Entrepreneurial journey told by eight students
Story written by Terry Guo
“Ever since I was a 12-year-old, the entrepreneurial spirit ran deep in my veins. Growing up in a family where both my parents were entrepreneurs, business discussions were as common as dinner table talk. I’d often discuss the ups and downs, risks, and rewards with my father, absorbing every lesson he’d share. This inquisitiveness led me to pursue a Bachelor in Digital and Creative Enterprise Management at UTS, equipping me with a diverse set of skills that would become the cornerstone of my future endeavors. My journey took an unexpected turn when, while working at my mother’s event venue. I encountered a glaring gap in the rental industry. Frustrated with unresponsive lenders, outdated booking systems, and a skewed focus on big corporate clients, an idea began to form. And that’s how Gecko was born in 2019 – a revolutionary platform that aimed to redefine the rental experience which not only enhanced the experience for borrowers but also unlocked new revenue streams for small rental businesses. However, like any entrepreneurial journey, mine was not without its fair share of trials. Our initial model, inspired by giants like Uber and Airbnb, missed the mark when it came to low-cost items. But failure has a way of teaching lessons no success can. I realized the importance of aligning product needs with customer interests and took a bold step back, reimagining Gecko’s strategy. The result? A more mature platform launched in 2022, optimized for the event space market, and driven by cutting-edge SEO and SaaS technologies. Financing this dream wasn’t easy. The initial phases were powered by my personal savings and contributions from close family and friends. There’s a certain responsibility that comes with using your own capital; it pushes you to make every penny count. This bootstrapped phase, although challenging, gave Gecko the tenacity to not just weather the pandemic storm but to thrive amidst it, capitalizing on the booming rental demand. In retrospect, my journey with Gecko is a testament to starting small and scaling up. It’s about understanding that not just keeping busy, but the decisions you make, shape the course of your entrepreneurial story. Balancing work and life, making informed choices, and relying on both intuition and analysis have been crucial to Gecko’s success. And as I stand here today, at the helm of a company that recently secured significant funding, I can’t help but think back to that 12-year-old kid with dreams of entrepreneurship. To all the budding entrepreneurs out there, remember, it’s the journey, with all its highs and lows, that makes the destination worthwhile.”
Story written by Ruihu Liang
In the world of number, there’s a formula for everything. But life? Not so much. I spent years in a corporate accounting role, but the job was as inspiring as a blank Excel sheet. I knew I needed a change, something that would not just pay the bills but also ignite my passion. The turning point came unexpectedly. While helping out at my mom’s event venue, I was struck by the glaring inefficiencies in the rental process. That’s when the idea for Gecko hit me. Why not apply the peer-to-peer model of Uber and Airbnb to rentals? It seemed like a simple enough equation: connect renters with providers through an easy-to-use platform.
I dove headfirst into creating Gecko, armed with enthusiasm but lacking in technical expertise. My initial model was ambitious but flawed. I had underestimated the complexities of the rental industry—things like contract negotiations, inventory management, and customer service. It was a humbling experience, to say the least. So, I took a step back to reassess. I needed to offer more than just connections; I needed to provide solutions. That led to my decision to pivot Gecko into a hybrid model, combining a marketplace with Software as a Service (SaaS) features. This hybrid approach aimed to simplify the rental industry by addressing its inherent inefficiencies and complexities. It was a gamble, but one that I was willing to take.
Financing this dream was another hurdle. I started by bootstrapping, using my own funds to maintain full control. But as Gecko grew, so did its financial demands. I had to adapt. I secured a small round of funds from trusted family and friends, which became a lifeline during the COVID. Now, you might think that with external funding, I’d go on a spending spree. But no, I remained committed to judicious fund allocation. I’ve seen too many startups burn through their capital without achieving sustainable growth. I’ve always believed in smart growth, using venture capital as a support mechanism rather than a “steroid” for rapid, unsustainable expansion.
Entrepreneurship is a complex equation, one that requires more than just a good idea. It demands the courage to pivot, and the innovate adaptively. And while the path has been anything but linear, the experience has been invaluable. I’ve traded my spreadsheets for a startup, and I couldn’t be happier with the sum of my choices.
Story written by Leo Lin
My journey with Gecko’s business idea was generated when I was still working with my Mom at an event venue for wedding planning and catering to clients. My job is to rent event-related types of equipment such as speakers, microphones, lights, and smoke machines from different rental businesses. I found out it was not easy to get in touch with these business providers, they often did not answer calls and online booking wasn’t available since there were no integrated platforms or resources I could access. Once I got in touch with them, the majority of responses were quote-based or under-email requests. Rental businesses are struggling to make money since they primarily focus on large corporate clients and neglecting smaller rentals. Moreover, traditional approaches to connect customers to business take time to communicate, and customers were frustrated with getting responses. I ask myself why there is no one-stop integrated platform that connects rental business providers and customers in a more efficient way.
Therefore, Gecko, is my answer to the question, a painkiller to both businesses and clients. On Gecko, customers can easily find the available equipment they need including detailed information like size and capabilities and make booking instantly. Gecko is not only a marketplace but also a SaaS for rental business. A more centralized system and information processing system allowed the business holder to boost their revenue and offer add-ons, referrals or other extra services via Gecko.
Making this business is never an easy task, We aim to create a peer-to-peer marketplace, like Air Tasker, and Gumtree. Their business model provides us with a good reference for how to make it successful. However, the market feedback helps us pivot from such a business idea to a more niche market. Rental business unlike buying, is a more complex process including returning, insurance etc. Peer-to-peer solutions may not satisfy their need and the journey experiences for renting wouldn’t be guaranteed. From our market feedback, we also found out about 80% of rentals are for event space. Then we decided to concentrate on this area instead of broad platforms with multiple customer segments.
Creating Gecko is absolutely one of the best decisions I have made. I enjoy being an entrepreneur and the journey from 0 to 1 is essential for my personal growth. As a startup, delegation is important, and that’s all about recognizing strengths and weaknesses. Choosing the right partner and starting small is crucial for a startup. I worked with several CTOs for tech solutions in our business before and try to work with people and you might find the right person throughout daily tasks. Startup is a learning process and I learned many new things from my past experiences and now every day. Keep exploring and maintaining enthusiasm is fundamental to success.
Story written by Hamish McAinsh
I’m lucky, a lot of people don’t know what they want to do with their life, but when I was twelve,
I thought about all the jobs that I could do. Both of my parents are entrepreneurs and I talked
with my dad about the benefits and challenges of working for someone else or being an
entrepreneur, he said “It’s very challenging” but he seemed to be just fine, and I think that’s
when I knew I wanted to be an entrepreneur.
Growing up I was always entrepreneurial, on my way to school I would go to coles and buy a box of 20 packets of chips for about $5 and then resell each packet for $1, however, I got really hungry after school, and I’d just end up eating them.
After high school, I still knew that I wanted to pursue entrepreneurship and I saw that the University of Sydney Technology offered a degree in Digital and Creative Enterprise Management and it seemed really interesting. I loved my time at university and I spent a lot of my time at the UTS Startups hub, plugging away.
The idea for Gecko came about when I was working for my mum, who owned a venue in Sydney, my job was to go and rent out speakers, lights, microphones and other items, but the process was so frustrating, there would be this whole back and forth process and that was frustrating for the seller and the buyer and I thought that there had to be a better way of doing this, so I started working on Gecko.
I made some mistakes in the beginning but I’m better for it and I’ve learnt a lot from them. I think that’s really important in entrepreneurship, especially in early-stage startups like us. I actually think, I know it’s controversial, that the aim for start-ups shouldn’t be to make a profit, I mean, you should aim to prove that the model works and that the unit economics are good, and thankfully, Gecko works.
These days, I’ll admit that I’m more stressed, but I was out for dinner with a friend the other day and they asked me “If someone offered you $5 million tomorrow to step away from Gecko, would you take it?”. I don’t think I would, firstly, because I believe that we’ll be worth way more than that, and also because if someone was to give me $5 million, I’d just go and build another Gecko, and I like the one I have already.
Story written by Lili Shen
Prior to the pandemic, I quit my well-paid accounting job that I worked for nearly 2 years. It might sound weird that I did not feel risky and insecure at the time. In fact, I felt a sense of relief and I didn’t feel lost but had a clearer goal – to start a real business by myself. I guess I have long dreamed of being an entrepreneur and this desire is perhaps deeply rooted in my soul. Both parents were entrepreneurs and ran their own businesses. I believe I am gifted by them for their unique entrepreneurial DNA. Also, growing up in this environment made me feel detached from working for others, but enthusiastic about entrepreneurship. In the days of being an accountant, I was not passionate about this career. I felt bored and realized I learned nothing valuable. This sense of job burnout prompted me to believe that maybe I should pursue what I really love -entrepreneurship. So, I took the path of looking for new opportunities to have my own business. The business opportunity was discovered through my experience of working for my mother’s event corporation, where I realized that there is a lack of a marketplace that can provide convenient and efficient rental services. Therefore, I saw this opportunity and grasped it, where the dream of Gecko started. I was thinking of creating a Peer-to-Peer online website that eliminates the back-and-forth between renter and lender. I raised my start-up capital with the support of friends and family after I had a clear business direction. The journey of turning my dream into a reality was loaded with challenges, but I am still filled with passion and motivation. My resilience and belief allowed me to overcome all difficulties. To this day, Gecko is already a small firm that operates with the joint efforts of a team of 6. I really enjoyed working and overcoming challenges with this small team every day, where I believe that through continuous learning and growth, we learn from failures for the growth of Gecko. I believe we will bring more innovation and value to Gecko. Every challenge is an opportunity for growth, and every failure is an accumulation of experience. I am full of confidence in each day ahead, taking on new challenges and living bigger dreams.
Story written by Tai Tai
I always wanted to be an entrepreneur. Growing up, I was surrounded by the stories of my parents’ entrepreneurship journey in the business world, which planted the seeds of entrepreneurship in my heart.
Small businesses before the age of 18 gave me a practical understanding of the fundamental principles of entrepreneurship. From selling potato chips to reselling overseas souvenirs for a profit, these experiences may not be serious entrepreneurship, but they laid the foundation for my entrepreneurial career.
When I chose major of college, my passion for entrepreneurship was unwavering. Despite my father’s cautionary tales about the hardships of entrepreneurs, I was determined to forge my own path. My heart urged me forward, whispering that I could succeed just as my parents had.
My journey of becoming an entrepreneur is not without hesitation and uncertainty. After graduating, I found a well-paying job at a major accounting firm, but the monotony kept me from being fulfilled. I realized that money should not be the only driving force behind starting a business, there has to be something more from the passion.
Therefore, I decided to take this step of officially starting a business. I was driven down the entrepreneurial path by a desire to create something impactful and innovative. Little did I know, this path would lead me to the birth of the gecko.
An accidental challenge of renting event equipment inspired my entrepreneurial journey. Frustration with quote-based systems and a lack of online options has left this market in need of innovation. An opportunity lay before me, an opportunity to disrupt the rental industry and make life easier for small customers who want to rent.
Gecko was born out of this experience—a platform that combines the convenience of marketplaces with the efficiency of Shopify. However, a wrong understanding of customer needs made the original peer-to-peer model fail. Fortunately, I embraced the lean startup model and quickly pivoted to niche event space, which accounted for over 80% of leasing demand. The journey has been full of ups and downs, but the lessons learned in constantly adjusting based on market feedback have been invaluable.
In the entrepreneurial world, it’s easy to be limited by financial goals. However, I came to realize that early success lies in achieving perfect product-market fit. It’s not about a race to break even, it’s about crafting a solution that users actually love.
Today, as I look back on my journey, I realize the importance of continuous improvement and learning from failure. Not only have I grown as an entrepreneur, but as a person who continually optimizes through discovery and feedback. Delegation has become an important part of my entrepreneurial philosophy and I realize how powerful a team can be.
Despite many paradoxes and tensions, my story is a testament to the power of dreams, the lessons of failure, and the unyielding drive to create something that matters. This is the story of Benjamin Kennedy and the Gecko—a story that is still unfolding, one innovative step at a time.
Story written by Wenshuang Wang
“I’ve always been intrigued by entrepreneurship. Pre-18, I sold notes and snacks at school, gaining business insights and profit understanding. Growing up with entrepreneurial parents further fueled my interest, leading me to major in entrepreneurship in college.”
A few years ago, my mother and I worked at “simmer on the bay”, an event venue located under the Sydney Harbour Bridge. My job is to rent all kinds of equipment for corporate clients and wedding planners, such as lights, microphones, smoke machines and more. But rental companies often don’t answer the phone and can’t book online. Even if they answered the phone, they would ask me to send them an email with information about the product they needed, and in the end I would have to wait a long time before they would give me a quote. This kind of ineffective back and forth communication is really a waste of time.
I wanted to do a rental platform that could combine marketplaces and something like shopify. We allow customers to immediately view and order what they need, and the platform also displays information on size compatibility and delivery options. This will eliminate a lot of ineffective communication. After talking it over with my parents, I decided to quit the accounting firm where I worked and start my own business. Because I found my previous job a bit boring.
I used personal savings and borrowed from family and friends to kickstart my venture. With limited tech knowledge as a business student, I connected through friends and recruited skilled technical talents who became our CTOs. We also brought on a cost-effective Indian developer. However, we soon recognized our approach needed refinement. While initially aiming for a peer-to-peer platform like Uber and Airbnb, we found renting posed greater complexities. Peer-to-peer interactions were less user-friendly than traditional rentals. We pivoted, concentrating on the event space niche, relaunching the platform in 2022.
We all agree that not everything needs an app. Application development should be strategic. At Gecko,SEO plays an important role. I think in the tech startup space, the main goal is not necessarily to break even or generate immediate profits, the focus should be on verifying whether our concept works. Our goal is to achieve steady growth every week. I think I prioritize product and market fit. This is important. Set a long-term goal and break it down into shorter, three-month goals.
Our company is getting better and we expect to shift our focus to referrals in the coming months.”
Story written by Hongteng Xiang
As the founder of Gecko, I am deeply grateful for every factor in my past life that finally brought me here.
I worked in various small businesses before officially getting into entrepreneurship. Now imagine this: Even before I was eighteen, I had started trying out some careers that I affectionately called my “cool things.” It includes everything from selling chips for a small markup to handing over souvenirs of trips abroad to my friends. I even started trading my HSC notes on online forums.
While these may not have been groundbreaking startups, they were my training ground for mastering fundamental business principles, profit margins, and the art of effective marketing. Through these “cool things,” I mastered the four key steps of innovation—asking, observing, experimenting, and making connections. These became my superpowers for discovering new opportunities.
Now let’s talk about family influence. Growing up in an entrepreneurial family further shaped my perspective. My parents’ stories of challenges and rewards sparked my interest in entrepreneurship. This early exposure instills perseverance and
self-efficacy, key traits of success.
Academically, my natural inclination is to pursue a BA in Entrepreneurship, which fits my interests. Combining these experiences, I honed my ability to identify opportunities through discovery and creation.
My entrepreneurial journey has been characterized by a firm start, continuous improvement, difficult decisions, and unwavering ambition. The idea behind my startup, Gecko, came from a chapter in my life when I worked with my mom on
“Simmer on the Bay”. It’s an event venue that confronts me with the complexities of event management. The experience sparked the idea for Gecko, a marketplace and Shopify-like rental platform that simplifies the process for customers. Based on market feedback, we shifted from a peer-to-peer model to a niche market (event space). This shift improves user satisfaction and efficiency.
Picking the right startup is critical in the entrepreneurial process, and I advocate building lasting companies. I emphasized self-reliance early on, relying on the founding team and family funding. This approach ensures informed and sustainable decisions that prioritize resilience, adaptability, and rapid product-market fit.
My experiences have highlighted the ability to spot opportunities, adapt to feedback, and maintain a long-term vision. It demonstrates the harmony between personal traits, prior knowledge, and entrepreneurial theory that are critical to entrepreneurial success.