Digital Dreamers

Digital Dreamers is a program exploring couples of Australian entrepreneurs start-ups making their way in the Silicon Valley, shot by Sydney Morning Herald tech reporter Asher Moses. Our feature should go through those episodes  to see how these young entrepreneurs experiencing.

Take a look at these two stories that I found which inspired me most.

Above: Peter Watts from SMH "Daring to fail at 23: Australia's  hackathon hero"

Peter Watts, a 23-year-old young entrepreneur from Sydney won $20,000 prizes from coding competition “Hackathons” and is heading to US to present his start-up business Swarm.fm.

With Swarm.fm, Watts is developing apps to help people find new music and learn more about the artists they love.

In the article I found in Sydney Morning Herald website Daring to fail at 23: Australia's hackathon hero, he tells us his opinion of Australia business environment, particularly online, “It’s hard to convince those people to stay in Australia because there isn’t the same environment for them to succeed.”

Above: Nikki Durkin Photo: Hugh Hamilton from SMH "Brain drain: why young entrepreneurs leaving home"

Nikki Durkin, a 20-year-old entrepreneur started her fashion website 99dresses since she was 15.

Ms Durkin's aim is clear:" I want to build a billion-dollar company." But she says Australia won't let her, so she's joining thousands of other Australians pursuing their dreams in the US.

“Over in Silicon Valley, failure is celebrated and seen as a chance to learn, but in Australia failure’s seen as a bad thing… generally I think it’s a bit of tall poppy syndrome happening.” She says.

Hence, it makes people wondering why so some Australian entrepreneurs choose to make their business big in Silicon Valley, in the US and the reasons why some Australian entrepreneurs have failed andcontinue to fail.

In order to know the exact reason, we should figure out the economic condition of Australia now. Unlike the US, Australians, by in large, are not investing in onine companies. There are more than 65 technology start-ups in Silicon Valley that were created by Australians,and this number is growing rapidly.

According to the Aussie expat network Advance, about 15,000 Australians work in the San Francisco Bay Area alone-alarge portion working for tech companies.

In the article that I found on SydneyMorning Herald website Brain drain: why young entrepreneurs leaving home, Matt Barrie, the Sydney-based CEO of global online outsourcing site Freelancer.com, says "They’re moving to the US, they’re getting agreen card, and they’re not coming back." We hope to do an interview with him to share his point of views.

Here are some statistics, in 2011, only$120 million – out of $1.8 trillion funds under management in Australia- was invested by Australian venture capital firms.

Adrian Turner, an Australian entrepreneur who has lived in the Valley for the past 12 years, says if Australia doesn't invest in the technology-based businesses in parallel to capitalizing on the commodities boom, we’re “going to be left behind globally in a way that’s irreversible”. 

Our feature will investigate deeply and further particularly on the reasons why Australians are heading to US and what is the different on policies and opinions between US and Australia in venture capital and investment on online business.