# Luke Fryer

> Luke Fryer is the founder and CEO of Harri, a New York-based workforce management and human capital management platform built for the hospitality industry and other service-driven businesses. A former restaurateur who opened Australia's first Burger King franchise and later held the Australian rights to wagamama, Fryer moved to New York in 2007 and co-founded Harri in December 2011 to fix the fragmented, low-tech process of finding, hiring, scheduling and retaining frontline workers. Today Harri serves over 500 enterprise customers across 35,000+ restaurant and hotel locations and roughly four million hospitality employees, and in 2023 it raised $43 million in growth equity to expand its AI capabilities and move into retail and healthcare.

- **Role:** Founder & CEO at Harri
- **Organizations:** Harri, wagamama Australia, The Counter, Ramen Co.
- **Nationality:** Australian
- **Education:** Bachelor of Business Administration, International Business, University of Technology, Sydney
- **Known for:** Founded and scaled Harri to serve over 500 enterprise customers across 35,000+ restaurant and hotel locations and roughly four million hospitality employees globally, Raised a combined ~$110M in funding, including a $43M growth equity round in October 2023, Built a platform that consolidates up to 30 fragmented point solutions into a single mobile-first enterprise system

## Career timeline

- **1998** — Completed Bachelor of Business Administration in International Business at University of Technology, Sydney
- **~2000** — At age 22, opened the first Burger King franchise in Australia
- **2002** — Secured Australian franchise rights for the wagamama Noodle Bar; grew it into one of Australia's Top 100 Fastest Growing Companies for three consecutive years
- **2007** — Relocated to New York and began developing restaurants, including The Counter gourmet burger franchise and Ramen Co.
- **2011** — Co-founded Harri in December to transform hospitality workforce management
- **2023** — Harri raised $43M in growth equity led by Atalaya Capital Management and Golub Growth
- **2025** — Launched open beta of Harri Agentic AI, including the 'Salli' agent, with early adopters such as KFC and Jersey Mike's

## Achievements

- Founded and scaled Harri to serve over 500 enterprise customers across 35,000+ restaurant and hotel locations and roughly four million hospitality employees globally
- Raised a combined ~$110M in funding, including a $43M growth equity round in October 2023
- Built a platform that consolidates up to 30 fragmented point solutions into a single mobile-first enterprise system
- Grew wagamama Australia into one of the country's Top 100 Fastest Growing Companies for three straight years
- Opened the first Burger King franchise in Australia at age 22

## Latest updates

- **2025-11** — Harri launched the open beta of Harri Agentic AI, a hospitality-first intelligence layer for frontline work, with early adopters including KFC and Jersey Mike's.
- **2023-10** — Harri closed a $43M growth equity round led by Atalaya Capital Management and Golub Growth to fund AI development and expansion into retail and healthcare.

## Links

- Website: https://harri.com
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/luke-fryer/
- Twitter/X: https://twitter.com/lukeharrinyc
- YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gFJ7pXY9acw
- Facebook: https://facebook.com/harriglobal

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Profile page: https://yespress.io/luke-fryer
Published by YesPress — https://yespress.io
Last updated: 2026-07-15