HOBART shipbuilder Incat has gone from building local boats four decades ago to now supplying the world’s best and fastest ferries to markets stretching from Trinidad to the Canary Islands, with its success helping grow a network of business suppliers in Tasmania.

WHEN Liferaft Systems Australia first started manufacturing marine evacuation slides and liferafts 26 years ago they had about six employees and a single local customer.

When mining giant Rio Tinto decided more than a decade ago to anchor one of its fly-in, fly-out hubs in the Western Australian city of Busselton, it revitalised the coastal community economically, socially, and culturally.

Nowhere does the adage of “build it and they will come’’ resonate  more than in the southern Queensland city of Toowoomba.

Gladstone is a magnet for business activity; a perfect illustration of the benefits that flow into a community when it attracts investment.

REVERSING the brain drain and attracting more business investment to South Australia are critical to ensuring the state can power ahead.

About 40 per cent of residents in Sydney’s west are forced to drive 90 minutes each way for work, said former Business Council president Tony Shepherd.

Back when the car manufacturing industry was in full flight in Australia, small to medium-sized Victorian business Australian Performance Vehicles had three customers: Ford, Holden and Toyota.

As far as career changes go, Jodie Auster’s journey from emergency department doctor to leading the Australian arm of one of the world’s biggest disruptors has been remarkable.

IT'S the essence of a migrant dream: the type of multicultural success story that contributes to the diverse fabric of Australia.

When Gaetano Ripepi left Italy for Australia in 1959, surely, he couldn’t have imagined the family-owned and run business standing in his footsteps today.

WHEN Noor Aljabury stepped into the Perth offices of Programmed, a door opened to a world of opportunities she had never before imagined.

Gaining invaluable hands-on experience during a paid internship at the leading management services company helped Noor realise her passion for business. It also ignited her ambition to one day own a business and scale the heights of senior leadership.

UNLIKE most working dads, Kelly Smith can often be found volunteering in the primary school classrooms of his two children on his days off.

“The teacher will say: ‘You can look after the arts and craft table over there today’,’’ Kelly says.

IF Jane Holt wasn’t already slightly nervous about the challenges of re-entering the workforce after an extended career break, she had to contend with her hot water service going on the blink and both her children breaking their arms in separate incidents.

This all happened in the first fortnight as Ms Holt began taking part in the pilot of Deloitte’s Return to Work program last July in the firm’s Consultancy division as a data manager in the Melbourne office.