nVest wins the Sydney Pitch, takes home prize of $115,000

This evening in Sydney, SmartCompany hosted its third instalment of the Pitch, an early-stage startup competition, with nVest named the winner.

Held at the spectacular 12 Micron events space in Barangaroo, the event was created in partnership with AWS, BlueRock and FinTech Australia, with a packed room in attendance to hear six early-stage startups pitch their ideas to an esteemed judging panel.

Our guest judges, Raaj Rayat of Airtree Ventures, Laura Faulconer of x15ventures, Jill Berry of Adatree, Bevan McLeod of BlueRock, and Wayne Clarke of AWS, chose nVest as the winner due to its identification of an unsolved problem and aim to modernise broker trading on any platform.

Now, nVest receives a $100,000 boost in AWS Activate credits, $15,000 in consultancy services from BlueRock, and a spot on FinTech Australia’s acclaimed podcast.

nVest’s mission is to democratise access to stock markets in the Asia Pacific region, a large total addressable market. It helps customers – from banks to startups – build investment features into their products.

Founded by Sivan Atad, its bank-grade embedded investment solution helps customers deliver accessible, simple and affordable investment experiences to Australian retail investors.

“nVest had a great pitch and found a problem that is being explored in other markets but is unsolved locally,” said the judges after the deliberation.

“It’s an interesting problem space. There is a real need to reduce trading costs so it’s a good market fit. nVest also showcased good signals around partner engagement and understanding around broader market trends from businesses who want to buy versus build.”

Image: AWS Startup advisor Wayne Clarke with Pitch Sydney winner Sivan Atad from nVest.

Members of the startup and VC communities packed out the room to learn more about the big ideas coming from Australia’s up-and-coming entrepreneurs.

“We know where we want to be and it’s exciting to see it form one step at a time. Now we’re going to take a moment to appreciate tonight,” nVest founder, Sivan Atad, said in a chat with SmartCompany after the event.

“We had an amazing day of launching our sandbox and then winning this award on the same night. I’m in a dream right now.”

SmartCompany congratulates nVest on its success, and extends that to all other shortlisted candidates for their incredible pitches, and to every startup who entered the Pitch.