Latest updates for ANZ sales professionals
PayPal deployed Salesforce Agentforce across 200 reps, targeting leads no human would touch. The AI SDR runs 10-nudge cadences on 8,000 dropped merchants monthly. Meeting conversions are up 50% in 14 weeks.
Adobe walked away from planned Creative Cloud price increases worth $500m ARR in H2 FY2026. The company that raised prices every year for the past decade just blinked. Enterprise renewals still getting the full increase, but consumer and SMB tier pricing power is gone. Canva at $4b ARR, Figma at $1.2b, and free Affinity changed the math.
Former NASA deputy administrator and Space Shuttle commander Pam Melroy joins Gilmour Space's board. The Queensland rocket builder hit unicorn status in January after a $217M Series E led by government fund NRFC and Hostplus. Worth noting: this is governance hire, not go-to-market.
Jason Lemkin's team strangled their pitch deck grader by adding too many rules. The lesson: over-guardrailing kills agents as fast as under-guardrailing. Meanwhile, their AI VP of Finance found an 8-year-old settings mistake and an agent now negotiates vendor contracts.
The NSW Budget allocated nearly $80 million for innovation and tech startups through its Innovation Blueprint, but the word 'startups' does not appear in the document. The state leads ANZ startup funding at 41%, yet the budget's focus on payroll tax increases and property revenue decline reveals how government priorities translate to policy language.
Sydney health firm faces Federal Court action over sales team posing as medical professionals to sell programs worth up to $7,500. ACCC alleges scripted fear tactics, refund denials, and unfair contract terms affected 6,000+ Australians between 2022 and 2025.
Erica Berchtold, David Jones CCO since May 2025, takes the top job at Australia's oldest department store. She replaces Scott Fyfe at a legacy retailer facing pressure from online competitors and specialist fashion brands. Worth noting: David Jones trades from 30+ stores but was sold for ~US$100M in 2023, down from A$2.1B in 2014.
David Fairfull, founder of Sydney AI-marketing startup Metigy, sentenced to 9 years for misleading investors and misusing $7.7m in company funds to buy property. The platform raised $39m on AI claims that the ex-CFO says never existed. Worth noting for sales teams: the red flags were visible during the raises.
Denise Persson runs a 700-person marketing org at Snowflake and stopped logging into dashboards. She asks her data questions directly, gets answers in real time, and cut cost per opportunity by 30% in six months. The shift killed the sales-marketing data war and changed who she hires.
Federal government revises capital gains tax proposal after founders warned the policy would double exit tax rates and push investment offshore. Small businesses with turnover under $10 million keep the 50% discount. New carve-out coming for innovative firms, details still unclear.
New Side Stage Ventures data shows Australia is the world's fastest-growing venture ecosystem since 2016, up 13.7x. The reality for sales teams: early-stage funding has dropped every year since 2021, and founders now raise 41% of seed capital from overseas, double the US rate. That means fewer SDR and AE roles at the earliest stages.
Labor's new CGT carve-outs for startups still leave equity comp less attractive than overseas markets. Founders say the changes won't stop commercial talent heading offshore. The concern: if equity upside gets taxed harder, ANZ startups can't compete on total comp.