Wild Hearts
Episodes
Didier Elzinga: What survives AI
16 Jun 2026
Contributed by Lukas
There are people who think about culture. And then there's Didier Elzinga.Fifteen years running CultureAmp. 7,000 organisations. A front-row seat to h...
Katelyn Lesse and Angela Jiang: Not the Anthropic you're expecting
09 Jun 2026
Contributed by Lukas
If you're here for commentary on the Pope, Trump, or the geopolitics of frontier AI - this isn't that episode. If you're here for the unfiltered view ...
Charlie Gearside: What to do with $1.6 billion
02 Jun 2026
Contributed by Lukas
Earlier this year, Eucalyptus sold for $1.6 billion - one of the biggest exits in Australian startup history. Charlie Gearside co-founded it.A year on...
Mason Yates What gives you the most energy?
26 May 2026
Contributed by Lukas
After 77 episodes and eight years at Blackbird, Mason Yates is signing off as host of Wild Hearts. This is his final episode - just eight minutes, no ...
Rory Garton-Smith & Harry Dixon: They saw the gap. Nobody else did.
19 May 2026
Contributed by Lukas
When Apple's iOS privacy changes hit, most people saw a headache. Rory Garton-Smith and Harry Dixon saw something else: millions of brands suddenly un...
Min-Kyu Jung: No offense, kid
12 May 2026
Contributed by Lukas
Min-Kyu Jung was a corporate lawyer who taught himself to code because he saw a problem that needed solving. Three years later, Ivo is winning enterpr...
Hardy Michel & Shak Lala: Go slow to go fast
16 Dec 2025
Contributed by Lukas
How did two first time founders get so wise?Paying customers in four countries within weeks of launch. Firms signing pilot agreements before a product...
Jeka Viktorova: Six weeks from dying, then the world came knocking
09 Dec 2025
Contributed by Lukas
This is the most technical episode we've ever done. Listen anyway.Yes, there are acronyms. Yes, you'll learn what a chiplet is. Worth it.But here's wh...
Adam Gilmour: We took the risk first. Then the government came.
02 Dec 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Most founders wait for perfect conditions. Not Adam Gilmour. He started Gilmour Space before Australia even had a space agency.On July 30, that bet pa...
Alex Wyatt: When seven years of platform work becomes seven-week product cycles
25 Nov 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Most robotics companies die trying to build their first product. Alex Wyatt spent seven years building the platform so the second product took seven w...
Nikki Brown: When you stop being a cog, you become the machine
18 Nov 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Nikki Brown is a Cambridge graduate who quit a dream job at Google after mere months. "I wasn't happy being a cog in a machine," she says. So she buil...
The Robotics Inflection: Why This Time Is Different (ft. Joe Harris, Alloy)
11 Nov 2025
Contributed by Lukas
There’s a graveyard of robotics companies—billions torched on beautiful demos we’ve all seen before, but never felt. This episode explains why t...
Andrea Quinn: The operator behind a unicorn's growth engine
04 Nov 2025
Contributed by Lukas
You don't have to be the founder to build the future.When Andrea Quinn made the leap from fashion merchandising to tech, she didn't start a company. S...
Xavier Collins: The AI studio unlocking the future of storytelling
28 Oct 2025
Contributed by Lukas
When storytelling meets startup energy, magic happens.In this week’s episode, Xavier Collins, co-founder of Wonder, joins Mason to explore how techn...
Lessons from the climb: Michelle Battersby on building Sunroom
21 Oct 2025
Contributed by Lukas
When Michelle Battersby launched Sunroom, she set out to change the game for women creators, building a platform where they could earn freely, safely,...
From zero to US$6.2 Billion: Lucy Liu on the Airwallex strategy that broke global payments
14 Oct 2025
Contributed by Lukas
When Lucy Liu co-founded Airwallex in 2015, she was flying around the world opening bank accounts in person and carrying bags of security tokens. Glob...
Brushstrokes, Flow State, and Freedom: The Procreate Story
07 Oct 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Procreate co-founder James Cuda has spent more than a decade obsessing over one thing: the brushstroke. From hacking the iPad 1 to run at 60fps, to tu...
One Impossible Idea: Why Pete Shadbolt left academia to build PsiQuantum
20 May 2025
Contributed by Lukas
What if you could take the most mysterious force in physics—and make it useful? In our final episode of this season of Wild Hearts, we si...
How Anna Guerrero is changing the way we cook
15 May 2025
Contributed by Lukas
What if planning dinner wasn’t a chore—but something you looked forward to? In this episode, Wild Hearts guest host, Silk Kadala - invest...
Launching Iconic Tech Companies in Australia with Kate Vale (ex-Google & Spotify)
13 May 2025
Contributed by Lukas
What’s it like to be employee number one at two of the most iconic tech companies of the past two decades? In this episode of Wild Hearts,...
LIVE from Sunrise Australia: How Alex Zaccaria Reclaimed Linktree’s Vision and Culture
01 May 2025
Contributed by Lukas
What happens when a side project becomes a platform used by over 75 million people—yet the founder feels like they’re losing control of...
From burnout to balance: lessons in product, writing and culture with Harry Flett.
22 Apr 2025
Contributed by Lukas
What makes a team thrive?According to Harry Flett, it's not just strategy or shipping speed; it’s how you make people feel. In the latest ...
The intersection of marketing, product, and creativity with George Howes from Magic Brief
15 Apr 2025
Contributed by Lukas
The internet is drowning in ‘slop’- and George Howes has a fix.The former creative lead at Eucalyptus believes the solution to this ‘cr...
Why Australia’s defence needs tech founders: Vu Tran of Black Sky Industries on building missiles with a startup mindset.
08 Apr 2025
Contributed by Lukas
What motivates a founder to shift from building a billion-dollar edtech unicorn to manufacturing missiles? And what happens when your career ...
Scaling Heidi in the US: Lessons in product, people and persistence.
01 Apr 2025
Contributed by Lukas
What happens when you pack a carry-on, fly across the world, and try to scale a healthcare startup in one of the world’s toughest markets?I...
From Impossible to Obvious: OpenStar’s Fast-Track Approach to Fusion
25 Mar 2025
Contributed by Lukas
What does it take to achieve nuclear fusion in less time than it takes to build a traditional power plant prototype? In this episode of Wild ...
Breaking barriers in neurotechnology: The future of brain-computer interfaces
18 Mar 2025
Contributed by Lukas
How do you take a scientific hunch and turn it into a breakthrough that could change medicine forever?In this episode of Wild Hearts, we sit ...
REPLAY: Changing the conversation on sexual wellness with Lucy Wark, founder of Normal (live Sunrise edition)
11 Mar 2025
Contributed by Lukas
In this episode we cover:✅Challenges of creating a hardware product✅Helping people overcome shame and stigma✅Building a brand beyond a ...
Scaling Chaos: The Wild Ride of Clutch with Annabel Hay
04 Mar 2025
Contributed by Lukas
What happens when a 10-second TikTok video changes everything overnight? For Annabelle Hay, co-founder and CEO of CLUTCH, it meant selling ou...
Betting Big: How Armina Rosenberg is Reshaping Investing with AI
25 Feb 2025
Contributed by Lukas
What happens when artificial intelligence isn't just assisting—but reshaping—the world of investment?In this episode of Wild Hearts, we c...
The Future of Product Management: AI, Efficiency & Leverage with Matt Hinds
18 Feb 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Imagine being able to understand your customers better than ever before—instantly. That’s the promise of AI-powered product management. ...
Winning Against Giants: Steve Hind’s Blueprint for AI-Driven Customer Support
11 Feb 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Winning against billion-dollar incumbents isn't about money—it’s about strategy. In this episode, we talk to Steve Hind, the co-founder o...
The Future of Research: How Juno is Revolutionising Market Insights with AI
04 Feb 2025
Contributed by Lukas
How do you take a deeply human skill—asking great questions—and scale it with AI? Michelle Gilmore, co-founder and CEO of Juno, is tackli...
AI and Creativity: The Springboards.ai approach to amplifying agencies
28 Jan 2025
Contributed by Lukas
AI & Creativity: how Springboards is changing the game for agenciesWhat does it take to turn an idea into a global business in just six m...
The COO Perspective: tech, education and innovation with Stephanie Carullo
21 Jan 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Discover how Stephanie Carullo from Box and Apple, transformed education through technology. In this episode, she shares the pivotal momen...
Rockets made in Australia: Taking on the global space race with Adam Gilmour
14 Jan 2025
Contributed by Lukas
What does it take to launch Australia into the global space race? For Adam Gilmour, CEO and founder of Gilmour Space Technologies, the answer...
REPLAY | The view from the top with Flavia Nardina
08 Jan 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Join us as we dive into the archives of Wild Hearts to re-live some of our favourite episodes! Flavia is connecting everything on earth via s...
REPLAY | Fenceless Farming with Craig Piggott
01 Jan 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Join us as we dive into the archives of Wild Hearts to re-live some of our favourite episodes! Halter is a fenceless farming startup. They're...
REPLAY | Earn The Right To Exist with Tim Doyle from Eucalyptus
25 Dec 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Join us, as we dive into the Wild Hearts archives to re-live previous episodes from some of our favourite guests! Tim Doyle, co-founder of se...
Satellites and solutions: Flavia Tata Nardini's journey to solve big challenges.
17 Dec 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Building a deep-tech company like Fleet Space Technologies isn't just about the technology; it's about the people, the focus, and the visio...
Simplicity wins: the Telehealth pivot that redefined success for Heidi with Dr Thomas Kelly
10 Dec 2024
Contributed by Lukas
What happens when a founder bets everything on simplicity—and wins?🎧 Subscribe on Apple or Spotify to learn.That’s the story of ...
Scaling Joy: The Creative Vision Behind Bluey’s Universal Appeal with Joe Brumm
03 Dec 2024
Contributed by Lukas
What happens when one man’s parenting experiences become the blueprint for a global storytelling phenomenon? That’s exactly what Joe Brum...
Re-writing the rules of learning: Amber Joseph on building NextWork
26 Nov 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Amber Joseph is rewriting the rules of learning.After scaling a solo business to $700,000/year without cofounders or funding, she pivoted to...
Fuelled by failure: Liam Millward on Instant’s Rise to $100M+
19 Nov 2024
Contributed by Lukas
How do you transform a rejection into a stepping-stone for success? For Liam Millward, founder of Instant, that rejection sparked an obsess...
When technology meets tradition: how Halter is changing the future of farming - with CEO & Founder Craig Piggott.
12 Nov 2024
Contributed by Lukas
What happens when you bring innovation to the heart of traditional farming? In this episode, we sit down with Craig Piggott, CEO and Founder...
From SpaceX to Vow: Ines Lizaur’s journey of reinventing reliability across industries
05 Nov 2024
Contributed by Lukas
How do you go from launching reusable rockets to pioneering cultured meat manufacturing?In this episode, Ines Lizaur, a former SpaceX enginee...
The secrets behind Canva’s relentless product growth with Head Of Product, Robert Kawalsky.
29 Oct 2024
Contributed by Lukas
With over 2000 engineers, an ever-expanding product suite, and billions of users, how does Canvacontinue launching world-class products at br...
Becoming the Healthcare Giant with Tim Doyle, Co-Founder and CEO of Eucalyptus
22 Oct 2024
Contributed by Lukas
What does it take for a startup to go from a house of brands to a healthcare powerhouse? And what changes about your leadership to get it the...
From 14K to 19M: The Rise of Leonardo AI and Its Acquisition by Canva.
15 Oct 2024
Contributed by Lukas
✨ What does it take for a startup to go from 14,000 users to 19 million in less than a year?How about being acquired by Canva within two ye...
Tracksuit’s Head of Marketing, Mikayla Hopkins on Building a High-Performing Marketing Team and Scaling with Growth
08 Oct 2024
Contributed by Lukas
What does it take to grow from one of the first hires to leading the team at one of NZ’s fastest-growing tech startups?Welcome back to our ...
Chair of Tesla, Robyn Denholm on Curiosity, Resilience, and Innovation: Lessons from the Dot-Com Bubble and Beyond
01 Oct 2024
Contributed by Lukas
What does it take to go from running a family-owned service station to being the global chair of Tesla? The answer is curiosity, courage, co...
Holly Cardew, Founder and CEO of Carted on connecting shoppers to every product on the planet
19 Dec 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Forget what you think you know about building a new e-commerce experience because Carted sees the world differently. It’s a world where the...
Tom Brunskill, Co-Founder and CEO of Forage shares lessons from closing the biggest brands in the world, reshaping employment with education, building a successful salesforce, solving the cold start problem and so much more.
21 Nov 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Reshaping education and employment, with Tom Brunskill, Co-Founder of ForageForage is on a mission to transform career education and employme...
Kiki’s co-founder and CEO, Toby Thomas-Smith describes the beginning of unlocking a new way of living, the mistakes, the deliberate design decisions, growing up with Dyslexia and so much more
31 Oct 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Unlocking a new way of living with Toby Thomas-Smith, Co-Founder of KikiKiki is on a mission to revolutionise the way we live and connect. By...
👩🎨 Dovetail's Head Of Design Lucy Denton, on design thinking, lessons from Atlassian, the “sacred rituals” of Dovetail’s design team, and so much more
22 Aug 2023
Contributed by Lukas
❤️🔥Episode 6, Season 4“Ship less, but better”, with Lucy Denton, Head of Design at Dovetail✅Lessons from working at Atlassian...
Marqo co-founder & CTO Jesse Clark, on the winners and losers of AI, searching the way we think, lessons from Amazon + Stitch Fix, defining 'developer first' and so much more
08 Aug 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Searching the way we think with Jesse Clark, co-founder of Marqo✅Lessons from working at Stitch Fix and Amazon✅What it means to be truly ...
🤓 EdApp founder, Darren Winterford on selling education around the world from day 1, measuring the magic moment, the journey through product-market fit and so much more.
25 Jul 2023
Contributed by Lukas
EdApp is changing workplace education and training with accessible and engaging mobile learning which leverages microlearning and gamificatio...
🔒 SafeStack co-founder & CEO Laura Bell Main, a masterclass storyteller who shares how AI is evolving cyber threats, a step by step guide to protecting your software borders and the power of authenticity in community-building
11 Jul 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Welcome back to another episode of Wild Hearts. One Blackbird described this week's episode as ‘My favourite episode yet. Laura is incredib...
Operator series, Eucalyptus CCO Joe Harris on lessons scaling Eucalyptus as the Head of Growth, key metrics that guide decisions, frameworks for leading future legendary growth leads and so much more.
27 Jun 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Lessons on Scaling Eucalyptus as Head of Growth and frameworks for leadership with CCO, Joe Harris. A layer-by-layer framework for building y...
🧩 Partly co-founder Levi Fawcett on lessons from Rocket Lab, frameworks over processes and the step-by-step guide to building a marketplace
13 Jun 2023
Contributed by Lukas
The step-by-step guide to building a marketplace with Levi Fawcett, Co-Founder of Partly. How making mistakes can lead to finding the right...
Changing the conversation on sexual wellness with Lucy Wark, founder of NORMAL (Live Sunrise edition)
13 Dec 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Changing the conversation on sexual wellness with Lucy Wark, founder of Normal (live Sunrise edition)✅Challenges of creating a hardware pro...
The tipping point of believability with Freya Berwick & Mary Minas, co-founders of Sense Of Self
22 Nov 2022
Contributed by Lukas
The tipping point of believability with Mary Minas and Freya Berwick, co-founders of Sense Of Self✅How to build an audience before launchin...
Transforming the world’s experience of work with Samantha Gadd, co-founder of Excellent
25 Oct 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Transforming the world’s experience of work with Samantha Gadd, co-founder of Excellent✅How expectations of employees have evolved✅Bein...
Building a 100 year company with Ross Chaldecott, co-founder of Kinde
11 Oct 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Building a 100 year company with Ross Chaldecott, co-founder of KindeLessons from Atlassian, Campaign Monitor & ShopifyHow to approach bu...
Unleashing your Zilla with Hartley Pike, co-founder of Sitemate
27 Sep 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Unleashing your Zilla with Hartley Pike, co-founder of Sitemate✅ Lessons from the Startmate Accelerator: “The incline on the learning cur...
Unlocking the capacity of human minds with Duncan Anderson, co-founder of Edrolo
13 Sep 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Unlocking the capacity of human minds with Duncan Anderson, co-founder of Edrolo✅Why unlocking the capacity of students could fundamentally...
Bioprinting Human Cells in 3D with Dr Cameron Ferris & Dr Aidan O’Mahony, co-founders of Inventia
30 Aug 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Inventia’s mission is to scale the creation of human tissue. This startup is creating some of the most powerful tools for advanced medical ...
A Managing Masterclass with Lauren Humphrey, co-founder of The Mintable
16 Aug 2022
Contributed by Lukas
A Managing Masterclass with Lauren Humphrey, co-founder of The Mintable The 5 dimensions of great people management Why soft skills are key (...
Building Magical Products with Jarrod Webb, Founder of Blinq
02 Aug 2022
Contributed by Lukas
S3 E1: Key Insights Covered 🧚♂️✅ Jarrod’s best operating lessons at UberEats.✅ Why product-market fit is the fundamentally wr...
Helping a Million Lives a Day at harrison.ai with Dr. Aengus Tran and Samantha Wong
15 Dec 2021
Contributed by Lukas
Harrison.ai is partnering with leading healthcare companies to build AI products at never-before-seen speeds in the industry 🤓“If you lo...
Supercharging Engineers with Dale Brett from FL0 & Tom Humphrey
09 Nov 2021
Contributed by Lukas
FL0 supercharges back-end engineers with the power of a low-code format, letting developers build 20x faster. The team is pioneering a new ca...
Creating happy, high-performing teams with Lauren Peate & Samantha Wong
12 Oct 2021
Contributed by Lukas
Building the best teams of the future means celebrating the silent heroes who hold teams together, understanding who isn’t receiving the su...
Building Dream Teams at the Frontier of Food - Pt. 2 With Vow
24 Aug 2021
Contributed by Lukas
Welcome to the second coming of Vow! Today, we speak with George Peppou and Tim Noakesmith, co-founders of Vow, as well as Ellen Dinsmoor, Vo...
Earn The Right To Exist (Pt.2) with Tim Doyle & Nick Crocker
14 Jul 2021
Contributed by Lukas
Welcome back to Season Two of the Wild Hearts podcast. To kick off the season, we’re speaking to our very first guest on this podcast: Tim ...
Cultivating The Best with Culture Amp
16 Dec 2020
Contributed by Lukas
In the midst of a global pandemic, company culture has never been more important. Teams are spread out over countries and cities, navigating ...
Fenceless Farming with Halter's Craig Piggott & Rocket Lab's Peter Beck
02 Dec 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Halter is a fenceless farming startup. They're creating mind control technology for cows. An engineer by trade and dairy farmer by birth, Hal...
The Epicentre For Startup Ambition with Startmate
18 Nov 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Startmate is the epicentre for startup ambition across Australia and New Zealand. Over the last decade, they’ve built a community of the mo...
Finding the Magic in Banking with Up
04 Nov 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Up is a unique bank. As the first digital bank in Australia, they launched with a team of less than 30 people. They’ve since upended expect...
Detecting Disease with Vexev
21 Oct 2020
Contributed by Lukas
“How can we have the biggest impact globally?”Vascular disease is the leading cause of death worldwide. Currently symptoms do not appear ...
Fulfilling Solar's Destiny with SunDrive
07 Oct 2020
Contributed by Lukas
SunDrive is a solar technology company aiming to create low cost, energy efficient and more material abundant solar cells.“We are in a very...
Above Water with FreightFish
16 Sep 2020
Contributed by Lukas
FreightFish is a New Zealand-based autonomous hydrofoil shipping company that aims to create a third option beyond the long wait of tradition...
Making user researchers feel like superheroes with Dovetail
02 Sep 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Dovetail was founded three years ago by CEO Benjamin Humphrey, and CTO Brad Ayers, who met working at Atlassian. They founded Dovetail on the...
AI is Saving Lives with See-Mode
19 Aug 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Today, See-Mode have announced their Series A funding led by MassMutual Ventures. This is the second time Blackbird has invested and partner ...
The Founding Story of Blackbird with Niki, Rick, Mike Cannon-Brookes & Hunter
04 Aug 2020
Contributed by Lukas
We’ve just announced our fourth fund of $500M.And so today we are going to do a deep dive into Blackbird’s founding story.The very first ...
Future-Proof Workspaces with Alex & Luke
28 Jul 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Future-Proof Workplaces with Alex & Luke from XY SenseIn 2016, Melbourne-based entrepreneurs, Alex Birch, and Luke Murray decided to star...
How to Hire the Best with Kate Glazebrook and Khyati Sundaram
07 Jul 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Hiring is the most important decision a company makes.Any company is only as great as the people building it. But, bias in hiring decisions c...
Rediscovering Mission with Michael Fox
23 Jun 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Co-founder of Shoes of Prey has started a new company, Fable.Fable sells braised beef. With one caveat, the main ingredient is shiitake mushr...
Changing the Food Game with George & Tim
09 Jun 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Vow's mission is building a better food system with more delicious, sustainable, equitable and interesting options. They are resurrecting pas...
The View From The Top with Flavia Tata Nardini
25 May 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Flavia is connecting everything on earth via sending toaster sized satellites into low earth orbit. In the second episode of Wild Hearts, hos...
Earn The Right To Exist with Tim Doyle
11 May 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Tim Doyle, co-founder of seed-stage company Eucalyptus, has spent $35M across political campaigns, mattresses and now healthcare. Before Euca...
The wildest of ideas, right at the beginning
29 Apr 2020
Contributed by Lukas
A preview of what's to come.Wild Hearts is a podcast dedicated to sharing the real stories of founders - the passionate few taking giant leap...