How to Win a Pitch Competition: What the Croc Pitch Panel Looks For
Our panellists are seasoned investors, founders, and technical experts who know what separates a good pitch from a fundable one. Whether you’re preparing to pitch or tuning in to watch, it helps to understand the lens they’re bringing to the room.
This year’s panel includes:
Larnie Batten – The Director, of the Innovation Activation team with the Department of Trade, Business and Asian Relations and Trade, Northern Territory Government, supporting initiatives that strengthen the Territory’s innovation and entrepreneurial ecosystem.
Professor Steve Rogers – Deputy Vice-Chancellor, Research & Community Connection at Charles Darwin University, providing leadership across research, innovation and regional engagement.
Alex Farrugia – The Darwin-based Investment Manager at Paspalis Capital. With 8 years of expertise in corporate advising, bringing strategic insights and financial acumen to drive venture capital investments and support growth initiatives.
Each brings a distinct perspective, and together they cover the commercial, technical, and market dimensions that the Paspalis Investment Committee cares about most.
The committee assesses every pitch against nine criteria. The panel’s Q&A is designed to test exactly these areas, so knowing what they are is half the battle.
Management Team
Why can you execute? The panel will assess the skills, experience and motivation behind the company. A strong idea with a weak team is a pass. Come ready to explain who you are, what you’ve built before, and why this team is the right one to scale this company.
Special Sauce
What makes your innovation genuinely defensible? Saying you’re better than the competition isn’t enough. The panel wants to understand your moat: IP, first-mover advantage, network effects, exclusive partnerships, or proprietary data. If you can’t defend it, they’ll find the gap.
Business Model and Financials
How will this make money, and when? What are the revenue and cost drivers? When does the business reach profitability? This is where many founders stumble. Know your numbers cold. If you hesitate on your unit economics or market sizing, the panel notices.
Market and Marketing
Who are your customers and how will you reach them? The panel wants to see a clear picture of the addressable market, a realistic customer acquisition strategy, and evidence that you understand how to grow and retain a customer base. Vague TAM numbers won’t cut it.
Capital Allocation
How will Paspalis investment be spent, and what will it achieve? The committee wants to see a clear plan: milestones, timelines, and a logical path from capital in to commercial outcome. If the answer is “general working capital”, that’s not a plan.
Exit Strategy
Who are the potential strategic buyers? Why would they be interested, and what comparable acquisitions have they made? This signals to the committee that you understand the end game and have thought about how they get a return.
Northern Australia Connection
The most important criterion for Croc Pitch specifically. How will your business create a positive use case and measurable impact for Northern Australia? Be specific. A vague answer here is a red flag. The investment committee is deploying capital to back Northern Australian economic growth, not generic innovation.
Prepare for the Q&A as hard as you prepare the deck. It’s ten minutes of direct questioning, and it’s often where the real assessment happens.
