Industry leaders join forces to launch Tech Council

Tech leaders including Atlassian, Afterpay, Canva, Microsoft and Google have joined forces to form Tech Council of Australia.

The Council will be chaired by Robyn Denholm, Blackbird Ventures operating partner and Tesla Chair. It aims to deliver three crucial goals for the sector.

The first is to employ one million people by 2025. The second is grow the value of tech to the economy to $250 billion by 2030. Finally, for Australia to be the best place to start and grow a global company, making sure we keep creating more jobs and opportunity right here in Australia.

Robyn Denholm, Chair, the Tech Council of Australia, said, “With the right investment and partnership, the tech jobs opportunity can get much bigger. Since 2005, tech jobs have grown by 66%, compared to an average jobs growth rate of 27% across the economy.

“During the pandemic, the tech sector generated 65,000 jobs, one of the economy’s highest job creators,” she said.

Tech Council of Australia engaged Accenture to conduct research on the state of the sector and market outlook. The Australian technology industry is generating $167 billion in output per year and employing 861,000 Australians, according to the report. 

The tech sector has already been critical to managing Australia’s COVID-19 response. As the pandemic forced businesses and everyday Australians into lockdown, software and cloud service adoption by businesses and workers helped avoid total economic shutdown and enable critical services across major sectors.

“While we have a lot of uncertainty across the rest of the economy, technology has succeeded despite this uncertainty. It contributed $167bn to the economy in FY21, or 8.5% of GDP. Crucially, it is an enabler of all other sectors, helping mining, agriculture, banking and health drive new growth and productivity,” Denholm said.

“As we rebuild our economy in the years ahead, technology has the potential to expand and create great jobs for our kids and grandkids. Near term, by 2030, the technology sector has the potential to contribute more to GDP than either primary industries or manufacturing.”

Kate Pounder, CEO of the Tech Council, wants to ensure all Australians are fully aware of the opportunities to access jobs in the sector.  “The boom in tech-related jobs means there are now more software engineers and developers in Australia than hairdressers, plumbers or high school teachers. That’s 1 in 16 working Australians.”

“Workers in our sector can be found all across the country. Tech workers are most likely to live in Western Sydney and Melbourne’s outer suburbs because of their housing affordability, with Southeast Queensland actually fastest growing area for tech jobs.

“This is especially important given the diversity of companies in the tech sector including 35,200 sole traders, 26,100 businesses with fewer than 20 employees and 100 large firms of 200+ employees,” Pounder said.

The Tech Council’s board includes: Scott Farquhar, Co-CEO, Atlassian (Director);  Anthony Eisen, Co-founder and Co-CEO, Afterpay (Director); Cliff Obrecht, Co-founder and COO, Canva (Director);  Mina Radhakrishnan, CEO, :Different (Director); Didier Elzinga, CEO, Culture Amp (Director); Wyatt Roy, Former Federal Minister (Executive Director); Kate Jones, Former Queensland Minister (Executive Director);   Alex McCauley, former CEO, StartupAus (Executive Director); Kate Pounder, CEO, Tech Council of Australia.

Founding members of the Tech Council are: 99designs; Afterpay; Airtasker; Airtree; Atlassian; Blackbird; Capital [b]; Canva; Culture Amp; Deputy; :Different; Google Australia; HealthEngine; LiveTiles; Main Sequence; Megaport; Microsoft Australia; Our Innovation Fund; Redbubble; SafetyCulture; Sonder; Square Peg; Stripe Australia and Tyro.

Image credit: ©stock.adobe.com/au/alphaspirit