A Husic eulogy, the problem with medtech funding, and Australia’s most psychedelic founder

Guest hosts AJ Koch and Claire Bull step in and put the microscope on medtech. While the action this week was in Melbourne for Digital Health Fest, we went under the hood of the medtech rollercoaster with two guests right at the coal face. From a funding point of view, you would be hard pressed to find a more in-tune resource than Emerald Scofield of Main Sequence Ventures. Starting out with a childhood passion to “take down the pharmaceutical industry from the inside”, and a biotech degree under her belt, she now lives and breathes all things medtech and happily gave us a warts and all assessment of Australia’s issues and opportunities. Flipping it to the founder experience, our 10x guest is the founder of Xylo Bio, Josh Ismin, who took us through the radical world of psychedelic-inspired neurotherapeutics. Describing himself as someone who’s pretty “granola”, Josh is a fascinating character balancing a global startup at the forefront of healthcare along with a purpose-driven and conscious livelihood. As a startup who has split their team between Australia and the US, Josh was an ideal person to quiz about the impact of this year’s political and social turmoil. Interestingly, while he would think twice about doing it again, ultimately the opportunity for access to capital and customers is simply too great to turn away. For now at least. And of course we couldn’t leave out a conversation about the renewed Government’s ministerial dramas, which see a much loved and respected Ed Husic exiting stage left, leaving Tim Ayres with some big shoes to fill in the eyes of the innovation community. There were some strong comments made throughout the week criticising the decision, summed up by M8 Ventures’ Alan Jones bluntly stating, “We obviously care more about short term interparty factionalism than we do the innovation industries”. This week’s episode of Startup 360 is supported by Vanta, helping startups unlock market opportunities through automated compliance.