Meliora Ventures will be participating in the upcoming funding round for two Australian start ups, Springboards.AI and StoryDesk.AI.
A new fund within the advisory and investment company, known as Meliora Ventures Fund One (MVF1), is a pre-seed focused investment fund raising $3m USD from sophisticated wholesale investors for the purpose of investing in Vertical AI startups, Generative AI products and SaaS technology with an AI differentiator.
As part of our AI focused World Radio Day coverage, StoryDesk is of particular interest, given its ‘write once, publish everywhere’ approach. StoryDesk “turns research into publish-ready content, blog posts, LinkedIn carousels, newsletters – all in your brand voice.”
Meliora managing partner Clive Dikens has told radioinfo: “We’re really excited to be working with StoryDesk.ai. It empowers radio stations with plagiarism-free, tone-of-voice AI, real-time research tools, and integrated workflows that help teams produce high-quality on-air, news, and digital content faster and more accurately.
“By combining human creativity with intelligent automation, StoryDesk.ai enables broadcasters to deliver more engaging, reliable, and consistent content in a fraction of the traditional production time.”
“We are investing where AI is the clear differentiator. We are focused on CTO-led companies, Vertical AI startups, Generative AI products, SaaS technology with an AI edge, and related technology that unlocks international scale.”
Springboards will also be of interrest to radio creative departments and all ad agency creatives as a partner in ideation. It is a “creative AI tool designed to inspire ad creatives and advertising teams, not replace them.” The startup has designed its tool “to fit seamlessly into an agency’s workflow, from Strategy to Execution, to “unlock creative leaps instead of predictable answers.”
Meliora investments focus on ethical usage in professional environments.
The Meliora Company, the advisory, ventures and creative business founded by entrepreneur Clive Dickens, says the new specialist AI investment fund will invest in Chief Technology Officer led startups that are focused on turning AI into practical advantage that results in accelerated build cycles, tighter unit economics, and products customers adopt faster.
Meliora partner Jack Lonergan (pictured with Dickens above) says the fund is “seeing a huge range of startups who are now unlocking the massive potential of AI and the large language models that underpin it, and then turning that into tangible new products that are not only transformative for businesses but significantly simplify and improve the daily lives of their consumers.
“Meliora’s Ventures Fund One seeks to be at the forefront of that wave, empowering focused, entrepreneurial teams to solve real world problems in highly innovative ways for the first $1.2bn Weekly Active AI users across the world.”
Dickens also confirmed that Meliora Ventures Fund One had secured Shazam Co-Founder Chris Barton and former Singtel Optus and Seven West Media senior executive William Hedberg as strategic advisors to the new fund. Both executives have strong experience working with ambitious technology founders and helping shepherd them from Pre-seed to Series A.
Investor presentations have now commenced with a target of first close before Easter and a final close by June 2026. Interested investors and start-up teams can learn more at melioraventures.com.
While we had Clive’s attention, given his previous radio experience, we also asked him about the incusion of AI in the new Commercial Radio codes. He said:
“I commend CRA and its members for this new Code which recognises that transparency with AI and synthetic voices is so important in maintaining the audience’s trust. Radio’s point of difference is a human connection and a shared experience but of course AI can make the radio industry much more efficient and help it continue to invest in deeper human connections and sustainable shared experiences.”
Reporting: Steve Ahern
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