HOW STRIVE STARTED?
We do one thing better than anyone else: we bring strangers together to connect, share, and grow. We’re the most active builders of local, national and international connections in the short-term rental world.
Every edition, every year, across every market we run in. Operators who’d never have met now work together. Tech companies land partnerships that didn’t exist before the event. Kiwi operators talk to Aussie operators talk to Bali operators, and the industry gets smaller; in the best possible way.
That’s the work.
That’s what the industry keeps coming back for. And that’s why, four years in, we’re no longer just running a local conference. We are the most successful Short Term Rental Conference brand in the APAC region.
Our Ambition
To be the biggest, most professional, short-term rental conference brand in APAC.
Not the loudest. Not the flashiest. The one serious operators and serious brands trust to deliver a room worth their time — every edition, every market, every year.
Eight STRive locations across APAC by 2029. Taken to wherever the community needs us, wherever our sponsors want to be, and wherever there’s a room full of accommodation operators who need a home to gather.
STRIVE 2023 - THE BEGINNING
2023 was the year STRIVE came to life. What started as a text message idea, bringing serious short-term rental operators and tech leaders into one room, quickly became something bigger. We gathered ambitious founders, property managers, suppliers and strategists who were ready to raise the standard of the industry. It wasn’t about ego. It was about practical conversations, real relationships and sharing what actually works.
The foundations were laid, partnerships were formed, and a community began to take shape around a simple idea: if we learn together, we grow together.
STRIVE 2024 - MOMENTUM BUILDS
STRive 2023 was meant to be a one-off. It wasn’t. Attendees asked when the next one was before the first had finished. Sponsors started planning year two before they’d unpacked from year one.
So we kept going. In 2024, ~150 travelled from across Australia and New Zealand, a 50% jump on year one. Sponsors went deeper. Conversations went sharper. Brands were discovered in the hallways, tools adopted on the spot, and collaborations that now shape the industry started with a handshake at STRive 2024.
STRIVE 2025 - PROOF OF CONCEPT
Over 200 operators, property managers, suppliers and tech leaders showed up to STRive Australia. Products launched on stage. Partnerships were sealed between sessions. Leaders were recognised at the inaugural STRive Awards — the first formal moment the APAC short-term rental industry had to celebrate its own. Sponsors didn’t just turn up for logo placement — they embedded themselves in conversations months before the event and kept building relationships long after it wrapped.
But 2025 wasn’t just about Melbourne. It was the year STRive stopped being a single-market event and became a regional platform.
STRive New Zealand launched as a full two-day edition in Auckland, extending the community across the Tasman and proving the format worked outside of home soil. The energy was the same. The conversations were the same. And partnerships that now run across both markets started in that Auckland room.
The STRive Bali Mixer followed; a one-day gathering in one of APAC’s fastest-growing hospitality markets. Smaller in scale, but huge in signal. It made one thing undeniable: there’s real appetite for a serious STR event across APAC. Bali was the proof point that set up STRive Indonesia 2026.
By year’s end, STRive was no longer a conference that ran once a year in Melbourne. It was a connected series of editions running across three countries — with the same standards, the same community, and the same mission in every market.
That’s what made 2025 the proof of concept: not the numbers, not the sponsors, not the launches. It was the moment the industry stopped being something STRive was hosting, and started being something STRive was hosting with.
STRIVE 2026 - THE BENCHMARK
By 2026, STRive isn’t emerging. It’s established.
It’s the room serious operators go to level up in, and the room serious brands go to lead from. What started as a single Melbourne edition now runs across three countries, with STRive Indonesia taking the model into South East Asia for the first time — the inaugural Bali edition landing on 10 September 2026.
The format has been refined. Sponsorship pathways are purpose-built. Masterclasses run deeper. The awards are bigger. The curated networking has been sharpened edition after edition into something that’s setting the APAC benchmark for how short-term rental events should feel — commercial, collaborative and community-driven.
2026 is also when the ambition got stated out loud: eight STRive locations across APAC by 2029. Taken to wherever the community needs us, wherever our partners want to be, and wherever there’s a room full of accommodation operators ready for a home to gather.
This is where ideas turn into execution. Where conversations turn into contracts. Where short-term rental professionals across the region don’t just attend — they build what’s next.
WHAT PEOPLE SAY ABOUT US
MEET OUR CEO & FOUNDER
BART SOBIES
2023 was the year STRIVE came to life. What started as a bold idea, bringing serious short-term rental operators and tech leaders into one room, quickly became something bigger. We gathered ambitious founders, property managers, suppliers and strategists who were ready to raise the standard of the industry. It wasn’t about hype. It was about practical conversations, real relationships and sharing what actually works. The foundations were laid, partnerships were formed, and a community began to take shape around a simple idea: if we learn together, we grow together.




































