Why Australia Has More AI PhDs Than Anywhere | First Cheque

Episode SummaryBlackbird partner Tom has spent the last decade obsessing over one thing: why Australia talks about innovation from a place of doubt, while the US talks about it from a place of opportunity.

From buying BHP as a kid through his parents, to operating at Canopy before it was acquired, to spending most of the 2010s investing out of Colorado and now back in Australia at Blackbird, Tom has seen both sides of the talent arbitrage.

In this episode of First Cheque, Tom joins Maxine and Cheryl to share why 8 percent of all AI experts in Asia-Pac are based in Australia, why we have more AI PhDs than any other country in the world and why no one is celebrating it, and what it really means that 88 percent of our PhD students are immigrated talent. They also dive deep into why commercialization is still broken, how Foundry and Baker Street are trying to fix the bridge from lab to seed, and why product-led growth is not dead — it just changed.

Tom also reflects on the boomerang effect, the R and D tax credit as Australia's secret weapon, and why the next decade of Australian companies will be built with a base in Australia and a base on the West Coast.

Time Stamps00:00:00 - Intro: Doubt versus opportunity

00:01:12 - Hey, I'm Cheryl. I'm Maxine. This is First Cheque

00:03:45 - What was the first thing you ever invested in? BHP and the Canva vs BHP math

00:05:51 - Invest early and hold: learning compounding from his parents

00:06:52 - Invest America: what happens when every kid gets $1,000 to compound until 18

00:08:14 - Robinhood, retail, and the new CEO playbook

00:11:02 - Why aren't we more excited about Australia? The AFR talent piece

00:12:29 - 8 percent of Asia-Pac AI experts are in Australia and we have 6 of the top 100 AI universities