Founder Topic

How do founders raise and build from Australia and Asia-Pacific?

The regional patterns from the archive: US capital is winnable from Australia with real traction and physical presence (Finnlay Morcombe raised from Accel without his Australian revenue being discounted). Australia doubles as a testing ground — per Brian Pham, US and UK companies release there first and it's a crowded market, so winning locally signals global strength. And the ecosystems differ structurally: Nhi Nguyen points out Vietnam has no equivalent of Australia's mandatory superannuation quietly building wealth in the background.

Most startup advice is written for San Francisco. The Founders In Motion archive is one of the few places where founders talk specifically about raising and building from Australia, Southeast Asia, and Europe — what transfers, what doesn't, and where the local edge actually is.

Quick answers

How do Australian founders raise from US investors?

Finnlay Morcombe names the two misconceptions Australians carry: that you can "just go to the valley" and raise a massive round, and the cognitive dissonance that it's both hard and possible at once. What worked for Fluency: actually moving to the US, real traction, thesis fit, and the leverage of "we have enough capital in the bank anyway."

Do US investors discount Australian revenue?

Finnlay had heard "they're going to discount it to zero" — but for Fluency it didn't happen: "No, not for us. Accel didn't anyway." His hypothesis: discounting hits vertical software harder than horizontal products.

Why is Australia a good startup testing ground?

Brian Pham's case: Australia "has been a release point for a lot of US and UK based companies" — Apple and Google Wallet features often come to Australia first after the US — and it's a crowded market, so winning there signals a strong chance globally.

Is building outside the US "hard mode"?

Elia from VibeFlow: "for me 100% agree with that." His two reasons: network — in San Francisco "you have to make zero effort to meet anyone you want" — and belief, the ambient sense that "you can do anything," which in Europe gives way to imposter syndrome.

What founders in the archive say

EP 23

Finnlay Morcombe · Fluency

The 25-Year-Old Who Raised $6M From Early Facebook Investors

At 25, Finnlay Morcombe built Fluency — a platform that maps how work actually happens in Fortune 500 organizations — raised 6 million from Accel within weeks of landing in the US, and hard pivoted into the product within one week of going to market.

6 millionSeed round Finnlay raised from Accel, before he'd been in the US more than a few weeks

"we went to market with it and within one week we're like okay we're hard pivoting because the reception was completely different"—

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EP 8

Brian Pham · Litecard

What Every Australian Loyalty Program Get Wrong, And How Litecard Fix It

Brian Pham built Litecard, a "wallet led marketing platform" that turns Apple and Google Wallet into a media channel for brands and retailers — and expanded it from Australia across Asia and into Europe. This is how he picked markets, killed technical friction, and learned to study the data faster.

1 to 2 minutesHow long the whole add-to-wallet-and-scan flow now takes, with no integrations

"we call it a wallet led marketing platform and wallet, meaning Apple and Google Wallet."—

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EP 5

Nhi Nguyen · MaiMoney

Why Vietnamese People Don't Invest - And How One Fintech Is Fixing It

Nhi grew up in Vietnam, studied finance in Australia, and was shocked that one country builds your wealth automatically while the other leaves you guessing — so she built MaiMoney to bring institutional-quality investing to everyday Vietnamese investors.

$2 millionIn investments on the platform at the time of the conversation

"we want to bridge the gap by making investing more simple, as simple as savings"—

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EP 18

Alessia and Elia · VibeFlow (YC S25)

Why This YC Startup Is Betting That AI Will Get Things Wrong

Alessia and Elia met in co-founder dating hell — Elia doing EF in Paris, Alessia trying the YC co-founder matching platform, connecting from apart (Paris and Sri Lanka) and complaining to each other every day about not finding the right match — until they asked why they weren't just brainstorming together. That became VibeFlow, a YC-backed startup helping non-technical founders build production-ready apps in no code.

6,000Users hit in three weeks after winning product of the day on Product Hunt

"the co founder is the most important thing especially in early stage startup like you need to prioritize your team before anything else"— Elia, on what matters most early (04:50)

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EP 31

Rakhesh Martyn · Hachiko Energy

Battery Storage Founder: 8 Months of Rejection, One Term Sheet He Refused

Made redundant at 28 and scrubbing dishes in a central London kitchen, Rakhesh Martyn rebuilt himself into the founder of Hachiko Energy — surviving eight months of investor rejection, refusing the only term sheet on the table, and getting a term sheet from the right fund just 16 days after meeting them.

8 monthsof fundraising, pitching four or five times a week at a minimum, before the first term sheet — which his lawyer said wasn't good

"I was just looking at a sink full of dishes and I was scrubbing them and I just looked at my hands and went, Jesus Christ, how did we end up back here?"—

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