With more than 2 million entrepreneurs apart of their global community, Startup Grind takes entrepreneurs and innovators to the next level. In February this year, the Startup Grind Global Conference in partnership with Google for Startups brought together startups, partners, investors, thought leaders, and worldwide directors come together for 2+ days of invaluable education, connection, and inspiration.

We spoke to co-founder, Rafael Niesten about his experiences at the conference and where leaders need to focus in order to drive the success of their business.

1. What attracted you to the Startup Grind Global Conference?

Startup Grind has a global network of innovators, leaders and experience makers that’s hard to ignore. We were part of the Australian chapter of Startup Grind and were selected to participate at the conference by invitation.

The opportunity was too good to turn down. It gave Jon and myself real insight and first-hand exposure to how startups are driving innovation in overseas markets like the US. Secondly, there were great networking opportunities with leaders from global companies, investors and people seeking partnerships from all over the world.

After we received our initial invitation, we were then selected as a top 50 startup globally which was a big honour.

2. How does the Bricks + Agent platform stack up against some of the tech and innovations exhibiting at the conference?

There was a lot of great tech innovations visible at the conference and a real variety of vendors across a range of industries. In the proptech space there was some innovation around Internet of Things (IoT) and retrofitting buildings to allow for the consumer or property manager to be able to monitor, control and understand their buildings, which is something that currently isn't happening. We can blend the data that comes from IoT into preventative and predictive maintenance rather than retrospective or reactive maintenance.

There has never been a better time to be involved in technology, and of the solution that we have developed can add significant value for all stakeholders in the maintenance and inspection space.

3. What are some of the activities and sessions you took part in?

During the first few days we attended networking functions including a VIP event that ran the day before the conference started with Chris Yah, the co-author of Blitzscaling. I got to most sessions each day. These ranged from motivational speeches on how to fuel entrepreneurship, building companies for intelligent growth, up skilling breakout sessions, right through to attendees pitching companies or ideas on stage in front of a live audience.

4. What have you taken away from this experience?

One thing that stuck with me the most from this experience is that the world is a big place. We need to design and build a solution that has a global focus from day one… and software is eating the world.

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