This article is a branded editorial feature highlighting Australian tech strategists helping organisations drive long-term innovation and digital growth.
Technology is no longer just supporting business strategy; it’s also shaping it.
Across Australia, a new generation of tech leaders is helping organisations navigate change, embrace artificial intelligence, and rethink how innovation creates long-term value. From founders building AI-powered platforms to consultants guiding digital transformation and business owners solving complex operational challenges with emerging technologies, these strategists are influencing the way Australian businesses adapt and compete.
In this feature, we highlight some of Australia’s leading tech strategists, whose work is helping businesses harness technology with purpose and positioning Australia at the forefront of the next wave of digital innovation.
Sam Robertson
Over his career in technology, Sam Robertson has worked closely with C-suite leaders across some of Australia’s best-known brands, helping them navigate major technology decisions. What he noticed was a pattern that has only become more obvious in the AI era: most organisations struggle with implementation.
That observation became the foundation of Amavis.ai, the consultancy Sam launched to help businesses move beyond curiosity and start using AI in ways that create tangible value. Rather than focusing on abstract strategy or future predictions, the company concentrates on practical adoption: helping teams understand where AI fits, what problems it can solve, and how it can be integrated into everyday workflows without disrupting operations.
A defining feature of Amavis.ai is its hands-on approach. Workshops are designed around building real solutions, often using a company’s existing tools and systems, with participants leaving not just with new knowledge but with working processes and automations already in place. The focus is as much on building confidence as it is on building technology.
While many conversations remain centred on possibilities, Sam focuses on what happens after the excitement of AI discovery, and he works with organisations in the often-overlooked space between ambition and execution. His belief is that successful AI adoption is ultimately a people challenge as much as a technology one.
Through Amavis.ai, Sam is helping businesses develop the skills, systems, and practical understanding needed to turn AI from an experiment into a sustainable capability.
Yiya Sun
Some AI consultants talk almost entirely about the future. Yiya Sun spends more time talking about what happens on Monday morning.
As founder and director of Optimise AI Consulting, Yiya has built her work around a problem many businesses face: they have experimented with AI, attended workshops, even launched a few pilots, yet still do not know how to make AI useful in day-to-day operations.
Her approach sits in the gap between curiosity and implementation. Drawing on a background in business consulting and an AI strategy certification from the University of California, Berkeley, Yiya helps organisations identify practical AI use cases, compare AI ecosystems, and translate AI opportunities into workflows that improve productivity, decision-making, and operational efficiency.
A key part of her work is helping businesses adopt AI within the systems they already use. For many organisations, that means working inside the Microsoft environment or Google Workspace. Rather than encouraging clients to chase every new tool, Yiya helps them assess which technologies fit their business goals, data environment, team capability, risk profile and expected return on investment.
Yiya works across AI advisory, customised training, Microsoft-based workflow design, governance and Fractional AI Leader support. These are treated as connected parts of long-term adoption, so teams learn how to use AI, where AI fits, where it does not, and how to embed it responsibly.
Recognised in Australia’s National AI Directory and named a finalist in the 2025 Australian AI Awards, Yiya represents strategists who are focused less on AI hype and more on operational clarity, responsible adoption, and measurable business value.
Kara Bombell
As AI adoption accelerates, one question is becoming impossible for many organisations to ignore: where does their data actually go? For Kara Bombell, that concern is the foundation of responsible AI strategy.
Kara brings more than 15 years of experience leading operational transformation across major digital and creative agencies, including senior executive roles at Digitas and Isobar. Throughout her career, she has focused on helping organisations embrace change while maintaining strong governance, ethical leadership and sustainable growth. Those priorities now shape her work as co-founder of EthicAI, a consultancy helping organisations navigate AI adoption in sectors where trust, privacy and accountability are non-negotiable.
That philosophy is reflected in Selma, EthicAI’s newest innovation. Rather than relying on cloud-based AI models hosted overseas, Selma is designed to operate entirely within an organisation’s own environment. Installed on-site, trained on internal knowledge and aligned with an organisation’s values, the platform enables teams to use AI without sensitive information leaving the building. The approach is particularly relevant for government agencies, healthcare providers, legal organisations and community services that face strict privacy and regulatory obligations.
Kara’s work reflects a broader shift in the AI conversation. While much of the industry has focused on making models bigger and faster, EthicAI has concentrated on making AI more governable, transparent and practical for organisations that cannot afford to compromise on data sovereignty. As AI becomes part of everyday operations, her work highlights that long-term innovation is also about trust, ownership and building technology that organisations can confidently rely on.
Dr. Jill Rathborne
Long before AI became a boardroom obsession, Dr. Jill Rathborne was already working with systems so vast and complex that they quite literally mapped the universe.
After spending two decades as an astrophysicist analysing large-scale data and testing ideas against evidence, Jill transitioned into the world of technology and AI with a perspective that feels noticeably different from the usual innovation narrative. As founder of Amity Insights, her focus is less on chasing tools and more on helping businesses figure out what practical AI adoption actually looks like.
That distinction matters. While many organisations are experimenting with AI in isolated pockets, Jill’s work centres on the harder question: how does AI fit into the real operational life of a business? Through Amity Insights, she works across strategy, workflows, operations, and implementation, helping leadership teams identify where AI can genuinely improve decision-making, execution, and the way businesses and teams operate. Just as importantly, the work also involves identifying where AI probably shouldn’t be used at all.
Her scientific background heavily shapes the company’s approach. In astrophysics, separating signal from noise is everything, and Jill applies that same discipline to AI adoption. Rather than treating AI as a standalone technology initiative, Amity Insights approaches it as a practical business challenge involving people, workflows, systems, and long-term adaptability.
Human oversight remains central, assumptions are challenged early, and implementation is tied closely to business realities, making Amity Insights’ work stand out for its measured, systems-focused approach to helping organisations build long-term capability through the use of AI.
Jason Pye
Jason Pye has built his career around an increasingly relevant question: what does it take to make new technology actually work at scale?
Before co-founding Mode AI, Jason spent years leading large, complex operations, including serving as CEO of Trek Bicycle Corporation Australia and New Zealand. Across his career, he has overseen more than 40 retail locations, supported hundreds of wholesale partners, managed teams of more than 500 people, and helped businesses navigate periods of significant disruption. Earlier experience auditing high-scrutiny federal government departments added another layer to his skill set: disciplined analysis, operational rigour, and a practical approach to solving complex problems.
That combination of commercial leadership and technology strategy became the foundation of Mode AI, an applied AI execution firm operating across Australia and the UK. Founded in 2025, the company focuses on a challenge many organisations face as AI adoption accelerates: bridging the gap between strategy and implementation.
Rather than concentrating solely on advisory services or software products, Mode AI works across the full lifecycle of AI adoption, from strategy and governance through to application development, deployment, training, and ongoing support. The firm has already delivered projects across sectors including construction, fitness, hospitality, property, and professional services, often in environments where compliance, security, and data governance are critical considerations.
Overall, Mode AI is helping organisations move beyond experimentation and toward practical systems that become part of everyday business operations, supporting long-term innovation rather than short-term enthusiasm.
Jules Aknin and Alfred Eggo
Most investment firms are built around a financial thesis. Avangard was built around decades of independent research.
Alfred Eggo built his career turning complex data into insight. After studying geology at Victoria University of Wellington, he joined CRA (later Rio Tinto) in 1980 and went on to lead the group’s AI and machine learning research. In the early 2000s, he began applying those same techniques to financial markets, building large datasets to analyse the relationships between commodities, currencies, interest rates, and equities.
In 2017, when Alf met Jules Aknin, a French-Australian entrepreneur then running a hospitality business in East Perth and Fremantle, a conversation about technology and markets turned into a partnership. Together, the pair set out to turn Alf’s research into an institutional investment business.
Today, Avangard operates as an independent wholesale investment manager powered by A.L.F.R.E.D. (Adaptive Learning For Ranking Equities and Derivatives), a proprietary AI and machine learning system that processes over 5.5 billion data points across more than 2,500 ASX-listed securities. No analyst recommendations, market narratives, or discretionary stock picks involved. On 1 July 2026, the firm launched the Avangard Systematic Australian Equity Fund, its flagship offering for wholesale investors.
As financial markets evolve, the labeling of AI-driven, systematic approaches to investing and portfolio management as “alternative” is becoming harder to justify. For investors assessing their Australian equities exposure, this is not a departure from sound investing; it reflects where investing is heading. Built entirely in Western Australia and independently owned, Avangard is making that case one data point at a time.
Arian Mianigivi
Education is one of the sectors being reshaped most dramatically by artificial intelligence, but Arian Mianigivi believes the real opportunity is rethinking how people learn, build skills, and prepare for work in an economy where technology is changing faster than traditional training models can keep pace.
As founder and CEO of AITx Group, Arian Mianigivi draws on a background that spans technology strategy and global consulting, including roles with Deloitte and PwC. That experience exposed him to the challenges organisations face as new technologies emerge, shaping his view that education needs to evolve alongside industry rather than react to it years later.
AITx Group was established to bridge that gap. The Australian education and training provider combines nationally accredited qualifications with AI-enabled learning, helping students, schools, and organisations build practical capabilities in areas ranging from employability skills to generative AI. It’s currently the only registered training organisation in Australia offering nationally accredited courses in both Work Skills and Generative AI for Work.
At the core is a simple idea: education should be tailored to industry — increasingly, to the emerging, technology-driven industries where the jobs are being created. AITx’s Esports stream is a clear example. Students earn the same accredited Work Skills and Business qualifications through a context they’re genuinely motivated by, building career-ready skills in event management, media production, marketing and branding. For learners who’ve struggled with traditional classroom delivery, including many who are neurodivergent, that relevance can re-engage them — turning a pathway that wasn’t working into one that does.
Central to that approach is Genesie, AITx’s proprietary AI-powered learning platform built together with a Perth-based AI consultancy, JustifyAI. Rather than using AI as a novelty, the platform is designed to make education more accessible and adaptive, particularly for learners with different support needs, while also reducing the administrative burden on educators through AI-assisted content creation, planning, and governance.
By combining accredited education with responsible AI and industry-aligned training, AITx is helping create learning pathways that are designed for careers that will continue to evolve as technology does.
Blair Steenholdt
For many businesses, the challenge with new technology is knowing which technologies are actually worth implementing. Blair Steenholdt has built his career around answering that question, helping organisations cut through the noise surrounding AI and digital transformation to focus on solutions that solve genuine operational problems.
As Founder and Managing Director of Horizon Web & AI, a Western Australian technology consultancy, Blair advises business owners and leadership teams looking to modernise the way they operate. His background spans technology ventures, digital innovation and emerging technologies, giving him a practical perspective on how businesses can use automation and AI to improve efficiency without adding unnecessary complexity.
That philosophy underpins Horizon Web & AI. The consultancy combines website development, AI-powered automation, digital strategy, search optimisation and user experience design to help businesses build systems that support long-term growth. Rather than approaching these disciplines as separate services, the team begins by examining how a business operates, identifying bottlenecks before designing technology around real workflows and commercial objectives.
Blair has also expanded this practical approach into regulatory technology with the launch of Horizon AML, a specialist consultancy helping Australian real estate agencies prepare for the country’s evolving AML/CTF compliance requirements. By combining automation with practical implementation strategies, the business aims to reduce the administrative burden that often accompanies regulatory change.
Across both ventures, Blair’s focus remains consistent: technology should solve real business problems and create measurable outcomes. As AI continues to reshape industries, he believes businesses that embrace practical, purpose-driven innovation will be best positioned for long-term success.
Rohan Mehrotra
The way we work has changed faster than the places designed to support it. Rohan Mehrotra recognised that shift early, seeing an opportunity to simplify one of the more overlooked challenges of hybrid work: finding the right workspace, exactly when and where it’s needed.
With more than two decades in advertising, digital strategy and business transformation, Mehrotra has built a career helping organisations adapt to changing technology. His experience spans leadership roles across the programmatic advertising and ad-tech sectors, where he worked with major Australian brands and managed international teams across Asia, Europe and the UK. That background shaped his understanding of how technology can remove friction from everyday business decisions rather than simply adding another digital layer.
He brought that thinking to Space Penguin, a platform designed to make Australia’s fragmented flexible workspace market easier to navigate. Instead of treating offices as fixed destinations, the business connects professionals, freelancers, digital nomads, and organisations with coworking spaces, meeting rooms, hot desks, virtual offices and even free public workspaces across major cities, reflecting the increasingly fluid nature of modern work.
As hybrid work becomes the norm, Space Penguin is using technology to match people with work environments that suit the task at hand, whether that’s a client meeting, a day of focused work, or a temporary office while travelling. The platform aims to simplify what has traditionally been a fragmented search process, helping businesses and individuals make more flexible use of physical workspaces.
Robbie Newton
Most businesses don’t need more software; they just need the software they already have to work together. That’s the problem Robbie Newton set out to solve when he founded TaskSmith, focusing on the messy operational gaps that often slow down small and medium-sized businesses but are too complex for off-the-shelf platforms to address.
Newton’s approach is grounded in a simple observation: businesses rarely operate according to neat process diagrams. Instead, they rely on years of accumulated knowledge, workarounds, and exceptions that live inside people’s heads. Rather than forcing organisations to adapt to rigid software, TaskSmith maps how work actually happens before building AI-powered automation around those real-world workflows.
The company occupies a space between no-code automation tools and expensive custom software development. Built on its own proprietary platform, TaskSmith provides the infrastructure so engineers can focus on solving each client’s specific operational challenges. That model enables businesses to automate highly customised processes without the cost or lengthy timelines typically associated with bespoke software.
For Newton, AI is most valuable when it disappears into the background, quietly improving the way organisations operate rather than becoming another technology to manage. As more businesses look beyond experimentation and towards practical implementation, TaskSmith reflects a growing shift towards AI that solves everyday operational problems instead of simply showcasing what the technology can do.
Be sure to follow these leading tech strategists as they drive the conversations, trends, and innovations shaping the future of technology in 2026 and beyond.
Disclaimer: This article is a paid branded content feature provided for general informational purposes only. Some or all of the featured profiles were prepared in collaboration with the individuals or organisations featured and may include contributor-supplied information. While reasonable care has been taken to ensure accuracy at the time of publication, inclusion does not constitute an endorsement, recommendation, or ranking. Readers should independently evaluate any services, strategies, or organisations mentioned before making business or technology decisions.
