BLAST OIF

Blast OIF | 23 things from 2023

OIF Ventures
DECEMBER 19 2023

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Reflecting on 2023, there have been many milestones both within our portfolio and at OIF: new investments, follow-ons, a new fund and continued opportunities to back exceptional founders and businesses.

So, to mark the end of the year, we’re going through 23 things that highlight the year that was.


One – 1 Exit 👋

This year we successfully completed a 100% exit of Eftsure. We partially exited eftsure back in 2021 when US growth firm Level Equity bought a significant stake in the business. We first partnered with Ian Mirels, Mark Chazan, Michael Kontorovich and the entire Eftsure team in 2017, and it has been an absolute privilege to work alongside them as they build the incredible business that eftsure is today.

Read more about the eftsure team at #17

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Two – Go1’s Global Growth 🌎

Go1 has acquired not one, but 2 new companies to fuel their growth. Go1 acquired both Blinkist, a mobile-first microlearning app that turns books and podcasts into Blinks (short 15-minute explainers) and award-winning content curation provider Anders Pink (Acquired by Go1). With a common goal of fostering a lifelong love of learning, these acquisitions will help the learning platform reach their goal of a billion workers quicker.

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Three – New Portfolio Companies 👏

We’re thrilled to welcome 3 new companies to the OIF portfolio; Visory, DataMasque and Nullify. From supercharging the back office of SMEs to protecting sensitive data or helping developers contextualise and prioritise vulnerability fixes throughout the software development lifecycle, we’re extremely excited to be partnering with these teams on their journey.

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Four – Successfully Raised Our Fourth Fund 💰

This year we announced the launch and close of the OIF Ventures Opportunity Fund. This Fund will stand adjacent to our three existing early-stage funds and will patiently and selectively focus on investing in outstanding later stage opportunities. With strong support from existing and new investors – it is great to see so much support for this vision.

This is an exciting milestone for us, a big responsibility and we are very excited by the opportunity ahead. Read more in the Australian Financial Review - here

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Five – Neara is Powering On ⚡️

Thanks to Neara’s digital insights it took only 5 days to re-energize feeder lines across the energy network, compared to the originally anticipated three-week time frame, during the recent River Murray flood event.

Neara are fast-tracking the transition to renewable energy by bringing more clean power into the market. We first backed the Neara team in 2021 and we’re incredibly proud to be their partners on this critical journey.

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Six – Some New OIF Faces 👋

Our portfolio companies are not the only ones growing! In 2023 we had the support of 6 new faces;

Plus, we were lucky enough to have the support of two epic interns through the year – 👨🎓Felix Zhu and Pavikshan Siribalamurali 🌍 – thank you for all your hard work.

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Seven and Eight – Atomi's biggest launch yet ⚛️

Atomi had their biggest launch yet …. Unveiling Atomi for Years 7-8

The Atomi team of more than 80 expert teachers, subject specialists, scriptwriters, animators and editors have spent the past two years bringing this to life, to support the needs of junior students and empower teachers with best-practice pedagogy.

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Nine – Advanced Navigation to the Rescue 🚨

Drones have saved over 900 lives and counting, enabling emergency personnel to respond to crises faster whilst minimising their risk to personal safety. This year Advanced Navigation unveiled #CGConnect, a cellular micro-modem connecting unlimited drones and robotic vehicles to the #CloudGroundControl platform.

Their technology is empowering companies such as Ripper Corporation Pty Ltd and Clean Earth Rovers with multi-vehicle missions from beach patrols to bushfires, providing relief to flooded communities and cleaning up harmful red tide and oil spills, helping to keep emergency responders safe.

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Ten – 10/10 Year 🏆

It’s been a 10/10 year for our portfolio companies, winning various awards. We couldn’t squeeze them all in – so to mention just a handful;

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Eleven – Enboarders Happy Customers 😊

This fall Enboarder earn't 11 brand new G2 badges in employee engagement and onboarding. These badges are powered by user reviews and it’s extremely exciting to see such positive feedback.

We’re thrilled to be on this journey with the Enboarder team, as they work alongside their customers to help create more human connections at every stage of the employee lifecycle.

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Twelve - OIF Community 💚

Over the last 12 months we’ve hosted several events, bringing together the community that is OIF.

  • We partnered with Advisory Partner Andrew Phillips to host an epic enterprise sales workshop
  • Our All-Access event with our friends over at TEN13 and Archangel Ventures was an awesome opportunity to share a drink with some of Sydney’s incredible founders, investors and operators
  • We spent an afternoon with Mulpha International alongside leading representatives from across the real estate and construction industry to deep dive into the latest PropTech trends

From Lunch and Learns with incredible speakers, intimate dinners with our Advisory Partners or drinks at the local pub with our founders, we’ve absolutely loved getting together with everyone in the ecosystem. We have already got some exciting events in the works for 2024 including a PLG masterclass with Ex-Head of Zoom APAC Michael Chetner - sign up to the waitlist here

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Thirteen - Inspace 🏙

Inspace now has over $130 billion in assets virtualised on the platform and growing. Inspace counts the likes of Dexus, Mirvac, JLL, CBRE, Blackstone, Brookfield, ESR and Lendlease as some of its customers. We first backed Justin Liang and the Inspace team in 2021 and are thrilled to have backed the team again this year, investing in their latest $6M funding round.

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Fourteen - Dataweavers 👩💻

CX and DevOps platform offering the ‘ultimate SaaS experience’, Dataweavers surpassed 14 enterprise customers across AU, the US and EMEA this year. We first partnered with Ben Shapiro and the Dataweavers team in 2022 and are thrilled to be continuing our support, backing the team again as they achieve an incredible milestone closing their $5.5M funding round.

Read more about why we first believed in the team (and still do) in our investment note – Here

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Fifteen - D-ID 👾

Users of AI generated video creation platform D-ID, have now created over 150 million digital people. D-ID continue to grow from strength to strength with 60,000 daily studio signups and 100,000 developers using D-ID's API. We first backed D-ID in 2022 and it has been a privilege to be on the journey with them ever since.

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Sixteen – Happy Birthday 🎂

Wow, where has the time gone! Founded in 2016 as Our Innovation Fund and evolving into OIF Ventures we turned seven this year. Whilst we continue to grow and evolve, our core values and focus remain as rock-solid as ever: to add material value to the founders we back and to work hard each and every day to ensure their success.

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Seventeen – EFTsure Deep Dive 🤿

Eftsure helps organisations securely pay their vendors by providing automated continuous control of outgoing payments. The multi-factor verification approach protects organisations from financial loss due to cybercrime, fraud and error.

We first partnered with the EFTsure team in 2017, and have watched them grow into the incredible business it is today verifying over $120 billion in EFT payments annually, for some of Australia’s largest enterprises including; SONY, Steadfast, Meriton, AFL and Employment Hero.

Completing a 100% exit of EFTsure does not mean goodbye, but rather see you later as we hope to stay close with the EFTsure team and continue to watch their hard work and success. We know we leave the business in very good shape and in very good hands.

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Eighteen – Bridgit 🏡

Over the past three years, Bridgit has had a 1898% growth rate, placing fourth in the Deloitte Tech Fast 50 Rising Star category. This list highlights Australia's fastest growing tech companies, and with close to a 1900% growth rate, this is a tremendous achievement.

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Nineteen - Kasada 🤖

Sam Crowther founded Kasada at just 19 years old, building Kasada into the incredible company that it is today, protecting leading companies such as Crocs, Hyatt Hotels Corporation , PointsBet and REAGroup from malicious bot attacks.

Sam was also recently selected as one of Forbes 30 Under 30 for 2023. We are thrilled to see his hard work and dedication recognised as he and the Kasada team continue to protect over 100M people daily from automated bot threats.

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Twenty – Jobs Jobs Jobs 🧑💻

Our portfolio companies continue to grow, experiencing on average a 20% increase in headcount.

Make sure to check out our jobs board to be a part of these exciting journeys.

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Twenty One – Biza 🔷

Biza.io now services over 21 customers, helping them to meet the complex and rapidly changing Consumer Data Right specification. Biza’s SaaS solution provides data holders with a platform that is easily implemented and entirely compliant with the complex CDR regulatory guidelines, helping businesses accelerate their open data capability. Biza’s products work to reduce the costly burden to implement and manage compliance on an ongoing basis.

As the CDR regime expands across an increasing number of industries, we’re excited to be partnering with Stuart Low and the entire Biza.io team.

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Twenty Two - Aussie VC 🇦🇺

First three quarters of 2023 Australian startups received over 2.2 billion in funding. Although this year was filled with lots of uncertainty, angst and volatility, it also brought with it new opportunities and as the Australian start-up and venture capital ecosystem continues to grow, we can’t wait to see and be part of what’s to come.

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Twenty Three – Milestones, Products and Partnerships 🤝

2023 – was the year our portfolio companies continued to soar to new heights, reach new milestones, launch new products and partnerships

  • Circle In launched their new product Well, the first tool for Microsoft Teams to help control psychosocial risks
  • Josef launched their new industry first AI-powered compliance tool, Josef Q
  • Matrak announced their partnership with BlueScope Buildings North America, Inc. Who are using Matrak's supply chain tracking software for ESG tracking in their steel operations to help reduce their carbon impact within the construction industry.
  • Vouch launched many new features this year to help users streamline video workflows, including their AI-powered question generator, AI-powered video scripts and AI-powered search 
  • Zitcha announced they are now the trusted partner of Meta's Managed Partner Ads (MPA). Retailers can now unlock the full potential of Meta's Shopper Marketing Ads product, using Zitcha’s Unified Retail Media Platform

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Twenty Four – Next year in 2024 🎉

As this special edition of Blast OIF comes to an end, from our team to you we hope that you have a restful and joyful break. Thank you for being an integral part of our community. We look forward to reconnecting in the new year as well as meeting many new faces.

Wishing you a happy, healthy and successful 2024.

Onwards and upwards,

Team OIF Ventures

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