What's your big idea
You don't have to be a multi-national to make your mark. There's help for innovation-rich but resource-poor businesses, writes Tim Mendham.
You don't have to be huge to be an innovation leader. In fact, the "skunkworks" – the 1980s concept of the lean, mean and nimble small operation – is still alive and kicking today.
Many smaller organisations are highly innovative, whether in the development of new products, new processes, adapting existing technologies and processes, or simply in the way they approach their internal administration.
They need to be, because they are working from a smaller base, with fewer resources at their disposal, and with a constant threat of annihilation by their competitors, large and small. However, they regularly lack the knowledge and wherewithal to put their innovations into practice.
But don't despair. There is help at hand. There are a number of government and private facilities that offer help, at reasonable rates, to small organisations with a good idea.
Innovation grants
Your first port of call is AusIndustry. AusIndustry is a division of the Federal Department of Industry Tourism and Resources, and it delivers a range of more than 30 business products, including innovation grants, tax and duty concessions, small business services, and support for industry competitiveness worth nearly $2 billion each year to about 10,000 small and large businesses.
To help customers with product and eligibility information, AusIndustry has customer service managers located in 26 offices across Australia, a national email hotline (hotline@ausindustry.gov.au) and website (www.ausindustry.gov.au), plus almost 60 small business field officers in regional areas.
Among the various programs here (AusIndustry lists 15 different schemes to assist small businesses), of particular note, if not widely known, is the Commercialising Emerging Technologies (COMET) program. This is a competitive scheme that supports early-growth stage and spin-off companies to successfully commercialise their innovations.
Forming strategic alliances
COMET offers funds to assist in securing third party support. To qualify, you need to be earning revenue for less than five years, have less than $5 million in revenue, defensible intellectual property (IP) and a working prototype. Business advisers offer a facilitation service to find alliances and funding.
Matthew Griffiths, based in Sydney and one of the 15 business advisers for COMET, proudly says the results have been good, albeit not as well known as they should be. Since 1999, COMET has helped 1,100 companies raise $360 million and form thousands of strategic alliances, he says.
One of these 1,100 companies is Queensland-based GrassAds, whose Druit project is an advanced system for drawing graphics on grass, especially the undulating terrain found on golf courses. GrassAds received a grant to help commercialise the product through market research, IP registration, development of a working prototype and business planning. Owner Ian Mayfield says he benefited greatly from the scheme, "particularly the advice and support provided by the business advisers".
Other programs worth following up include Commercial Ready (grants for R&D proof of concept), pre-seed funds, various state incubators, the Innovation Investment Fund, pooled development funds and, of course, the R&D tax offset scheme.
Also, the InnovationXchange Network (www.ixc.com.au) offers a service to help small businesses form alliances through its Intermediary Access program, which includes workshops, networking, access to intermediaries and promotional outlets.
So if you're innovative, have time on your hands but little else, then there is help out there. You've just got to find it.
Tim Mendham is a freelance journalist and editor of innovation magazine Fast Thinking.