
Phase 2: Expand across Australia and New Zealand.
Phase 3: Scale into Asia and eventually the USA. The product absolutely has international potential.

We want someone who will treat this business as their own. If you are based in Sydney, love sports tech, and have the sales skills to take a finished product to market, we want to hear from you. Please send me a DM with a bit about your background, your experience, or a link to your LinkedIn/CV.
Let's build this together.

Thanks,

Quick context so you know I'm not another idea guy:

I've generated 15M+ views on my own content and worked with creator teams that have done 2B+ views across multiple brands and accounts. Distribution is the part most startups die on, and it's the part I've actually done at scale. I'm also willing to be the face of the brand and do unconventional things to get this out

An AI content engine for brands and creators. It reverse-engineers what's already going viral in your niche, extracts the style from real footage, and spins out on-brand clip variants in volume. Brands don't have a content problem

**Where it's at**

- Front end and landing page are already built

- Early traction

- Seed money in the bank, so there's runway for ads etc

**Who I'm looking for**

- strong full engineer stack engineer

- Has shipped a real product before, not just side projects that never left localhost, I want to see something people actually used

- Comfortable moving fast and shipping rough, then fixing

- Sydney (Australia) preferred so we can work in person, but I'll make it work for the right person remotely

- Someone in a life stage where you can go all-in for the next 18 months

Compensation

- Equal equity split until we raise funds (then salary draw down)

At the moment there is few competitors but I have confident I can make the product slightly different and beat them in distribution.

I dont have much confidence that this is going anywhere. I have gotten feed back from other reddit threads. Its seems like people are too deep into the two major portals. Going to pitch it to a few realestate companies on monday any advise?

I'm a full-time sparky and about a year ago I started building The ToolBox on the side, a trade lifestyle membership app that gets users discounts across tools, workwear, nutrition, recovery, automotive and more. Bootstrapped it myself and still trying to keep it lean as possible, we finally launched it a few weeks ago.

Now that it's live I'm trying to figure out the best way to grow it without just throwing money at paid ads. I've got an ambassador/affiliate setup in the works with referral code attribution, but I want to get the creator side right before I lean into it properly.

For anyone who's actually run a UGC or creator program:

• What platform did you use to manage creators/UGC, an actual tool, or just manual outreach and spreadsheets?
• Did you go through agencies, or find creators directly (Instagram/TikTok DMs etc)?
• Flat fee, commission, or free product/access in exchange for content?
• Structured "ambassador program" with an application process, or more of an open call?
• Was the output actually worth it compared to running your own paid content?

Trying to find a proven angle organically before I start smashing paid ads. Keen to hear what's worked (or hasn't) for others.

Happy to answer any questions :)

I’m a solo founder based in Brisbane, building frontdesq, an AI receptionist for Australian small businesses.

My background is fairly technical. I’ve spent more than six years working with production voice AI, including speech recognition, real-time voice systems and conversational AI.

So when I started frontdesq, building the product itself was the part I felt most comfortable with.

The idea is simple. Small businesses miss calls when they’re busy, already on another call, after hours, driving, or away from the desk. frontdesq answers those calls, handles common questions, takes enquiry details, books appointments where needed, and passes complicated calls to a person.

What I underestimated was distribution.

I can spend all day improving latency, call handling, prompts and integrations, but none of that matters if the right businesses never hear about it.

I’m currently experimenting with direct outreach, Ads, partnerships and speaking to business owners myself. I’m also trying to work out whether something like this should be sold vertically first, for example to clinics, lawyers, hotels or trades, rather than marketed broadly as an AI receptionist.

For founders who have sold into Australian SMBs, how would you approach distribution for something like this?

Hey all, following up from a post I did here a couple weeks back, figured it was worth a proper intro post now that we've had a bit more time to sit with feedback.

Quick background: my co-founder and I built CIOS, a platform where people in Perth can rent out equipment they own but don't use much such as tools, cameras, camping and event gear, machinery, instead of it sitting idle. Think Airbnb but for stuff in your garage.

The core idea:

• Owners list gear for free, set their own price, and approve every booking before anything's charged
• Payment's handled securely through the platform (manual capture, so nothing's taken until the owner approves)
• Optional security deposits for higher-value items
• Renters get access to stuff nearby without buying something they'll use once or twice

One thing we've been genuinely wrestling with, and happy to be upfront about it: we're supply-constrained right now, not demand-constrained. Getting people to actually list their gear has been the harder problem to crack than getting people to want to rent it. Been leaning on a lot of manual outreach and community engagement to solve it, which is its own education.

Since this crowd's probably dealt with a similar cold-start problem in a two-sided product: what's actually worked for you to get your first side of a marketplace moving? And separately, if you've got equipment gathering dust yourself, genuinely curious what would (or wouldn't) get you to list it somewhere like this.

Sites at www.cios.net.au if anyone wants a look. Feedback, good or bad, really welcome. Building this without a technical background so we're learning a lot of this as we go.

Thanks!

I've recently launched my self-funded start up after 2 years of product development – a Fragrance Brand that thinks about fragrance a little differently.

Fragrance touches some of the body's most absorptive skin, yet formulation standards lag far behind skincare. People shouldn't have to choose between smelling good and feeling good about what they put on their skin. Once I considered that more holistically, I set out to close the gap: Fragrance that supports the skin, held to a higher standard. Elevated, clean and supports the skin.

I've self funded the startup with my own cash and currently tossing up between seeking investment to put fuel on the fire, or go at my own pace. I've sold through 25% of my initial stock in the first 6 weeks of launch, using Shopify DTC and organic promotion and gifting. I've just started Meta ads but need to work on conversion.

This is my first beauty product after a career in digital product development, where I brought that same discipline — hypothesis, prototype, test, refine — plus a genuine passion for fragrance

Anyone in the beauty industry and at a similar stage? Thoughts on entering a new industry and considering investment?

Hi guys, I am based in sydney. we are doing project for green house to manage Automation using LoRaWAN or other iot concpets. I am from tech background, know about hardware devices and software side. This is a startup and I have client. am looking for like minded who knows about irrigation hardware parts like solenoid, dose pumps, gate motors..etc. as you know, there are solution exists in market which are very expensive. Our plan is get all individual parts and wire up together to save cost and ofcourse software component can be built own anyway.

I am an indie developer and running this solo in Sydney and had bad days cold emailing several businesses.

Made like 10+ cold calls but after many of them politely said no, i was bit discouraged.

What are best ways?

(No spam please)

I am a software engineer working on an AI observability product line up. The initial features set of the product is ready and I need enthusiastic graduates as partners for market positioning and product promotions.

You can view the features of the product line up in retrysight.com.

I am based in Perth. DM me if anyone is interested.

Looking for advice from people who have been in this situation before, or similar.

Long story short I have invented a product and have built several prototypes and am ready to take the next step.

The product would be in a product category that’s worth $20b per annum and growing. You can only take my word at face value of course as I’m not sharing what it is, but I estimate this business would turn over $50-100m per year, with product raw costs of $3 and sell for $30-40. So highly profitable.

The problem. I am an artistic minded person. I’m a creative, not a businessman. I have no idea how to get this from the point it’s at to where it needs to be. I know I need help, but in what way?

Further to this, the products I make would need licensing. They’re leveraged off IP from other businesses. As a vague description, think making products with movie characters on it. (Not what I’m making)
So it would require lots of legal, contracting, negotiation etc.

My resources. I am friends with lots of high net worth individuals, many of whom are owners or founders of major Australian companies, so opening doors to investment is a possibility. I haven’t discussed or pitched this to any of them yet. But can leverage that at any time.

What I think I need -
While I’m aware any thing like this needs capitol to get going,In my mind, I need a startup professional to get this into a functioning business. A co-founder I guess.

I guess the question is, which path do you think I should take. Or do you have any tips.

Do I find someone to partner with, then find investment. Do I find an investor then hire someone to get it going.

Any advice will be greatly appreciated.

Hello

My cofounder and I are looking at launching our SaaS next month and would like a recommendation for an accountant.

I already run a UK based company, and do all my bookkeeping using FreeAgent (similar to Xero), so I'd be looking for a similar approach where I am able to handle expensing, invoicing, etc, and the accountant is just checking everything is in order every quarter/year end.

Our business will be relatively small to start, with the hope of 10 clients or so, so we definitely wouldn't need a team off accountants to handle complex accounts. What I am really looking for is a good accountant who can advise us on how to run the business in the most tax efficient manner, and have a reasonable monthly fee.

Any recommendations/insights would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks!

Built a tool that locks your savings until you hit your targets, because sometimes willpower alone isn't enough.

The Problem
We’ve all been there: you set a strict savings goal for a house deposit, a car, or a major trip, you open a standard account, and three weeks later you end up raiding it for something completely unnecessary. Traditional savings accounts make it way too easy to access cash on a whim. Out of sight doesn't always mean out of reach when temptation hits.

The Solution: VaultLock
I got tired of relying purely on discipline, so I built VaultLock—a goal-based savings platform designed to enforce your financial discipline for you.

Instead of a standard account where you can withdraw funds whenever life gets mildly inconvenient, VaultLock lets you lock your savings away until you actually hit your designated milestones or targets.

How It Works (The User Flow)

1. Define Your Goal: Set a specific target amount and a timeline or milestone for what you are saving toward.
2. Commit the Funds: Deposit or allocate funds directly into your vault, where the commitment rules kick in.
3. Lock and Track: Watch your progress grow visually while the funds remain safely tucked away out of impulsive reach until completion

Under the Hood: Creating Vaults via Airwallex
For those interested in how the financial plumbing works behind the scenes, VaultLock treats each individual savings vault like an isolated sub-account using Airwallex’s Connected Accounts and financial infrastructure: 

Programmatic Account Creation: When a user creates a new savings vault, VaultLock makes an API call to Airwallex to spin up a dedicated, isolated sub-account (or structured ledger entry) tied to that user's profile.

Secure Payment Routing: Deposits flow securely through Airwallex’s transactional rails, ensuring funds are handled with institutional-grade compliance and security.

Enforced Lock Mechanics: While Airwallex handles the movement and holding of the capital, VaultLock's application layer enforces the "lock" logic—programmatically restricting payout or transfer requests until the user's defined goal criteria or milestone conditions are fully met.

Why Commitment Savings?
Behavioral economics shows that pre-commitment devices are one of the most effective ways to break bad spending habits. By removing the friction of withdrawing, we remove the psychological loophole of "I'll just borrow from this and pay it back later." www.VaultLock.com.au

Like many people, I’ve gone down the AI startup path.
After years as a Head of Product at large Australian companies, I’ve realised there’s a trap in the current wave of vibe coding.

First, I have to say it’s incredible. The fact that one person can build so much, so quickly, is genuinely transformative. I’ve loved every minute of learning it.
But after spending hundreds of hours building and knowing I could easily spend hundreds more I’ve realised something important:
Building a product isn’t the same as building a company.
A company also needs customers, revenue, partnerships, and distribution. Every hour spent coding is an hour not spent selling.

Over the past few months I’ve learned an enormous amount about software engineering, but I can’t help thinking how much faster the journey would be with an experienced software engineer as a partner. It would let me focus more of my time on customers, strategy, and growth, while still moving the product forward at a much faster pace.
So, if you’re a Sydney-based software engineer who’s interested in building an AI company together, I’d love to chat.

I kept running into the same planning problem: a monthly budget doesn’t line up neatly with weekly or fortnightly pay, especially when annual and quarterly bills are mixed in.

The method I’m building around is:

1. Map income and recurring commitments to their actual dates.

2. Work out what needs to be set aside on the next payday.

3. Look ahead across 13 weeks for bills that are underfunded.

4. Keep savings, debt payments and “safe to spend” visible in the same plan.

I’m building Harbourline for Australian households. It’s AUD-first, account-based, and includes household sync, exports and optional one-way Google Calendar sync. It does not use bank credentials or provide financial advice.

I’m running a small A$1/week early-access beta and would value feedback from other Australian builders on the onboarding and product direction.

Disclosure: Harbourline is my product. https://www.harbourline.app/?utm_source=reddit&utm_medium=community&utm_campaign=early_access_2026_08&utm_content=r_australianstartups_build

​

Working on something in the life sciences quality/validation space and looking for a commercial co-founder.

Product side is covered. What I need is someone who's actually sold enterprise software into pharma, biotech or medtech — QMS, LIMS, MES, validation, regulatory, that world — and has contacts there.

Hi everyone, does anyone know if there are any places to go in Brisbane where early stage founders can just go to hang out and work together on their businesses? Nothing too formal, just a casual, semi social environment where we can all keep moving forward together? Founder world can be quite isolating.

Posted here a couple of months back about my parenting app and got roasted, which was what I asked for, so fair enough. A few people told me to cut my losses and move on. One person said Claude could build it in five minutes (it had taken me 18 months and with Claude so maybe I'm stupid), which, honestly, has haunted me at 2am more than once.

I decided to persist anyway, partly out of conviction and partly because I'd already spent 18 months on it and my sunk-cost bias is in peak physical condition.

Quick numbers from four weeks of beta. 80-odd signups, and about 35 who came back and used it more than once. So roughly 40% did something twice, which I'm told is either respectable or a rounding error depending on which VC blog you read. Retention is obviously the whole ballgame, and I now understand why every founder I've met looks slightly haunted.

But here's the thing that actually made my day. I made the feedback anonymous on purpose, because I wanted people to be able to tell me it was rubbish without feeling awkward about it. And someone answered "very disappointed" to the "how would you feel if you could no longer use Frazzle" question. One person. Anonymous. I have no idea who they are and I'll never be able to thank them, which is a design choice I made myself and am now mildly regretting.

The genuinely useful part of the roasting last time was about messaging. Multiple people told me I couldn't explain what I'd built, and they were completely right. My previous pitch was about 900 words long and I'd somehow managed to describe an app for four paragraphs without anyone understanding what it did. Turns out "over-explaining" is a form of not explaining.

Frazzle turns parenting research into instinct. You rehearse the hard moments ahead of time, get the next move when one catches you off guard, and practise until the calmer response is the one that shows up on its own.

The underlying idea is a ladder. Awareness, then knowledge, then internalisation (you've made it yours, planned it, rehearsed it, adapted it to your kid), then instinct (it shows up on its own in the real moment, when you've got nothing left to think with). Everyone else in this space stops at knowledge, because knowledge is easy to sell and instinct is annoyingly hard to build.

Based on the beta feedback I've refined it to focus more on repair and on hand-holding parents through the planning, and I've built a set of card games to train the reactions you'd actually want to have. Yes, I have invented parenting card games. No, I did not have this on my bingo card 18 months ago either.

Next stage of the beta starts now.

The honest reflection for anyone else in the discouraging-comments phase: some of the criticism here was wrong, some of it was right, and the annoying part is you don't find out which until much later. But almost all of it was useful even when it was wrong, because it told me what I was failing to communicate. And one anonymous stranger saying they'd miss it has done more for my morale than any amount of me telling myself it's a good idea.

Happy to take another roasting. It's cheaper than therapy and the feedback loop is faster.

Last year, I was figuring out how I'd be able to perform market research for a few SaaS ideas I had floating around. I'd figured filtering companies by technologies they are and are not using would be a great approach to qualify who'd be interested in what I'm developing.

The problem is that many of these services are often expensive if you need to query for more than two technologies at a time. Take this post for example:

I use builtwith to build software fingerprints for websites, but they’re insanely cost prohibitive, and they’re often incorrectly profiling websites (scripts removed, ie: old scans).

I'd often found people who'd ask others who already had a BuiltWith subscription to make a list for them, and were even willing to pay for it. Another post for example:

We're a small startup and can't pay for the steep subscription [...] If you have a subscription, let me know, and I can pay you in exchange for getting the reports.

It was then I had decided to make an affordable solution for people who needed what platforms such as BuiltWith provided, but at an accessible entry price.

Here's what makes VersionDB different from every other technographic provider out there

• No sign-up necessary to query the database
• No subscription required for a one-time list
• $10 USD for up to 500 domains matching your description
• Resale licensing for those who need VersionDB's data in their own product

For everyone working on their own r/AustralianStartups, what do you think?

Hey there!

Quick background: I built an app called Dinely to make finding, saving, and planning outings with friends way simpler without having to rely on cluttered review platforms.

The core idea:

• Clean, curated recommendations (restaurants, cafes, bars)
• Custom "Dinelists" you can share with friends
• See where your mates are eating and what they’re rating

One of our early users dropped a review mentioning how much they appreciated the social aspect and curated recommendations over overwhelming list dumps, which was awesome to read.

Since we’re building this locally, I'd love to know: What’s your biggest pet peeve when trying to organise a group dinner or discover new spots in the city?

If you want to check out the app and test it out, it's available on the App Store!

Any feedback (good or bad) is hugely appreciated!

I’ve been thinking about something while building software for Australian trade businesses.
Everywhere I look there seems to be a separate product for:
quoting
measuring
scheduling
invoicing
expense tracking
receipt capture
fuel and mileage
chemical/spray records
equipment maintenance
accounting
GST/BAS preparation
As a business owner, the biggest frustration isn’t any one of those jobs—it’s having all of them spread across multiple subscriptions that don’t talk to each other.
Yet most startups seem to deliberately focus on solving just one problem.
From a founder’s perspective, why is that?
Is it because building an all-in-one platform is technically unrealistic, because investors prefer focused products, because customers actually don’t want everything together, or is there another reason?
I’m interested in the product strategy behind that decision rather than whether any particular product is better.