SoIT's News, Issue 4 2007

Alumni Profile: Darren Williams, BSc Hons (1995), PhD (2004)

Dr Darren Williams is a double graduate of the School of IT and is now the Chief Executive Officer of the network security firm Sensory Networks. Sensory Networks produces hardware and software acceleration solutions for network security applications, including multi-gigabit content scanning acceleration technology: “The basic function of our products is to allow our clients to search vast amounts of data very quickly and is mainly applied when searching network traffic for security threats.”

Sensory Networks was one of a handful of Australian start-ups to get funding from venture capitalists in 2002: “We spent a year developing our idea and planning. We got lots of advice by working with some really experienced people. I think we stood out because we had a good plan and a good team who had a combination of industry experience and education. We raised $4 million in our first funding round. Since then we have raised over $US20 million for further development and to develop our sales”.

Starting a business after the IT bubble ‘burst’ presented challenges in terms of raising capital but it also had its advantages: “It was a tough time to be raising money, but once we were up and running it was a great time to be hiring people... we knew lots of talented people looking for work. Now technology is picking up again, which is great for IT generally, but it does make it harder to find and retain good staff.”

He is optimistic that there are other opportunities for graduates who want to build a start-up business. “There is a lot of funding around – investors are looking for good ideas and good people… and not just internationally – there is funding in Australia to do this.”

Dr Williams reminisces that the best times at university were during his Honours year, working with his fellow students in room G7 in the Madsen Building: “My Honours year was a lot of fun, we had a ping-pong table in our room and a great group of students. The atmosphere was wonderful. We worked hard too - there were seven students in G7 and we all got first class honours, so we did something right.”

Dr Williams has tried to maintain some of the collegial atmosphere of his Honours year at Sensory Networks: “We started hiring people we knew and found as the business grew our staff expanded through friends and then friends-of-friends from university. In fact, one of the best parts of my job is the people around me.”

Josephine Spongberg

Photo: Sensory Networks team of alumni and friends L-R David Taylor, Matt Barr, Darren Williams, Michael Flanagan, John Bignucolo, Geoff Langdale, James Gregory, Amila Fernando, Hui San Heng & Peter Duthie