Capital Brief

Capital Brief is an Australian news website that primarily covers business and politics. It launched in August 2023 and is aimed at founders, executives, investors and politicians and policymakers.

The editor-in-chief is John McDuling, the former national business editor of The Sydney Morning Herald and The Age.

Journalists are based in Sydney, Melbourne and Canberra. They include chief political correspondent Anthony Galloway, VC and startups correspondent Bronwen Clune, legal and regulatory affairs correspondent Laurel Henning, media correspondent John Buckley, markets and finance correspondent Jack Derwin, technology correspondent Dan Van Boom, associate editor business and geopolitics Philip Wen and associate editor banking and finance Andrew Cornell.

Its main newsletter, The Edition, is published at 4.30pm weekdays. Specialist newsletters Capital Gains (banking and finance), Prima Facie (legal affairs), Sweat Equity (VC and startups), and Political Capital (politics and policy) are published weekly.

The company also produces the daily M&A, equity capital markets and VC deals newsletter Letter of Intent, which was acquired in 2023 for an undisclosed sum.

Its business model is subscription based and unlike many Australian media companies, it does not collect personal data for advertisement targeting. Its "reader-revenue-first and journalism-first" approach is modelled on the US websites The Information, Axios and Semafor.

The publication includes breaking news provided by national newswire Australian Associated Press in a "briefings" format that is unique to the publication.

It is the first publication from Scire, a start-up launched by former Fairfax Media executives Chris Janz and David Eisman. The venture was confirmed in March 2023 after months of speculation in Australian media. Janz was previously publisher of The Sydney Morning Herald, The Age and The Australian Financial Review and led the initiatives that prevented The Age and Herald from discontinuing their print editions.

Scire is backed by Sydney venture capital firm Shearwater Capital.