Sam Pritchard brought People in Paddocks to evokeAG in 2025 to get chatting. She returned in 2026 with those chats now looking like partnerships, customers, investor interest and a snappy network.
It was a cracking year for Sam, People in Paddocks Founder and creator of the award-winning PIPA platform.
PIPA uses a simple, multi-language system that turns safety and compliance into daily practice and now achieves a 98% adoption rate by workers – and Sam credits the evokeAG Startup Program with lighting the spark.
"The Startup Program launched PIPA," she says. "It opened new partnership conversations, investor interest and connections with farms wanting to adopt the platform."
The program led to a partnership for PIPA with evokeAG 2026 partner The Lucas Group, an integration with AgWorld, and introductions to horticulture clients through Coles. It also landed entries into the WorkSafe awards and the AgriFutures Rural Women's Award. And the big one? Paying customers.
"evokeAG is the holy grail for launching your agtech business in Australia," Sam says.
"It sits at the intersection of agriculture, technology and investment, so it's one of the few places where founders can connect with the full ecosystem in one room."
Sam's focus shifted in 2026 when she rolled into evokeAG 2026. She was still up for a chat and a coffee, of course, (Fun fact: 3100 coffees, presumably with a side of brilliant ideas, were enjoyed at evokeAG 2026) but this time the goal was investment and distribution partners.
The opportunities got even bigger and better when Sam was selected to pitch at the Culinary Capital Dinner. For founders, it's one of the most high-profile moments of the event.
"Being chosen to pitch at Culinary Capital was an incredible honour and will most probably be life changing for PIPA," Sam says. "Watch this space."
The format also flipped the traditional pitch dynamic. Rather than chasing investors, founders host tables and investors choose which startups they want to hear from.
"They chose to be seated at my table, not the other way around," Sam says.
"That shaped the tone of the conversations and set the foundation for everything that followed."
Big bang for dinner buck quickly followed. Four investors reached out post evokeAG 2026 to set up meetings and several corporations expressed interest in onboarding the platform into their operations.
Across evokeAG 2026, People in Paddocks made more than 30 new connections spanning investors, corporate farming groups, distribution partners and family farms.
For Sam, the calibre of attendees really stood out.
"The seniority and quality of participants was exceptionally high," she says.
"That landed meaningful investor, partner and client engagement."
Culinary Capital Dinner 2026 served up both the good food conversations, but it also gave Sam a practical lesson that future founders can tuck away for reference: bring printed pitch decks.
"My guests found the visuals really valuable, and they reinforced what I was saying," she says.
It's a little detail but one that helped turn dinner chats into fantastic engagement.
After two years in the evokeAG Startup Program, Sam has one warning (in a good way) for founders thinking about applying.
"Be prepared for a surge in interest and opportunities," she says.
And her biggest piece of advice? Don't blend in.
"To ensure your spot, make your application unique and bold," she says. "Stand out from the crowd and clearly demonstrate why your product will offer unique value."