Six weeks, then a room full of investors.

Partnership case studies

Toyota Community Trust: FutureHack across four regions

The challenge

Toyota Community Trust wanted to reach young people in the regions, not the ones already sitting in accelerators and university programs. Regional young people are three times more likely to be unemployed than their metro peers, and more than half the students we work with are on track to leave school before Year 12. Opportunities like this rarely arrive where they live.

The original plan was a single Innovation Summit in Newcastle for 50 to 100 students. Co-funding from Toyota Community Trust turned that regional plan into a national one.

What we did

FutureHack ran in two stages across Newcastle, Geelong, Goondiwindi and Logan.

The first stage was a full-day, inter-school Innovation Summit. 120 students came together in Geelong and 50 in Newcastle, meeting peers from other schools for the first time. The day centred on a six-hour hackathon where students identified a real problem in their own community, then worked through entrepreneur-led workshops on ideation, design thinking, business modelling and pitching. It closed with a live showcase.

The second stage was the six-week FutureHack program, taking students from a raw idea to a fully pitched business. Teams formed across schools and worked through a business model canvas, prototype development and testing, and refining their value proposition. Each week they joined two-hour workshops and hour-long mentorship sessions with entrepreneurs, angel investors and CEOs.

Top teams pitched at the National Finale to a panel from Microsoft, Toyota Community Trust and Startmate.

The outcome

Over 180 high school students, aged 16-18, took part across 12 schools in four regions.

Understanding of the skills a startup demands went from 34% to 70% in Geelong, and from 53% to 92% across the six-week cohort. 5% of students had met an angel investor before the program. 83% had by the end.

Two ventures took the top awards and $1,000 microgrants each. PEETA, built by Ashutosh Vaitha, is an augmentative communication tool inspired by his non-verbal brother Vishan. Stulete, built by Ashley, is a sport-to-life pathways platform.

The reach went past the students. The Geelong Advertiser ran a double-page spread. Jacob, 17, travelled nine hours by train from Goondiwindi to attend the Newcastle Summit, crossing a state border to get there. He said afterwards it was worth every second. His participation prompted the Goondiwindi Chamber of Commerce to approach us about a permanent innovation hub in the town.

What's next

We are expanding to seven cities by 2027, including Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, Newcastle, Geelong, Toowoomba and Goondiwindi. Corporate partnership is what funds free delivery in regional and low-income communities, and we are looking for partners who want that reach.