49. Successful Endeavours

Revenue: $1.7 million
Growth: 50.4%
Founders: Ray Keefe (57), Junette Keefe (60)
Head Office: Victoria
Employees: 13
Industry: Science and technology
Website: successful.com.au

Taking the 49th spot on this year’s Smart50 is Ray and Junette Keefe’s eponymous successful endeavour: an electronics manufacturing business founded in 1997 which is continuing to thrive and grow over 20 years later.

The company’s 50% growth over the last three years can be attributed to the uptick in desire for high-end electronics in IoT and smart devices, which Successful Endeavours is able to take from design to manufacturing in under eight weeks

“Small IoT devices like this now make up 50% of our business and are responsible for all of the 42% revenue growth in the past 12 months,” the founders tell SmartCompany.

However, with many years under his belt as a engineer working in R&D, Ray says his aptitude for running a business wasn’t finely tuned, joking that “as a business owner, I made a very good engineer”.

He says he spent eight years “earning a living and not making a difference” in the business’ early days, and in 2008 decided to change things up and get some learnings under his belt.

“It took a couple of years to find the right person to help us, but we did, and spent 18 months learning the ins and outs of business and getting our act together,” he says

”The results have been pretty good since then.”

Through their experience designing and manufacturing products in Australia, the founders encourage other businesses to give Australia a go when it comes to manufacturing, and don’t just automatically assume Asia is the be-all and end-all.

“Manufacturing is currently growing strongly and that is because we are good at it and for high-value, complex or high-reliability products we can really meet the brief,” they say.