Assyrian Business Council of Australia: Connecting a growing diaspora through entrepreneurship
With the second and third generations of Assyrians coming of age in Australia, the increasingly well-established community is turning its focus toward entrepreneurship.
The Assyrian Business Council of Australia (ABCA), founded in 2025, has quickly established itself as a key platform for Assyrian entrepreneurs. Designed to foster networking, mentorship, and collaboration, the ABCA represents a significant step forward for the Assyrian community in the country.
At the core of the business council are some of the community’s most accomplished professionals, including Anter Isaac who is the chairman of Football Australia, the governing body for soccer in Australia. With him in the council board are Susan Warda, a successful lawyer and partner of a leading Sydney family law firm, Dr George Marano, founder and Principal Consultant at a boutique firm dedicated to strategic management, Dr Daniella Beniamen, a neurosurgeon, and Lucas Barkho, a lawyer at an award winning law firm. Together, they have begun to shape an organisation that aims to unite Assyrians across industries, generations, and backgrounds.
Patterns of entrepreneurship
While no formal studies exist on entrepreneurship among Assyrian-Australians, Assyrians own a significant number of small businesses in areas such as Sydney’s City of Fairfield, City of Blacktown, and in Melbourne. These businesses span a wide range of sectors, including real estate, finance, retail, service and hospitality. With new generations of Australian-born Assyrians graduating in diverse fields and entering the workforce, more are choosing to pursue entrepreneurship compared to the first generation that settled in Australia. And while the tight-knit community networks were more crucial for the first generation in Australia, the second- and third-generation Assyrian-Australians are entering the market with a higher degree of professionalisation, as more of them have an education and a professional network, enabling them to scale and establish larger services. This growing trend is one the ABCA aims to encourage and strengthen.
"An Assyrian business incubator"
In less than a year of its founding, the ABCA has already managed to host three successful networking events. The first, in Sydney's Central Business District, offered attendees a professional setting to meet, exchange ideas, and explore opportunities for collaboration. The second, held at the Assyrian Sports & Cultural Club in Fairfield Heights, created a more relaxed and welcoming environment where established business leaders mingled with young professionals and students. The third, a Women in Business event, held in Sydney's CBD, which offered a space for Assyrian women to hear from a speaker about about brand building and developing confidence with business skills.
The gatherings have highlighted the enthusiasm within the Assyrian community for spaces that foster connection, learning, and growth, serving as an unofficial business incubator. "If we are to survive as a people we must learn to work together, and through business we can maintain and grow what it is to be Assyrian," Dr George Marano told the Post.
With its foundation laid, the ABCA looks to officially launch in 2026. The path forward and the vision are clear for Dr Marano and his colleagues: “We want an organisation that establishes and facilitates the economic empowerment of Assyrians in Australia, it's that simple”, he said.
