Exit / M&A
Company
Meta
Funding history
Investors
Every investor coverage indicates participated in a round Meta raised.
What Meta bought
Companies Meta acquired or merged with, per published coverage. Buying a company is not investing in one: nothing here counts in the deals column.
People
| Name | Role | Sources |
|---|---|---|
| Alexandr Wang | Forbes Australia, Rampersand, siliconrepublic.com | |
| Ben Sand | Founder | Folklore Ventures |
| Brennan Hatton | VR Software Engineer (former) | SmartCompany |
| Catherine Porter | Executive (former) | AFR Technology |
| Jay Parikh | Engineering Chief (former) | siliconrepublic.com |
| Joel Pobar | Senior Engineering Organisational Leader (former) | Ten13 (Tue 30 Jul 2024), Ten13 (Thu 28 Mar 2024) |
| John Hegeman | Chief Revenue Officer (former) | The Age Business |
| Mark Zuckerberg | CEO (former) | ABC News Technology, Forbes Australia, Square Peg Capital portfolio, Square Peg Capital, TechCrunch Venture, SmartCompany, Startup Daily |
| Mike Schroepfer | Chief Technology Officer (former) | SmartCompany |
Coverage
Stories naming Meta. Where several outlets covered the same round, they are bundled under whichever ran the fullest account.
2 deals
‘Confidence evaporated’: Explaining Firmus’ $44 billion IPO flop
Firmus withdrew its ASX listing after weak investor demand. The explainer covers the data centre developer's history, its Nvidia and Blackstone backing, prior raises, and why the float collapsed.
Also Rampersand·Dealroom·Cut Through Venture·Startup Daily·SmartCompany·SmartCompany·Forbes Australia·Business News Australia·Forbes Australia·Mirage News
News
Live: Oil prices on the rise as energy supply concerns continue
Markets live blog covering rising oil prices, a higher ASX open, weak LVMH quarterly sales, analysis of Firmus Technologies' failed float, and an analyst's bullish view of Meta's new AI models.
2 deals
‘Confidence evaporated’: Firmus $44 billion IPO collapse explained
Firmus, the Nvidia-backed data centre developer, pulled its planned ASX listing after weak investor demand and will instead seek private capital. Explaining its background, backers, valuation history and why the float failed.
Also Rampersand·Dealroom·Cut Through Venture·Startup Daily·SmartCompany·SmartCompany·Forbes Australia·Business News Australia·Forbes Australia·Mirage News
9 deals
🇦🇺 This Week in Australian Startups #181, 11th October 2026
Weekly digest: Firmus withdraws its planned listing, Square Peg reaches a billion-dollar close on two vehicles, MUFG clears regulators to buy Grow Inc, and Lubdub, RocketDNA, Energy Bay and Metal all raise.
2 deals
Figure's Brett Adcock sold investors a humanoid future. Now he has to build it.
Profile of Brett Adcock probing Figure's $39 billion valuation, narrow robot deployments, disputed claims involving BMW and OpenAI, and his habit of raising vast sums for ventures like Hark before products ship.
Also Crunchbase News
Funding announcement
Australia's great AI hope just hit a speed bump
AI infrastructure company Firmus, preparing an ASX listing at a reported $44 billion valuation, has split from partner CDC over a scrapped data centre plan, while its prominent backers stay supportive.
Also The Age Business
News
Evan Spiegel’s ill-fated $3 billion plan to put Snapchat on your face
Profile of Snap's CEO and his costly, long-running bet on AR smartglasses, the spurned Facebook takeover offer, Meta's dominance in AI eyewear, and activist investors pushing for change.
Seed
~$50m
Airwallex-backed start-up raises nearly $50m in seed round
Metal, co-founded by Loong Wang and Catherine Porter, completed a roughly $50 million seed round with Airwallex and its venture arm Capital 49 as joint leads, per new filings.
Also Fintech News Australia·This Week in Australian Startups
14 deals
🇦🇺 This Week in Australian Startups #180, 4th October 2026
Weekly roundup reporting Australian startup funding rounds and government grants, a venture fund close, agreed acquisitions, an IPO pricing, a collapse, plus executive hires and AI policy developments.
News
From prison to billionaire data centre operator, the incredible story of Oliver Curtis
Analysis tracing Oliver Curtis from an insider trading prison term to his central role in Firmus's planned $7.2 billion Australian sharemarket listing, with Blackstone and Nvidia among its existing backers.
Exit / M&A
Q2 2026 Global Fund Newsletter
Quarterly report from the Defender Global Fund flagging an 84.7% portfolio return, profits taken on SharonAI following its February Nasdaq uplisting, SharonAI's GPU collaboration with NVIDIA, and fresh investor subscriptions.
Exit / M&A
Q2 2026 Global Fund Newsletter
Defender's quarterly newsletter reports an exceptional quarter for its global fund, headlined by portfolio holding SharonAI, which surged after a February Nasdaq uplisting and an NVIDIA GPU deployment partnership.
Also Defender AM portfolio·Startup Daily·AFR Technology·Forbes Australia·Forbes Australia·Dealroom
2 deals
Skalata reveals the 13 new startups it's just backed with seed investments
Skalata Ventures unveils its October 2021 seed intake of 13 startups, among them Ardacious and Strength By Numbers, and notes alumnus Preezie recently secured a $5.5 million Series A.
Funding announcement
Topic | Managed funds | Australian Financial Review
An AFR managed-funds topic page: a star small-caps deputy goes solo with a new Sydney firm, Gigacomm buys rival DGtek, Google plans a multibillion-dollar domestic bond, plus fund manager and market stories.
Pre-seed
$2m
Our Investment in Bower | The AI Research Partner for Scientists
Ten13 led Bower's A$2m pre-seed round for a voice-first AI assistant that helps scientists capture lab observations hands-free, founded by a four-person team with backgrounds at Microsoft, Google and Atlassian.
Also Startup Daily
News
SafetyCulture has a new name – and an insurance bet to match
Forbes Australia reports the workplace-safety unicorn's new name and its expanding insurance arm, with founder Luke Anear back as chief executive.
Funding announcement
Our Investment in Flyweel - Building the Financial Layer Beneath Ad Spend
Ten13's post explains why it led Flyweel's pre-seed round with QIC, Antler and angel investors, backing a platform bringing real-time financial visibility and funding to advertising spend.
Exit / M&A
Property investment startup Dashdot in liquidation, with Budget as 'the straw that broke the camel's back'
Property investment advisory Dashdot has entered voluntary liquidation after seven years, with co-founder and CEO Glenn McGrath citing economic conditions, federal budget tax reforms and rising Meta advertising costs; clients face losing upfront fees.
Unnamed stage
$505m
💫 Ramplify: April Architect
Rampersand's April newsletter: an essay on AI services startups, model releases from Anthropic and Meta, Firmus Technologies' $505 million raise, Dexibit's sale to accesso, plus portfolio jobs, events and market commentary.
Also Dealroom·Cut Through Venture·Startup Daily·SmartCompany·SmartCompany·Forbes Australia·Business News Australia·Forbes Australia·Forbes Australia·Mirage News
Grant
$2m
Vision Via Sound for the Blind: Can a Silicon Valley Veteran Deliver the Solution to a $2B NDIS Problem?
Profile of ARIA Research, Robert Yearsley's audio-based AR startup for blind users, recalling a $2 million NSW Medical Device Fund grant among $11 million raised and targeting the NDIS market.
Funding announcement
Team Techstars Sydney: How Juxtabyte is turning data into gold
Startup Daily profiles Juxtabyte, a data governance startup founded by former CBA data governance lead Hugh Le, ahead of the Techstars Sydney 2025 cohort's Demo the Future event.
5 deals
ByStorm Beauty wins $30,000 to make cosmetics more accessible
Makeup accessibility startup ByStorm Beauty took out Enterprising ME's 2025 Kickstarter Challenge in Canberra, receiving $30,000, while four fellow finalists' ventures were each granted $7,500.
Funding announcement
Square Peg Investor Letter Half Year Report 30 June 2025
Square Peg's half-year investor letter reviews its accelerating AI investing, portfolio companies' progress including several completed raises, listed fund returns, a new data hire, and ongoing fundraising for its 2025 vintage funds.
2 deals
Square Peg Investor Letter Half Year Report 30 June 2025
In its half-year letter, Square Peg explains how it picks AI founders, reports several portfolio companies' recent raises, flags a data engineering hire, and says fundraising for its next funds is well advanced.
Also Tech Funding News - Australia·Forbes Australia·SmartCompany·SmartCompany·Startup Daily·Startup Daily
7 deals
Five Aussie startups that raised $35.2 million this week
Weekly roundup detailing five Australian startups' raises: a PR platform's Series B, a biotech's post-stealth funding, a defence tech round, a pre-seed voice-AI raise, and a crowdfunding campaign.
Also Startup Daily
8 deals
Meliora's Clive Dickens teams up with NextGen Ventures to back AI startups
Meliora, Clive Dickens' advisory firm, has started backing AI companies alongside a student-focused venture fund that is closing in on its fundraising target.
Also Forbes Australia
Unnamed stage
$5m
Investment Notes: Why We Invested in splose
EVP sets out its reasoning for backing splose, an AI-native practice management platform for allied health clinics, citing NDIS-driven admin burdens, customer traction and a planned UK expansion alongside Australia and New Zealand.
News
DeepSeek: Why It's Important — in Layman's Terms
Aura Group's blog post explains how DeepSeek's R1 reaches near-frontier AI results with far less computing power and why its cheaper, self-correcting methods threaten today's AI incumbents.
4 deals
Over $1 million pledged to Australian women-led businesses at Sister Pitch 2024
Global Sisters' Sister Pitch event with Dentsu steered $1m-plus to a dozen Australian ventures led by women; GTAB Parfum, Soni Health and Chocolate On Purpose were standouts, and Google.org funded a 2023 pilot.
3 deals
H1 2024 in Review: $100m invested
TEN13's investor letter celebrates passing $100 million deployed, plus fresh backing for iion and Switchboard, team promotions, AutoGrab's overseas growth and NZ-arm sale, and the Mr Yum–Me&U merger.
Funding announcement
Ben Sand on Strong Compute's path to enterprise via hackathons, research grants and more
Folklore Ventures Q&A with Strong Compute founder Ben Sand covering its enterprise AI compute offering, community events, grant programs, hiring and his take on how AI market assumptions have shifted.
Funding announcement
Canva gets a ‘glow up’, expands into enterprise to take on Salesforce and LinkedIn
Forbes Australia profiles Canva's enterprise relaunch after a demo with COO Cliff Obrecht, covering new sales, marketing and HR tools; Airtree's co-founder recalls the firm's early backing of the company.
13 deals
Nine Aussie startups that raised $233.5 million this week
Weekly roundup of nine Australian startups that together raised over $233 million, led by Hysata's $172 million Series B, with rounds also for V2 Digital, AgriWebb, Disco, Genero, Brainfish, Kite Therapy, Nucanon and Maslow.
Unnamed stage
US$1.5b
Neural Notes: Ovum AI wants to close the gender data gap in healthcare
SmartCompany's AI column profiles Ovum AI, a Melbourne women's health startup preparing its pilot, which has backing from Wollemi Capital and Nakatomi and plans a crowdfunding round; briefs on other AI news follow.
7 deals
Five ANZ startups that raised $21.2 million this week
Weekly roundup detailing funding rounds by five Australian and New Zealand startups: a diversity analytics platform, a thermal energy storage maker, a carbon accounting service, an activated carbon producer, and legal communications software.
Funding announcement
Bringing our venture DNA to the public markets: Square Peg's Global Tech Fund
Square Peg profiles its Global Tech Fund, a listed-markets strategy applying its venture investing approach to early-stage public tech companies, and outlines its team, edge, and focus on fintech, software and AI.
Funding announcement
Q1 2024 Global Fund Newsletter
Defender's fund letter reports a 2% quarterly return, discusses listed trades including a semiconductor ETF position, and revisits its Series A investment in Australian pet-food maker Lyka Pet Food.
Funding announcement
Anthropic's Joel Pobar joins TEN13 as a Venture Partner
TEN13 announces Joel Pobar, an Anthropic engineering leader formerly at Meta, as its first Venture Partner, reinforcing the firm's AI investing focus; its early bets include Rockfish Data, Arintra and Qsic.
8 deals
Blast OIF | 23 things from 2023
OIF Ventures' year in review: full Eftsure exit, Opportunity Fund close, Visory, DataMasque and Nullify backed, follow-ons at Inspace and Dataweavers, new team members and portfolio milestones.