Although we’re sad to say farewell, we love to see our coworking companies grow and “graduate” from our space.

We’ve been lucky enough to have Zepplin Bend, or Zepben for short, as resident coworkers for 5 years now. As they get ready to move on, we spoke with Managing Director, Bill Tarlinton to find out what their next big adventure is.

What is Zepben?

We are an engineering and software solutions company – working in the electricity energy sector, which is undergoing transformative change due to the rapid uptake of renewables, and in the near future, electric vehicles. Our mission is to maximise the community’s access to their local energy network. We achieve this by developing new decision support and operational technology systems for electricity distribution networks.

Tell us about why you’re graduating

We have grown from a startup with 3 founders and a total of 5 employees (including the founders) to an organisation with 15 employees. Over the past 5 years, we have been working to develop our solutions, and we have now reached “critical mass” where we have working software that can be deployed commercially. We believe there is a lot of pent up demand for the solutions we have developed, and we are expecting to enter a period of growth. For this phase of our journey, we need to establish our own office and grow our team.

What are your most notable highlights while working in the space?

The great community we have had the good fortune to be a part of.

For those of us with a window seat, the wonderful view looking out to the Brindabellas is also something we will miss.

So what’s next?

We need to consolidate our product offerings in Australia, and then get out into the big world. We already have customers in New Zealand, but we don’t really count that as an international customer. One of our guys – Carlos, has already been talking with people in Columbia and there is a lot of interest in our solutions there. We are fortunate to have a few Spanish speaking people on the team, and South America may be our first international market.

Do you have any advice for entrepreneurs or startups who are thinking about joining our Coworking community?

If you are a Startup, a single entrepreneur or someone who is working remotely and wants an office environment and people to interact with – you can’t do any better than CBRIN. CBRIN has a laid back atmosphere, plenty of social events, great mentors and support staff, interesting events and lots of diversity in its members.