Rail manufacturing strategy aims to coordinate procurement

The federal government has released a National Rail Procurement and Manufacturing Strategy, aiming to help grow a sustainable rail manufacturing sector, increase productivity, international competitiveness and industry participation. To be delivered in partnership with the states and territories the Strategy has six pillars: Develop a nationally coordinated approach to rolling stock procurement Harmonise standards for…

CSIRO programme targets SME innovation in agrifood

Start-ups and small and medium sized enterprises (SMEs)are being offered access a new online innovation learning program, ‘Innovate to Grow: Agrifood’, led by science agency CSIRO. The free 10-week online programme is designed to help Australian SMEs assess how they can advance their technologies, solutions and ideas through research and development (R&D). The programme, supported…

The enterprising story of Softlabs ERP

Introducing @AuManufacturing’s latest sponsor – SoftLabs enterprise software company. In this sponsored article, Peter Roberts talks to the company Director, Sreeni Pillamarri about the history and philosophy of this unique business. A glance through Sreeni Pillamarri’s Linkedin profile tells you a lot about about the Hyderabad, India born businessman, and a lot about how he…

Defence innovation accelerator says – find me a leader to challenge the status quo

The recently established Advanced Strategic Capabilities Accelerator in the Department of Defence is on the hunt for its most senior staff – its head and an assistant secretary. They will lead the organisation which took over disparate defence innovation efforts including the Defence Innovation Hub and Next Generation Technologies Fund. While these were considered successful,…

SA defence innovation grants open

Applications are now being sought to receive funding from South Australia’s Defence Innovation Partnership’s Collaborative Research Fund. Successful applicants will receive grants of up to $150,000 to support collaboration across government, universities and industry for early-stage defence-relevant research, development and innovation. The CRF was established in 2018 to support research partnerships between industry, academia and…