In an exclusive interview with Fintech Business, NSW Trade Minister Stuart Ayres said Sydney is starting to attract more and more international fintech firms.

"You’ve got organisations like Dropbox, Qualtrics, Facebook, SurveyMonkey – strong IT firms are already establishing here in NSW, and particularly Sydney," Minister Ayres said.

"The strength of the strong financial services sector out of this city is a real attractor for a lot of businesses looking to set up here," he said.

For European and US businesses, Sydney represents a "fantastic safe landing zone" in the Asia Pacific region, Minister Ayres said.

There is a "unique business model" available to IT firms to have their back-of-house activities based in Sydney and their more customer-focused staff based in San Francisco, London or New York, he said.

"In a global world we should be work with  businesses around how they structure themselves," the Minister said.

When it comes to convincing Australian talent to stay put in Sydney, the biggest stumbling block is access to capital and the "immature" nature of Australian venture capital, he said.

"But we’re seeing change to that. There are more and more [venture capital] funds coming online. People are looking to tap into the strong, high-quality innovation that exists here in Australia.

"That said, I’m always happy to see Australians venturing overseas – we’ve always been a country that’s taken our great ideas offshore and shared them with the world. I don’t think that should change. It would just be great if we could commercialise a few more at home," he said.

Watch the full interview with Minister Ayres here.

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