Rainstick Founder Darryl Lyons: How Ancient Knowledge Sparked a DeepTech Breakthrough

I'll be honest, I was skeptical about working with a large corporate again. In a previous startup, I'd experienced what I call 'death by maybe', with endless discussions, no clear commitments, and a slow bleed of time and energy without real progress. So when we looked at the Rio programme, I had questions.

What made the difference was momentum and clarity. We went in with a very pragmatic mindset to under-promise and over-deliver, build relationships and trust. We started quickly, the programme was short, so we knew we had to move immediately. One advantage we had is we didn't need site clearance to begin. Rio could send us seed, and we could demonstrate results externally before anything happened in the field.

Within two weeks of the programme starting, we had seeds shipped to us and we were already treating and testing. That speed mattered because it built our credibility early and reduced perceived risk.

Now we're running a Proof of Concept, treating tens of thousands of seeds and moving into field trials, including a major trial in the Pilbara.