Looking for a program for your SME?
Every day, we work to connect small to medium sized businesses (SMEs) to world-class research and development, whether within CSIRO or the Australian research ecosystem. Our SME Connect team help Australian start-ups, small and medium businesses uncover what’s possible through research and development; taking an idea from concept through to execution to drive business growth. We can connect you to the right research expertise for your business, as well as access to funding support, world-class facilities, training, and links to other CSIRO opportunities, networks and the Australian research sector.
How can we assist your business?
SME Connect offers five programs, with three that have matched-funding grants for projects and placements for SME businesses of all sizes. We help SMEs by:
- streamlining the connection and collaboration process between SMEs and research organisations
- providing assistance at all stages of the collaboration process from start to finish.
- defining the business problem to be solved, and/or identifying the research opportunity
- locating the right research capability to meet those needs
- facilitating the project scoping and design
- accessing and applying for grant funding
- assisting with project agreements and contracting.
[Image appears of text “CSIRO” in the foreground and a person going downstairs can be seen in the background, and text appears: SME Connect]
[Images move through to show a side view of Simon Hanson talking on a Smartphone, Simon talking to the camera, and then a close view of Simon talking on the phone, and text appears: Simon Hanson, Director, SME Connect – CSIRO]
Simon Hanson: I’m Simon Hanson. I’m the Director of the CSIRO’s SME Connect team and our role is to connect Australian start-ups and SMEs with the research sector.
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We’ve got great businesses in Australia, great researchers.
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The challenge has always been to actually bring them together to do productive collaborations, productive projects.
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Our role is to act as an intermediary between business and research.
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Our facilitators actually sit down with companies and researchers, make sure that they understand each other.
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Researchers have their own language. Businesses have their own language.
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We bring them together to make sure that they’re, they’re aligned and that the project that the research team does meets the businesses priorities.
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We get a lot of really stand out moments. Sometimes it’s the simpler projects that deliver the biggest impact.
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I remember one with Australian Plant Proteins in our Kick-Start programme.
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We helped Australian Plant Proteins work with CSIRO.
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We managed to enhance the, the efficiency of their protein extraction process.
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They built a, a fantastic manufacturing facility in, in Horsham in Victoria worth tens of millions of dollars, and they’ve now gone on to expand that facility.
[Images move through of a close view of a female working in a lab, and then Simon watching the female work in the lab]
And I think it’s a great example of where we can work with a company, work with a research team, to bring about a really high impact outcome.
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We’ve done over 2,000 projects between industry and research over the last several years.
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There’s great opportunities to amplify that, to expand that.
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What it means I think for Australia is it means growing companies, it means exports, it means employment, it means vibrant industries.
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In SME Connect we’ve got a number of programmes and businesses, wherever they are at their journey, we’ve got an offering for them.
[Image changes to show a side view of Simon talking to the camera, and then images move through to show Simon and Dr George Feast seated on a park bench in conversation]
We can help you find the right researcher and we can ensure that the project will meet your business priorities.
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And very importantly, we can get you access to funding to offset the costs of doing the project.
[Image changes to show views of Simon talking talking to the camera, and then a close and then medium view of Simon talking to a female client]
So, wherever you’re up to in the business journey, we can help you.
[Image changes to show a medium view of Simon talking to a female client, and then the image changes to show the CSIRO logo on a white screen, and text appears: CSIRO, Australia’s National Science Agency]
Who knows where it can take you but we’re confident we can help you get to the next level.