Sweat co-founder Tobi Pearce taking new online start-up to the world

Sweat co-founder Tobi Pearce is expanding his latest start-up, hoping to match the global success of the fitness platform he created with Kayla Itsines.

EzLicence chief executive Tobi Pearce. Picture: Emma Brasier

Sweat co-founder Tobi Pearce is eyeing off new international markets for his latest start-up venture, as he looks to replicate the global success of the digital fitness platform he created with business partner Kayla Itsines.

Mr Pearce took over as chief executive of online driving instructor marketplace EzLicence in 2023, and quickly set about expanding the brand into the UK, where the company has been operating for a little over a year.

EzLicence, which launched in 2018, allows learner drivers to find, compare and book verified driving instructors online, offering its service in major cities and towns across Australia and now the UK.

Mr Pearce, a co-founder of the company and it’s largest single shareholder, said the success of the platform in the highly fragmented UK market proved the online marketplace could be expanded into other regions with similar market environments.

“We really wanted to find a market that had some of the similar trademark challenges to what Australia did ... and generally speaking, we knew there was a pretty healthy driver education market (in the UK), but a very fragmented supply side,” he said.

“And as far as driver education is concerned, on an average basis they actually do about seven times as many driving lessons as what we do in Australia. So on average, we see people do about five and a half lessons (in Australia) – in the UK the average learner’s doing about 35 to 40 hours of lessons.

“And so the impact to us, from a market acceptance standpoint, is that it’s a very great market, economically, for us to enter, both because the population is two and a half times the size of Australia, but they’re also doing seven times as many lessons at a roughly similar hourly rate.”

Tobi Pearce co-founded Sweat alongside fitness influencer Kayla Itsines. Picture: Matt Turner.

Mr Pearce, now based on the Gold Coast, said bookings on EzLicence in the UK were growing “really nicely month on month”, and he was now looking at other regions for a potential expansion.

The company is backed by a high profile lineup of investors including Mr Pearce’s Pearce & Co Investments, co-founders Andrew Rawlinson and Simon Strode, Adelaide businessman Rob Chapman’s Chapman Capital Partners and Oodie founder Davie Fogarty.

Mr Pearce took the helm a year after his departure from Sweat, which was acquired by US fitness giant iFIT in a $US150m ($228m) deal at the height of the pandemic in 2021. Mr Pearce and Ms Itsines later took back control of the company in late 2023.

Sweat’s annual turnover hit close to $100m at its peak, backed by a huge following in the US, where Mr Pearce spent significant time growing the brand.

He said that while the size of the US market was appealing for many start-ups emerging out of the relatively small Australian market, expanding EzLicence there would come with some challenges.

“There are state-based regulations, there’s some quite large competitors, they’re not doing as many lessons – so there’s quite a different dynamic,” he said.

“But traditionally, with these particular sorts of businesses and others that I’ve launched there as well, it’s such a great market to sell these sorts of products into so I definitely think we’ll be there at some point.”

EzLicence has generated around $100m in bookings via its online marketplace, with more than 1600 verified instructors on the platform, including more than 300 in the UK.

Following a small fundraising round in 2023, Mr Pearce said the company was now well capitalised to execute its growth strategy.

“As a start-up there’s a really cool milestone that happens where you transition from being capital defensive in some regards, conserving capital, to achieving profitability, and we’re going through that transition right now,” he said.

“We’ve got to a really good position performance wise – it doesn’t mean that we’re closed off to the idea of capital. But personally, I very much like the idea of building and scaling an organisation that’s not necessarily dependent or beholden to more capital requirements in the short term.

“Sometimes a little less money actually forces more conscious, deliberate decision making from a business standpoint.”

Originally published as Sweat co-founder Tobi Pearce taking new online start-up to the world