Thoughts on the NRF - Innovation Aus

Innovationaus.com have published this article outlining some of our perspective on Australia’s National Reconstruction Fund - titled ‘NRF needs ‘more shots on goal’ to build a Future Made in Australia’ (Click this link for the full article)

In summary, we believe the $15billion industry fund is very much needed, and well intentioned to fill venture capital gaps in Australia’s hardware and manufacturing sectors.
However one of the holes in the Australian capital market seems to be between $5m and $20m, and the NRF, when coming in for equity, are only designed to contribute to a round, yet their smallest cheque is reported to be more than $10m, implying that typically a round would be circa $30m or more before the NRF could get involved.
We believe that the government risk matrix should not be entirely financial, but rather they should also give consideration to the jobs being created, keeping innovators in Australia, and the overall impact on Australia’s supply chain and supporting industries. Even if a company that receives some funding fails, the innovators tend to take the lessons learnt and build another business, with much higher odds of success each successive time. All the employees they had have stayed in Australia and built key transferrable skills that aid in our national sovereignty, as we rebuild the Australian manufacturing sector.
It is our hope that we can work with the NRF at some point, as whilst we are yet to receive funding, they have been quite easy and pleasant to deal with, and seem willing to engage meaningfully with us. It is a mixed blessing therefore that whilst we need more capital, we don’t need quite as much as they would like us to ask for.