Since Founder and Director of Foxie Games Dineth Abeynayake started the company in 2017 the number of employees has gone from two to 25.

The number of downloads for the company’s most successful game – Horse Riding Tales – has exceeded 10 million and the number of global players using Foxie Games has reached well over 15 million according to Abeynayake.

As well as Horse Riding Tales, which was particularly successful with girls aged 13 to 16, Foxie Games has released Horse Paradise, Horse Quest and Dino Tamers, aimed towards boys.

Abeynayake told The Lead last year the company was moving away from horse riding games into other virtual world areas in a bid to diversify and reduce risk.

The South Australian developer is a trained aerospace engineer who started making mobile games while working as a missile analyst in Adelaide’s growing defence industry.

After five years working on apps “as a side hustle,” Abeynayake said he gained enough commercial traction to pursue the business full-time.

In the three years since launching the company, Foxie Games has ranked number one for fastest employment growth and number three for fastest revenue growth in SA’s 2020 BDO Fast Movers awards.

Outside of gaming, Abeynayake has also been involved in community sport with the Mawson Lakes Cricket Club.

Alpha Box & Dice Managing Director Dylan Fairweather has expanded the business across a number of areas since he bought into it seven years ago.

What began as a boutique, multi-regional winery based in McLaren Vale in 2008 has grown into a direct-to-consumer business, under Fairweather’s guidance.

Maintaining the winery’s original concept, which attempts to represent every letter of the alphabet through a different wine variety or style, Alpha Box & Dice today makes more than 30 products and is distributed across 15 countries.

Domestically, its small-batch, minimal intervention and vegan wines have garnered the business a cult following among South Australian bars, restaurants and independent cellars.

Since taking full control of the winery’s operation, four and a half years ago, Fairweather has grown the number of permanent staff to include an internal graphic designer and head of digital to grow the company’s eCommerce focus.

He has also developed a Barossa-based wine project, Palmetto Wine Co, and curated boutique bottle shop Sometimes Always Cellars. During the height of the state’s coronavirus pandemic lockdown, Fairweather launched Alpha Box & Friends, an initiative pairing other local wines with the brands own drinks to be sold in packs.

Last year Alpha Box & Dice’s Cellar Door was awarded the Gourmet Traveller Wine Magazine’s Best Small Cellar Door in McLaren Vale. It followed a fire in one of the cellar door buildings in 2016 which caused structural damage to the property. Fairweather said shaking the impact of the fire on the brand was harder to clean up than the fire itself.

Co-founder and Managing Director of TABOO Sanitary Products Eloise Hall is InDaily’s youngest 2020 40 Under 40 winner, at 21 years old.

She started TABOO with business partner Isobel Marshall in 2017.

She said while her age initially deterred many people from taking the business seriously it was also “a huge asset”.

“Being young, there’s not a lot to lose in giving something a shot, so that’s what we did,” she said.

At 17 and 18 years old, Hall and Marshall took out the Startup Weekend Adelaide competition.

The pair won about $20,000 worth of prizes and, after raising a further $56,000 through a crowdfunding campaign, were able to launch the social enterprise in August 2019.

Hall said TABOO existed to sell organic cotton pads and tampons within Australia, with all net profits donated to charity OneGirl.

TABOO’s products are available through an online subscription or in-store at a South Australian-based IGA where they sell nearly six times better than their competitors, said Hall.

The business also supports Australian women through its online model. When purchasing products there is an option to buy on behalf of women staying at Vinnies Crisis centre or women receiving support through the NPY Women’s Council.

Hall has launched the business while studying a double degree, which she is due to complete in 2022.

Emma McCaskill

Renowned South Australian Chef Emma McCaskill has worked in kitchens across the world for restaurants in Tokyo, England and Melbourne.

She began her career as an apprentice under Chef Teage Ezard, at the two-hatted Ezard Restaurant, before landing the role of Chef de Partie at Tetsuyas’s Restaurant in Sydney. While working at Tetsuya’s, the restaurant was awarded three chef’s hats and ranked number nine on the San Pellegrino World’s 50 Best Restaurants list.

But McCaskill’s most recent position was closer to home. In 2019, she headed female-found and led beer and wine company Sparkke at the Whitmore’s 636 person restaurant Fare.

Under the guidance of the entrepreneur and Executive Chef, Fare was named among SA’s 2019 Delicious Hottest 100. McCaskill said her menu aimed to showcase local producers and minimise the restaurant’s carbon footprint and waste, embracing the nose-to-tail concept.

The award was not the first time McCaskill gained recognition for her skills in the kitchen. In 2014 she was named Best New Talent by Gourmet Traveller, while under her helm SA restaurant The Pot scored a hat in The Age Good Food Guide. McCaskill also made it onto CityMag’s list of 20 most influential people in 2019 as a strong role model for women and girls in Adelaide wanting to get into the restaurant scene.

Although she has left her role as Fare Head Chef, McCaskill has continued in a consultative role for the business.

She is a SA Ambassador and programmer for Tasting Australia.