Nicho Hynes is unlikely to forget Saturday October 28, 2023. As a crowd was piling into the stands – a sea of green and gold, littered with black jerseys – he emerged from the tunnel to take in the scenes. His NRL career had started just five years ago at the Melbourne Storm; Aami Park his second home for three of those. It was on that very field that he was about to fulfil another childhood dream. As he walked onto his old stomping ground wearing the Australian jersey for the first time, he turned around to see his family…
Author: Andie Robinson
The University of Wollongong’s (UOW) iAccelerate RISE program is set to continue its mission of supporting entrepreneurs in regional New South Wales, after receiving a $455,000 from the State Government, as part of the Accelerating Regional Innovation Fund (ARIF). The iAccelerate business incubator and accelerator has created over 1,000 jobs and served as a launching pad for more than 300 companies over a decade. Those businesses have since generated $61.1 million in revenue and injected $33.6 million back into the economy. The iAccelerate RISE Program, designed specifically to empower regional entrepreneurs, has proved instrumental in propelling economic growth in bushfire…
The rise of influencer marketing has transformed the way brands connect with consumers, with more than 80 per cent of Australians now on social media. Sydney-based designer, Ella Barker, 19, launched a handcrafted clothing brand, Garments by El two years ago and is struggling to keep up with consumer demands after leveraging influencer marketing to promote her small business. “Up to 80 per cent of my sales are a result of influencer promotion,” Ms Barker said. “As a relatively new, small business, social media influencers have played such a big part in promoting my business to a larger audience, engaging…
Athletes are no strangers to adversity. From pushing their physical and mental limits on the field to coping with injuries, non-selection, media scrutiny, relationship breakdowns, and family trauma off the field, rugby league players are seemingly in constant battle-mode. Sporing club well-being managers are often responsible for carrying the weight of player problems, mental and physical, on and off the field. Cronulla Sharks NRL Club well-being manager Morgan Te Oka has guided and assisted players to navigate difficult times for the past two years, but when the responsibility to support others and to take on players’ trauma began to take…
A potentially ground-breaking new blood test to detect breast cancer could soon be launched in Australia, providing hope for the country’s growing number of breast cancer patients. Breast cancer is currently the most diagnosed cancer amongst women in Australia, with one in seven women diagnosed with breast cancer in their lifetime and approximately 57 Australians diagnosed every day – that is over 20,000 people each year. BCAL Diagnostics executive chair Jayne Shaw has worked with scientists, clinicians, and researchers in New South Wales for over 14 years, to develop a new screening tool which uses artificial intelligence and lipid…
Latest figures in the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) Targeting Scams report, which analysed over 500,000 scam reports from various agencies, have prompted urgent calls for the Australian Federal Government to take action. The report reveals Australians fell victim to scams at an unprecedented level in 2022, losing an $3.1 billion, marking an 80% increase from the total losses recorded in the previous year. Despite the rise in financial losses, Scamwatch saw a 16.5 per cent decrease in scam reports, with the number of reports dropping from 268,622 in 2021 to 239,237 in 2022. Despite the fewer reports, Scamwatch…