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It’s been a week of big fund announcements: two from the British Business Bank (a £150 million fund for the north of England, a £210 million fund for the southeast), a $500 million fund for Israeli institutions, and an A$150 million fund for spinouts in Australia’s New South Wales.
On the surface, they all look like signs of global momentum in innovation funding. But the last of these deserves scrutiny. The fund is being dangled in front of voters before a March 2027 election, and its launch won’t happen until July, if at all. That should raise eyebrows.
The timing is already proving fodder for the conservative opposition (which had been in power until 2023), which attacked Labor’s innovation policy as “Frankenstein’s monster” that is stitching “together old funding, dead programmes and Liberals and Nationals-era achievements”.
They’re predictable, cheap shots. But universities are being asked to co-develop a fund whose political lifespan depends on an election outcome they cannot control. Commercialisation is a long-term game, especially in the areas NSW has identified as its strengths—deep tech, biomedical science, environmental science. A fund that may vanish in March before writing a single cheque is a distraction.
Yes, it takes time to set up a fund, but universities should question whether spending resources on helping to build something that might not survive the election is worthwhile.
While it’s too early to call which way the electorate will swing, Labor leads a minority government, and 49% of voters think the state is heading in the wrong direction.
For now, universities should focus their energy towards vehicles that already exist or that they’re already developing, not letting themselves be turned into a political football. The University of Sydney, for example, is reportedly working on a large venture fund.
Australia, like many other nations, produces world-class research but struggles to commercialise it. That gap has persisted for years. Funding spinouts properly would help narrow it. But stability is the precondition.
Universities should not step back entirely. But they shouldn’t reorganise their innovation strategies around a vehicle whose political certainty is contingent on an election seven months away. If Labor wins and the fund is genuinely resourced, revisit the opportunity. If the opposition takes power, invest energy in the alternatives that have survived the transition, because the wording in the opposition’s press release indicates a spinout fund wouldn’t survive.
Here’s the practical reality: spinouts needing funding today cannot wait until July 2027. Universities should focus on helping their portfolio companies raise capital through existing channels. Holding their fire now may ultimately delay the government fund’s launch until the autumn, but that’s still the better outcome for spinouts.
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