David Fairfull, the founder and CEO of Metigy, has been sentenced to nine years in prison over misleading conduct and the misuse of the failed AI adtech startup’s funds.

The Federal Court convicted Fairfull on one count of making false and misleading statements to investors – he was originally charged with five counts – and another of dishonestly using his position as a director for personal gain.

He was sentenced to seven years and six months imprisonment for making false or misleading statements to investors, and three years for using his position as a director dishonestly – with 18 months served concurrently, and a non-parole period of five years and four months.

Guilty plea

Fairfull pleaded guilty to the charges in November 2025.

The plea for dishonest conduct involved borrowing $7.7 million from Metigy for his personal use to buy two properties.

He spent it on a $10.5 million six-bedroom house in the Sydney suburb of Mosman, and a $7.7 million rural retreat in Kangaroo Valley in the NSW Southern Highlands.

He had repaid $3.7 million of the loan before the startup collapsed.

The properties were sold by liquidators in December 2022, for a $1.5 million profit on the Mosman house and $1.45 million loss on the country one.

Fairfull’s guilty plea for misleading investors included three capital raises between 2018 and 2020, which raised $23 million; a secondary share sale in 2021, when investors paid nearly $15.7 million; and a planned $50 million raise just before the business collapsed.

The value of the investments involved was $39 million.

Metigy went into administration in July 2022, just 20 months after its $20 million Series B funding round, led by Cygnet Capital.

Its backers also included Regal Funds Management, OC Funds, Five V Capital, Alex Waislitz’s Thorney Investments, and CP Ventures.

The adtech startup claimed it had developed AI software for small and medium enterprise.

It was supposedly valued at $1 billion as it tried to raised another $50 million, but ultimately that was based on false information about the revenue and income Fairfull gave potential investors.

A 2023 Federal Court investigation, instigated by administrators Cathro & Partners, heard the Metigy boss allegedly told an investors he’d “doctored the statements” and “the bulk of the figures are fabricated”.

Faked revenue

Investors were told the revenue was in the millions – the truth was it was just above $43,000.

Fairfull was declared bankrupt in November 2022.

ASIC launched the criminal case against Fairfull in 2024, led by the Director of Public Prosecutions.

Justice Wendy Abraham said his offending was for personal gain and “deliberate, premeditated, sophisticated and rational”.

“Victims of these types of crimes are not confined to those who directly suffered through loss of their funds, but extend to the investing public at large,” she said, adding that it “undermines the integrity of Australia’s financial markets and system of corporate regulation and erodes the confidence of participants in the commercial world”.

This article is republished with permission from Startup Daily. You can read the original here.