The third Early‑Stage Growth workshop focuses on Experimentation & Validation, with leaders sharing insights on testing strategies.

The 2026 BEDA Pathfinder Early-Stage Growth Workshop series is a structured immersion of 4 x one hour workshops designed to help early-stage businesses strengthen their strategic foundations, prioritise growth opportunities, and build the capability needed to scale with confidence.

This new workshop series features inspiring local industry business leaders whose role is to share real examples of how they have navigated strategic approaches and challenges.

The third workshop in this Early-Stage Growth series has a particular focus on Experimentation & Validation. Our highly successful industry leaders featuring on this panel will be sharing insights around experiments and strategic testing.

 

KEY TAKEAWAYS

This workshop involves:

• A practical, evidence-based session where businesses design and test growth experiments to validate customer needs and refine their value proposition.

This workshop is ideal for: Participants who are owners/MDs of businesses with $500k-$1.5M revenue and 5-20 staff across sectors including manufacturing, professional services, retail, hospitality, and tech. They are past the survival stage but hitting growth ceilings. These businesses need strategic frameworks, not startup advice.

 

This Panel Session will be facilitated by Dr Sam Bucolo (Spark Consultants), with our industry leader panellists to be announced soon.

Facilitator Dr Sam Bucolo:

Dr Sam Bucolo (Spark Consultants) is an experienced business advisor and innovation leader with over 30 years supporting SMEs to strengthen competitiveness, unlock growth opportunities, and build the capability needed to scale. His career spans senior roles across industry, government, academia, and the not-for-profit sector, giving him a unique ability to translate strategy into practical execution. Sam has held Professorial and University Leadership roles at UTS and QUT, establishing major research centres and cross-industry innovation programs. As Chair of the Australian Design Council, he leads national efforts to embed design-led innovation across business and government.

 

Panellist: Llew Jury

Llew is the Chairman of Sprint Ventures, a Queensland based VC with two funds and 18 portfolio companies. He is the Managing Director of Advancer, a leading AI Agency based in Brisbane with national clients and is the founder and presenter of Zero Shot, the AI Podcast that brings anti-hype AI insights to growth businesses.

Between 2006 and 2016, Llew was the Founder and Managing Director of The Reload Group, one of Australia’s largest digital & eCommerce marketing agencies. Llew built the Reload business to 90 staff and 300 clients located in offices throughout Brisbane, London and Manila. From 2016 to 2022 as Chair, he oversaw the global governance function and Reload’s sale to Hardie Grant Media.

From 1999 to 2006 Llew was co-Founder of leading Queensland web, eCommerce and digital agency Alfresco, that was sold to a consortium led by the ASX listed STW Group.

Llew has held positions with River City Labs as Entrepreneur in Residence and Mentor, and is a program mentor for Co Spaces.

 

Panellist: Dr James Fielding

Dr James Fielding is a medical doctor, entrepreneur and the CEO & Co-Founder of Audeara Limited, an ASX-listed hearing health technology company redefining how people experience sound. He has founded five companies across medical devices, robotics engineering, consumer products and health technology, building ventures from concept through to commercialisation and scale.

After studying biomedical science and business management at The University of Queensland, James worked in finance and public relations in New York before returning to complete medicine. While practising as a junior doctor, he began experimenting with early medical device concepts that would later evolve into scalable ventures. In 2016, he stepped away from full-time clinical practice to focus on building Audeara.

Under his leadership, Audeara has progressed from prototype and pilot testing to national distribution, international expansion and ASX listing in 2021. Along the journey, the company has completed several key pivots — evolving from an own-brand consumer product strategy to global licensing, embedded technology partnerships and expanded med-tech capability. Through targeted capability bolt-ons and strategic collaborations, Audeara has remained nimble, adapting to partnership opportunities while strengthening its core IP and commercial position.

James is passionate about experimentation as a growth discipline — running pilots before committing capital, validating demand before scaling, and treating failure as data. He brings practical insights into navigating the shift from startup survival to structured, strategic growth.