Sustainability Demo Day 2024

Sustainability Demo Day 2024

Following on from the success of last year’s inaugural event, 26 September 2024 marked the second City of Moreton Bay Sustainability Demo Day.

The event was an incredible success, highlighting the innovative sustainable solutions available from talented local businesses across our city. We were blown away by the amazing ideas and products presented, and their potential to contribute to a more sustainable future for Moreton Bay and beyond!

Sustainability Demo Day featured live pitches from a diverse selection of individuals and organizations dedicated to driving City of Moreton Bay toward a more sustainable future. These dynamic presentations showcased the innovative solutions being developed in our region.

Following each pitch, judges, including Scott Waters (CEO, City of Moreton Bay), Mark Livings (Award-winning founder and entrepreneur) and Sarah Woolmington (Founder, Impact Dragonfly), provided valuable feedback and engaged in insightful Q&A sessions. This deep dive into each business' vision and processes offered attendees a better understanding of what industry leaders seek in the sustainability space.

Ethe.ai emerged as the overall winner of Sustainability Demo Day, for their incredible work in ethical AI governance. The full list of winners included:

  1. Best presentation: The Earth is My Place
  2. Highest impact: Aqua Ubique
  3. Local Hero: Bamboo Projects
  4. Honourable mention: CTECK
  5. Overall winner: Ethe.ai

A huge thank you to each and every one of the businesses who took part, pitching their incredible sustainable products and solutions. You should be incredibly proud of your accomplishments! You can find the full list of businesses below:

Australian Urban Growers (Christopher Fullon)
Ethe.ai (James Gauci)
Bamboo Projects (Kristy Paterson)
TPS (Greg Smyth)
Ozius Pty Ltd (Alisa Starkey)
The Earth is My Place (Sebastian)
Aqua Ubique (Shannon Lamanski)
Elexon Electronics (Sandra Simpson)
CTECK (Chris Rogerson)

Of course, a big thanks goes to our judges, Scott Waters, Sarah Woolmington and Mark Livings, who provided invaluable feedback and insights during the day, and to our incredible MC, Mark Gustowski.

Another thanks goes to Eatons Hill Hotel, especially for showing that hospitality and service can also make a positive difference to the planet! This includes their commitment to dedicated recycling and organic waste streams, and partnerships to recycle glass bottles at their premises.

And finally, a warm thank you to the audience, who brought the energy, excitement and buzz that contributed to the amazing atmosphere of the day. Make sure you keep connecting and continue to think about how you can support the city's innovation and sustainability ecosystem.

Go #TeamMoretonBay!

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Innovation in Moreton Bay

Innovate Moreton Bay and City of Moreton Bay remain dedicated to fostering innovation in the city. Sustainability Demo Day is just one example of their ongoing commitment to the Regional Economic Development Strategy (REDS), which includes the objective of Moreton Bay becoming and maintaining its position as a top ten regional innovation hub.

For more information about Council’s innovation programs, visit: www.moretonbay.qld.gov.au/innovation

To learn more about Sustainability Demo Day, see the previous event: https://www.innovatemoretonbay...

Meet The Judges

Scott Waters

Holding over a decade of experience in Chief Executive and General Management roles within the Local Government sector and over 15 years’ experience in the Aviation and Tourism industries, Scott is a strategic commercially focused senior government executive that is firmly focused on enabling sustainable growth and development. Scott commenced as the Chief Executive Officer at City of Moreton Bay in May 2023, Australia’s 3rd largest and one of the fastest growing. In this role, he continues to draw on his expertise to deliver the ambitious agenda for transformational change as the first CEO of Australia’s newest city.

In his previous role as the Chief Executive Officer of Noosa Shire Council, Scott was charged with successfully delivering strategic cultural change while working closely with the Mayor and Councillors in modernising Council’s operations and delivering the largest budget in the history of the Council, at just over $220M.

Mark Livings

Mark is a serial, multi-award-winning entrepreneur and founder of several multi-million dollar businesses in both Australia and Globally. 15+ years of experience as a Founder and CEO. He has advised, coached and worked on board for more than 100+ startups in several sectors. Mark is an EY Entrepreneur of the Year Finalist for Australia and Great British Entrepreneur of the Year Finalist, with companies featured in the AFR Fast 100 across multiple years. His recent work includes working with Australia’s premiere scientific institute, the CSIRO as a Venture Explorer.

Mark is currently working on several new startups, and in the Venture sector as GP of TenNine VC, Venture Partner with Mandalay Ventures and as an Angel Investor.

Sarah Woolmington

Sarah the founder of Impact Dragonfly, a sustainability engagement partner that helps organisations transform their practices and culture.

With 25 years of experience in coaching and training, she has a passion for inspiring and activating behaviour change in teams and individuals.

At the heart of Sarah's professional journey lies a profound dedication to driving sustainability and empowerment in organisations and she has leveraged her expertise in ESG to influence and enact meaningful change in all sized entities from large corporate's to small businesses.

Mark Gustowski (MC)

Mark is the co-founder and Managing Partner of Mandalay Ventures, an agrifood tech venture capital fund investing in agtech and foodtech companies from Seed to Series-A. Mandalay is a $50M fund based in Brisbane with a mission to sustainably feed the world's growing population by investing in the most promising startups working across farm-to-fork technologies globally.

Mark is also the Managing Director of Innovation Architects, an innovation advisory firm that works with Australian and international government agencies in the design and delivery of entrepreneurship, innovation and industry development programs and accelerators.

He was previously the CEO of QUTCEA, a private investment arm of the Queensland University of Technology and has been a founder or cofounder in four startups in the biotech, property tech and FMCG verticals.

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