REVEALED: 30 Cairns influentials under 30
The Cairns Post reveals a list of 30 young influentials under the age of 30 from all walks of life including lawyers, doctors, real estate professionals and business owners who have smashed their goals at a very young age. SEE WHO ALL ARE IN THE LIST
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ONE day these people will be running Cairns, The Cairns Post has compiled a list of 30 influentials under the age of 30. From a diverse background, the youth are shaping up to be a group to watch out for. From real estate agents to young entrepreneurs, there’s nothing this group can’t do. This list includes people who are getting involved in the community, opening up their own businesses and smashing goals.
DAVID MURPHY
RE/MAX Cairns broker/owner
David Murphy is 26 and skyrocketed into the real estate industry at the end of 2019. Mr Murphy bought RE/MAX real estate from real estate principal Tony Williamson with his brother Ray Murphy and mother Sharyon Murphy. After that he obtained his auctioneer’s licence. He has since been crushing goals with his family. Mr Murphy also has a sporty past. He has since retired as a Northern Pride player and co-captain to focus on his business.
SANGEETHA BADYA
Solicitor
Sangeetha Badya is a solicitor at Holding Redlich and keeps going higher and higher at the age of 26. At the company she works in planning and environment, but she does a lot of pro bono work. Ms Badya has done stuff with refuge legal clinic and does a lot of volunteering. But it doesn’t stop there. Ms Badya also does a bit for the community. She has a passion for arts and found that she didn’t get that outlet at work. During high school she was involved in set design, so last year she became a board observer at JUTE Theatre Company. She is quickly moving up the ranks and is already on the board of directors.
SHAI AGER
Agile Project founder
Shai Ager has accomplished so much at 24. A lot of her work has been focused on wildlife, including working on the recent SEQ floods where she helped wildlife carers impacted by the floods. She was first known from her work through the animal welfare group — the Agile Project. She has done a lot of volunteer work helping rehabilitate agile wallabies. By the age of 21 she had also been crowned as 2019 Cairns Young Woman of the Year on International Women’s Day.
MATTHEW ROMANO
Intrust Building Solutions director and current shareholder
Matthew Romano has risen to the top at 27 and found himself in a crucial role of establishing Intrust Building Conceptions in 2019 when he was very young. Mr Romano has a Cert III in Carpentry and a Cert IV in Building and Construction. This got him to the point to oversee 139 jobs for Intrust Building Solutions from procurement to completion. Mr Romano is into his fitness and came first in his age category (25 to 29) for the Cairns Marathon last year.
AMY HART
Hart Virtual Service owner
Amy Hart decided to create her own business after working in medical administration. She is currently 29 and is an online business manager where she automates client processes. Ms Hart’s business is all about automating systems and processes to make it a really easy client experience.
KATE GEORGE
KL Performance Industry director
Even through the Covid pandemic, Kate George was able to run her business KL Performance Industry successfully and managed to entertain people with a bang. Her mission is to provide memorable entertainment to her clients. Ms George is 27 and trained as a gymnast and a trampolinist, she is actively involved in the community and you might see her handstanding her way around the world. She was a part of the Cairns Taipans NBL Cheer squad since the age of eight.
ROHIT GUPTA
Laserfun Cairns owner
Rohit Gupta is a business owner at the young age of 25 years old. He took over Laserfun Cairns at DFO back in December. He has a goal of changing the perspective people have on laser tag to make it more than a game for kids. Mr Gupta mixed things up as soon as he took over the business, putting some new artwork by local artists and creating a BYO policy to attract young people to the business.
JESS FATNOWNA
2022 Cairns Young Woman of the Year
Jess Fatnowna has been a guardian and a mentor to vulnerable young girls through the art of sport. She was given merit for the work she did earlier this year when she was awarded Cairns Young Woman of the Year at the age of 23. Ms Fatnowna was part of Cairns Hockey’s Aspire to be Deadly program which supervises healthy choices eating program and supports reconciliation. Ms Fatnowna was also part of Cairns Hockey’s first Indigenous round back in 2021.
BRODY OXENHAM
Manexo Media business owner
Brody Oxenham is a young entrepreneur at 25. He started his own business, Manexo Media, when he was 23. His business strives in digital marketing, websites, creating content and building online audiences. He helps business owners with tech. He has been apart of the Cairns Young Chamber since 2019. Mr Oxenham recently finished up as Y (E)P Entrepreneurship Facilitators digital marketing manager, a company that provides support to entrepreneurs at all stages.
CHLOE BUCKLEY
Cairns Cycling
Chloe Buckley is 13 years old and already achieving so high in the cycling industry. She will be competing in the 2022 AusCycling Junior Track National Championships. Ms Buckley has a method of having a steady focus. She had strong results in the state titles back in December and continues to crush goals.
MIKAELA FRENCH
Marrawah Law solicitor
Mikaela French is currently kicking goals at Marrawah Law in the Indigenous law sector. She is a proud Torres Strait Islander women who back in 2015 was already making waves and spoke at the National Indigenous Youth Parliament. Ms French gives commercial advice to Indigenous businesses, corporations and not for profits. But outside of work she aims to close the gap of education for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander students, and participates in the Australian Indigenous Education Mentoring Program.
JASMINE DARRAH
Tapt business development manager
Jasmine Darrah has been building her career in the start-up industry since she finished university and is now 23. Ms Darrah works for Tapt, a eco-friendly digital card business. She is up and coming in the Cairns community and has already put her work to good use working with the Cairns and Far North Environment Centre. Ms Darrah is also the Cairns Young Chamber deputy chair.
SATYEN HARGOVAN
Medical Registrar
Satyen Hargovan is leading his way as the next generation doctors in Cairns at 27. Mr Hargovan is a medical registrar with an interest in cardiology. But his fascination in the industry doesn’t stop there. He is a member of many boards, an advisor on the Clinical Ethics Advisory Committee and a strategy and governance lead at the Hand-n-Hand Peer Support. Mr Hargovan is also an adjunct lecturer in medicine at JCU.
CATHERINE CURNOW
Artist
Catherine Curnow is a young Cairns artist painting her way through the city. Ms Curnow painted the big Hibiscus mural at Ben and Jerry’s in the CBD. She has also contributed largely to CIAF (Cairns Indigenous Art Fair) and was the Evolution Project trainee for the 2021 virtual fair.
MOLLY STEER
Child activist
Molly Steer, now 14, began fighting as a child activist from a young age. She is passionate about protecting the Great Barrier Reef marine life. She was the driving force behind the Straw No More campaign that wanted to ban single use plastic. She has been pretty vocalin her fight for climate change.
JACK WILKIE-JANS
Artist
Jack Wilkie-Jans is an innovator in the art industry at 29. Being an artist, he is also the marketing manager at Cairns Indigenous Art Fair (CIAF) and an aboriginal affairs advocate. He started his career as an art volunteer, but has since soared his way into the art industry after he did Bachelor of Arts, majoring in Political Science and International Affairs at JCU.
NATASHA WHALLEY-THOMPSON
RE/MAX sales associate
Natasha Whalley-Thompson only joined the team last year. She started her career in 2013 and has since been smashing goals. Ms Whalley-Thompson was born in Cairns and has found herself living and breathing real estate. She has assisted with hundreds of transactions.
MICAH HART
Social Impact and Hart Creative Co-owner
High career ambitions doesn’t stop 28-year-old Micah Hart from following his goals. He opened up Social Impact back in 2020 when Covid was in its peak. Social Impact is a business aimed to support small business and give them a chance to have a great online presence. Mr Hart decided to push things further recently, and opened a photography studio called Hart Creative. It is aimed to make a creative space for anyone in Cairns who can go to where they want to focus cooling themselves in an airconditioned room.
BELLA SINOPOLI
Bella for Hire Owner
Bella Sinopoli decided to do the crazy and open up a business late 2020 when other businesses were shutting down. She is now 28 and created a business where she hires out clothes to people and they can hire it for events. Ms Sinopoli looks after her business while taking care of her four-year-old daughter. She has an uplifting attitude of nothing ventured, nothing gained. Her business doesn’t stop in Cairns. She has expanded her business by shipping clothes Australia wide.
HARRISON OATES
Youth advocate
At the very young age of 18, Harrison Oates has been appointed as a UNICEF Australia Young Ambassador. Mr Oates has just finished high school and is a vocal advocate for the dignity and rights of the youth for which he was honoured with the 2021 Cairns Young Citizen of the Year award. Mr Oates will be studying advanced computing and politics, philosophy and economics this year.
BETH WATSON
The Dairy team leader
Beth Watson is the team leader behind The Dairy at the age of 29. Her family own Mungalli Dairy and she is trying to create a self-managing team. Ms Watson has aims to continue the family business but instead of becoming CEO, she would like a board of trustees so the whole family can have their say and input in how the business is run.
SAMANTHA GRAY
Experience Co reef education manager
Samantha Gray is one of the lucky ones who gets to spend her days on the Great Barrier Reef at the age of 28. She oversees the Reef Education Program and co-manages a team of marine biologists and Indigenous education rangers. Ms Gray has helped launch the new Reef Magic platform, which is a pontoon based on at Moore Reef that can give capacity to 250 guests. She is a teacher, dive master and master reef guide.
JESS KELLY
Personal trainer
At the age of 21, Jess Kelly is known as a hype lord when it comes to fitness. She is a PT and nutrition coach. Every Sunday she runs MEGARUN Cairns — an initiative to keep young people healthy and help them with their mental health. Ms Kelly has heaps of enthusiasm and allows people to run at their own pace. She is someone to watch out for in the fitness industry as she has already started doing big things.
JIMMY BURMAN
Jimmys Burger general manager and director
Running a family business in the middle of the Covid pandemic is not an easy task. Mr Burman is 29 and the general manager and director of Jimmys Burgers and Howlin Jays. Mr Burman has been in the family business for six years now and aims to keep them growing to give fun dining experiences for Cairns.
QUINTON ULRICH
Dietitian
Quinton Ulrich is a dietitian who is also the community manager at Launch FNQ. Launch FNQ is an entrepreneur-centred incubator for tech-start ups and scale ups. Mr Ulrich moved to Cairns from Brisbane for his job and stuck around when an opportunity came up at a digital tech start-up Sophys Nutrition. He does work with kidney transplant patients, weight loss and Ironman athletes.
EMILY HART
Social Impact Co-owner and Hart Creative co-owner
Coming from a creative background Emily Hart is able to make her business fun at the age of 25. She always had a passion for dance and creative arts and that has since evolved. Her business is based on building an online presence for her clients. Ms Hart handles the client management side of her business, while her husband handles context creation.
JAMES LIPPMAN
Luminosity Film Studios owner
James Lippman is a photographer who mainly focuses on weddings. He has a history of doing wedding videography, but quickly realised photography was his passion. He always loved the creative industries in school which then kickstarted his photography career. Mr Lippman is 29 years old and is keen to see where his photography career will take him.
RHIANNON INNES
HerSkin Studio owner
After working as a registered nurse for eight years with a plastic surgeon, Rhiannon Innes decided it was time to open up her own clinic this year at 27. She is a new business owner and loves what she does. Ms Innes has spent her time training to master the facial aesthetics.
LANCE HENDERSON
South Cairns Cutters women’s coach
South Cairns former player Lance Henderson ended his playing career after he broke his neck. But this didn’t stop Mr Henderson from continuing his passion at the age of 29. The reserves player was recently named the head coach of the Cutters women’s team for 2022.
FRANKIE TRUMPER
Pretty Muay Thai & Boxing co-owner
Frankie Trumper is only 27 and owns a boxing gym with her partners. The business opened up just before Christmas. She runs the whole show and the marketing side of things. Ms Trumper likes to explore her creativity by posting fun videos on Instagram to promote the business.
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