In Melbourne to celebrate Square’s second birthday in Australia, the company’s cofounder and CEO Jack Dorsey announced Square is set to build out an engineering hub down under, its first outside North America.
“We have been humbled by the support Square has received from Australia’s business community over the past two years. Australia is an important market for Square, with more and more businesses joining our platform every day,” Dorsey said.
“As our seller base continues to grow, our team needs to grow with it, which is why we are investing more in Australia, adding new high-skill jobs and expanding our local operations in Melbourne.”
The company has also moved into new headquarters in Melbourne, taking up residence on Bourke Street.
Launching in Australia with its original card reader in 2016, Square revealed last May that it had more than 60,000 businesses using one or more of its products; Australian country manager Ben Pfisterer said today the number of local businesses using Square has since increased 150 percent.
“With a thriving small business community and thirst for innovation, the Australian market has proven to be quick-adopters of new payments technology,” he said.
“We are investing in our local workforce this year, and adding new engineering capabilities so that we can introduce a greater range of products and services that will help more Australian businesses.”
Australia has been an advanced market for the company over the last two years: it was the second launch market for its Build with Square APIs, introduced in Australia last year, and the Square contactless card reader.
Pfisterer previously told Startup Daily, “[Australia is] seen as a really advanced market not only from a small business perspective…we know Australian businesses are some of the most tech-savvy there are with a great uptake of new tech, cloud-based systems, but also from a payments innovation perspective.”
The company has received support from the Victorian Government to expand its local team as it plans to grow its Australian headcount to 100 over the next couple of years.
The Victorian Government allocated $55 million to its Investment Attraction and Assistance Program in this year’s budget. The program, which looks to both help interstate and international businesses expand and grow into Victoria and local businesses expand, received $90 million in 2017 and $116 million in the 2016 Budget
It has helped attract the likes of Square, Alibaba, Slack, and Zendesk to Victoria.
Image: Jack Dorsey. Source: Simon Shiff.
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