City of Sydney's tech start-up action plan

The City of Sydney has produced a draft tech start-up action plan designed to help the city’s innovative entrepreneurs prosper.

The plan includes initiatives including establishing an entrepreneurship centre, offering coding classes at local libraries and reducing red tape for co-working spaces.

Lord Mayor Clover Moore commented that Sydney is home to Australia’s highest concentration for tech start-ups. She said the plan is designed to encourage start-ups to establish and remain in the city.

“The next billion-dollar company to follow in the footsteps of success stories like Canva or Atlassian is already being developed, we want to make sure those companies see the benefits of setting up and staying here in Sydney,” she said.

“I’m proud the City is involved in so many initiatives to help these entrepreneurs create innovative products that will make a positive difference in people’s lives.”

PricewaterhouseCoopers estimated in 2013 that the Australian tech start-up sector could generate over 500,000 jobs by 2033.

Alexis Soulopoulos, CEO and co-founder of online personalised pet-sitting booking service Mad Paws, said there are a number of factors that make Sydney a good location for start-ups.

When people visit the site, we want them to be positively surprised to find a sitter around the corner. Sydney offers that population density,” he said.

“Sydneysiders are also tech savvy. They’re comfortable adopting new technology solutions and this makes Sydney a great test market for global start-ups.”

Sydney’s draft tech start-up action plan is available to view online. Industries will be able to comment on the plan and suggest any alterations until 10 November.

Image courtesy of Corey Leopold under CC