The day after this conversation was recorded, the government blinked: on 18 June it announced targeted CGT carve-outs for innovative startups, following more than 1,000 submissions to a Senate inquiry, one of the largest responses to a budget measure on record.

About the guests

Sam Maher is the founder and CEO of GovTech and the driving force behind the Coalition for Australia's Innovation & Investment Future (CAIIF), the cross-industry group that formed within two days of the budget and now represents more than 180 entities. Cheryl Mack is the CEO and co-founder of Aussie Angels, the platform behind more than 45 angel syndicates and over 3,000 wholesale investors, with close to $70 million deployed into early-stage companies. Both have been meeting Treasury and ministers' offices directly to respond to the changes.

What this episode covers

• Why the May 2026 budget changes to CGT, scrapping the 50 per cent discount in favour of indexation and a 30 per cent minimum tax, hit early-stage investment hardest

• The zero or low cost base problem and why inflation-based indexation does little for founders and angels who start from almost nothing

• Why the Early Stage Innovation Company (ESIC) rules, set in 2016, now exclude most pre-seed and seed rounds, and why that matters for the new carve-out

• What CAIIF asked the Senate for: separating property from productive capital, more time for consultation, a sunset clause, and harmonisation across innovation policy

• Cheryl Mack's practical advice to angels: hold fast, keep writing committed cheques, and wait for guidance rather than freezing

• What founders facing a liquidity event in the next twelve months should watch, including ESVCLP structures and debt instruments

• How Australia's proposed CGT settings compare with the United States, the United Kingdom, Singapore, New Zealand and Israel

Why now

The 18 June carve-out announcement does not end the uncertainty, it reshapes it. Treasury submissions close on 10 July, the second tranche of legislation may not be settled until close to the 1 July 2027 start date, and the carve-out's reliance on the ESIC definition leaves real questions about who actually qualifies. Founders and investors are making capital and hiring decisions now, against rules that are still moving.

Who this episode is for

• Founders raising capital or planning a liquidity event in the next twelve months

• Angel investors and syndicate leads weighing early-stage cheques

• VCs and fund managers assessing how ESVCLP structures change the picture

• Operators and employees holding or being offered equity through an ESS

Links and resources

Coalition for Australia's Innovation & Investment Future (CAIIF): https://www.linkedin.com/company/caiif/

Read the submissions to the Senate Economics Committee tax reform inquiry: https://www.aph.gov.au/Parliamentary_Business/Committees/Senate/Economics/TLABITRTaxReform/Submissions The Periodic Table of Australian Innovation: https://www.innovationperiodictable.au/

Australia has passed a regulated framework for tokenised assets before the United States has, and the Reserve Bank's Project Acacia has already tested it on live use cases with the major banks.

About the guest

Alan Burt is Executive Chairman of Redbelly Network, the public blockchain infrastructure named in the Reserve Bank of Australia's Project Acacia, and Co-Founder and General Partner of Beachhead Venture Capital. He came up as a technologist and IT services founder, exited his cloud services business in 2013, and has spent the years since investing across B2B SaaS and, more recently, blockchain and tokenisation. He invests alongside Utiliti in a number of companies.

What this episode covers

• What tokenisation actually is, and why it is not the same thing as crypto speculation.

• The Corporations Amendment (Digital Assets Framework) Act, which received Royal Assent on 8 April 2026, and the two new regulated categories it creates.

• Redbelly Network's role in Project Acacia, including settling a central bank obligation on a public blockchain for the first time anywhere.

• The liquidity unlock: research cited in the episode points to roughly $24 billion a year in savings, around 1 per cent of GDP.

• What it would take for an Australian fund manager to offer investors genuine liquidity options on assets that have never had them.

• Collateral mobility, the looping trade, and why borrowing against an asset can matter more than selling it.

• Founder liquidity, the secondary market problem, and the early-stage funding gap in Australian venture.

Why now

Australia has gone from policy ambiguity to a defined regime, while the equivalent United States legislation is still pending. The Act carries a transition runway before it commences, so the next 12 months are when fund managers, issuers and custodians decide how to use it. Capital markets have tightened, exit windows have narrowed, and a credible new route to liquidity changes the calculation for anyone holding illiquid assets.

Who this episode is for

• Fund managers and GPs weighing whether to tokenise an LP interest or offer secondary liquidity.

• Founders thinking about exit options beyond an IPO or trade sale.

• Investors and LPs who want optionality on long-dated commitments.

• Operators in financial technology building on the new regulatory clarity.

Subscribe for new episodes every two weeks.

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/utiliti-group/

Growth can feel like momentum. But momentum without financial control is not steering — it is a crash waiting to happen. Ryan Barnes, Managing Partner of TWIYO Capital & Advisory, has worked at CFO level with more than 100 businesses across sectors. He knows what the warning signs look like before most founders do.

Ryan Barnes is Managing Partner of TWIYO Capital & Advisory, a Sydney-based CFO and capital advisory firm he co-founded in 2020. Before TWIYO, he was a CFO at 26, building his career across large chartered firms, multinationals, and high-growth businesses. Since founding TWIYO, he has worked at CFO level with over 100 businesses across sectors, guiding them through rapid growth, capital raises, and strategic transactions. TWIYO is an AFR Fast Starters firm and a certified B Corporation.

The era of cheap and abundant capital is behind us. Australian founders who built their models around serial raises are now being asked to prove they can sustain the business on its own terms — and that any raise serves a specific, strategic purpose. Ryan speaks from inside 100+ engagements through this transition, across a broad range of industries and business types, which makes this one of the most grounded conversations on sustainable, profitable growth you will hear.

Subscribe for new episodes every fortnight.

Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/44IVscPmz3sgMSmxEvk312

Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/rule-of-40/id1887992198}

Youtube: https://youtu.be/VRT9jWn5pjc

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/utiliti-group/

Australian enterprise deals over $1 million in total contract value now involve upwards of 10 buyers and a sales cycle approaching 300 days. If your sales motion still depends on the founder being in every room, you are building a ceiling, not a company.

About the guest

Jonathan 'Jono' Staff is Chief Revenue Officer at ASE Tech and Executive Director at WinDC. He has spent more than 20 years building high-performance sales teams across Australian IT, including time at AC3, Dimension Data, and Macquarie Cloud Services. He also hosts Things. Reasons., the independent show for Australian IT leaders.

What this episode covers

• The 2026 Australian buying landscape: more stakeholders, longer cycles, and why the cost of poor qualification has never been higher

• Why 92% of B2B buyers begin their journey with vendors already in mind, and what that means for how you get in front of them

• The science and art of sales: why high performers are not following the playbook, and why that matters for founders building a team

• Why 'I'm a relationships guy' is the wrong answer in a sales interview, and what credibility actually means to a modern enterprise buyer

• How to know when founder-led sales has become a ceiling, and what to do before you make your first sales hire

• The right hire sequence: stabilise the customer base first, separate landing from retention, and never hire a Swiss Army knife

• Why performance managing through incentive plans is a trap, and how to set a new hire up so you can have an honest conversation if things go wrong

• Quick Fire Three: one GTM decision to revisit in the next 30 days, one piece of sales advice that has aged badly, and the first sign the sales motion is working

Why now

The spray-and-pray era is over in Australian B2B tech. Buyers are more educated, more committee-driven, and more discerning than they were two years ago. The cost of a failed sales hire has never been higher, and most founders are still trying to scale before they have extracted their own process. This conversation gives founders a practical framework for getting it right before they burn capital on the wrong hire.

Who this episode is for

• Scale-up founders with $1M to $10M ARR who are trying to move beyond founder-led sales

• Revenue leaders stepping into an early-stage or growth-stage B2B tech business

• Investors and board members evaluating the quality of a portfolio company's go-to-market

• Operators building or inheriting a sales function in Australian tech

Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/44IVscPmz3sgMSmxEvk312

Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/rule-of-40/id1887992198}

Youtube: https://youtu.be/VRT9jWn5pjc

Subscribe for new episodes every two weeks.

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/utiliti-group/

#RuleOf40 #AustraliaTech #FounderLedSales #B2BSales #TechScaleup

In this first episode of Rule of 40, Jason Serda and Josh Ayscough introduce the podcast and unpack the "misunderstood middle", the critical stage where startups must evolve into real, scalable businesses.

They explore how today's tougher funding environment demands discipline, resilience, and a focus on building sustainable companies, not just raising capital. This episode also introduces the Rule of 40 as a key metric for balancing growth and profitability.

A candid look at what it really takes to scale and why most companies get stuck along the way