What is the Innovation Seed Fund?
The Innovation Seed Fund is a program that provides funding to WA start-ups to help them develop early-stage proposals for novel processes, products and/or services in the health/medical sector.
Background
The Innovation Seed Fund provides the opportunity for Western Australian innovators to develop their novel health and medical solutions to prime WA’s commercialisation pipeline, create high-level health sector jobs and bring innovations that improve the health and wellbeing of the community to realisation.
Funding will be provided on a competitive basis to innovators with early-stage proposals for novel processes, products and/or services that demonstrate potential to be commercialised and that may have a major impact on the health and wellbeing of the WA community.
The Innovation Seed Fund is open to innovators based in Western Australia.
Objectives
The objectives of the fund are to:
- increase the number of new health and medical innovation start-up companies in WA
- advance the innovation maturity level of the majority of funded innovations
- improve the success of WA innovation initiatives in accessing additional funding to assist in taking the innovation to market.
Funding
Successful innovators will be awarded funding of $250,000 to $500,000 to undertake key de-risking activities that advance the innovation to a maturity level where it is positioned to attract investment through traditional funding sources to commence, or progress, the commercialisation process. Funded activities must be completed within no longer than a two-year period.
Eligible Activities
Funding will be in accordance with the following:
- Salary costs:
- Salaries must be directly attributable to the delivery of the activity outcomes.
- Salaries of up to $150,000 per annum, including on-costs, may be requested for each individual, with this limit adjusted to a pro rata amount for fractional Full Time Equivalent (FTE).
- Salary on-costs may be requested to up to 30%
- However, WA public health system applicants must claim salary on-costs in accordance with the WA Health Financial Management Manual s521 ‘Internal Salary Recoup (within WA Health entities)’ table.
- Salary funding can be used for leave entitlements that accrue during the innovation activity, however leave entitlements accrued outside this period must not be paid through this funding. In addition, severance and termination payments must not be paid through this funding.
- Innovation activity costs:
- Activity costs may include funding for essential services, equipment, consumables, and other additional expenses directly related to the innovation activity.
- Travel costs will not be approved unless these are strongly justified as being essential to the undertaking of the activity.
- Overhead charges:
- Overhead charges (also referred to as indirect/infrastructure costs, e.g. utilities) may be requested up to 10% of the total budget.
- However, WA public health system applicants cannot claim standard overhead charges, as per the Financial Management Manual s522 (RIO is an exempt organisation).
Requested FTE, salary level and activity costs must reasonably reflect the proposed innovation activity.
Eligible Applicants
To be eligible for the Innovation Seed Fund, applications must be made through a responsible entity, which must:
- have an active Australian business number (ABN)
- have a physical and operational presence in WA
- not have the funding constitute their entire financial base.
The innovation applicant must:
- be an Australian citizen or permanent resident
- reside in WA for the period of the grant
- be employed by the responsible entity for the period of the grant.
Timing
Applications close 2 May 2022.
More Information
Latest News
12 July 2022 – 17 recipients awarded $8M to commercialise their medical inventions
The Western Australian government has announced $8 million in early-stage funding to help proceed medical and health innovations developed in the state.
The first round of the Innovation Seed Fund provided assistance to 17 startups and publicly-funded institutes. The funding would “support the successful recipients to undertake activities to de-risk and advance their innovations along the pathway to commercialisation,” according to the Future Health Research and Innovation Fund’s website.
One company was awarded $500,000 to develop its prototype VeinWave device. Device fits in the palm of hand and helps visualise veins, making injections easier and more successful.
Latest Recipients
Innovation Team Lead | Responsible Entity | Project Title | Funding Awarded |
| Mr Nikhilesh Bappoo | VeinTech Pty Ltd | Developing a commercialisation-ready and clinically compatible prototype of the VeinWave to reduce cannulation insertion failure | $500,000 |
| A/Prof Jenny Downs | Telethon Kids Institute on behalf of the Centre for Child Health Research, UWA | Detecting pain in kids who can’t tell you it hurts: PainChek® for children with disabilities | $392,820 |
| Dr Sarah Doyle | What the Doctor Said Pty Ltd | An innovation to provide personalised, mobile-accessible discharge instructions for opioid medications for patients attending the emergency department, ambulatory care and hospital outpatients department at East Metropolitan Health Service | $462,332 |
| Prof Wendy Erber | The University of Western Australia | Precision Diagnostics for Blood Cancers | $499,632 |
| Prof Sue Fletcher | Murdoch University | Modulation of the Autophagy Pathway to treat Neurogenerative Diseases | $497,956 |
| A/Prof Juliana Hamzah | Curtin University | Novel medicine to improve blood circulation in patients with peripheral artery disease | $496,715 |
| A/Prof Tim Inglis | The University of Western Australia | FAST STRIDES: Flow cytometry-assisted Antimicrobial Susceptibility Test Software to Translate Innovative Diagnostics for trEating Sepsis | $497,190 |
| Prof Terrance Johns | Telethon Kids Institute on behalf of the Centre for Child Health Research, UWA | Repurposing ion channel drugs to treat brain cancer | $499,406 |
| Prof Yogesan Kanagasingam | Medivitals Pty Ltd | AI based remote monitoring platform with medical grade wearable bioband technologies | $383,250 |
| A/Prof Anthony Kicic | Telethon Kids Institute | Making bacteriophage therapy a reality: Implementation of a novel treatment pipeline to treat antimicrobial-resistant infections | $500,000 |
| A/Prof Joost Lesterhuis | Telethon Kids Institute on behalf of the Centre for Child Health Research, UWA | Activating the power of anti-cancer immunity using small molecule drugs | $496,351 |
| A/Prof Joost Lesterhuis | Telethon Kids Institute on behalf of the Centre for Child Health Research, UWA | Intraoperative immunotherapy to prevent cancer recurrence after surgery | $497,156 |
| A/Prof Samuel Lundin | Biotome Pty Ltd | Development of Helitope, a precision immunological diagnostic to determine gastric cancer risk | $497,000 |
| Prof Bill Morgan | AECONA Pty Ltd | OcuLinx™: A portable hand-held device for non-invasive measurement of intracranial pressure via the eye | $500,000 |
| Dr Matthew Payne | The University of Western Australia | Refining a novel molecular diagnostic test for prediction of women at high risk of preterm birth | $357,017 |
| A/Prof Ming Yew | Innova Medical Pty Ltd | Taking the Fuss out of Pus: A novel medical device for the percutaneous treatment of skin abscesses in an ambulatory setting | $498,973 |
| Prof Minghao Zheng | The University of Western Australia | Bio-textile collagen rope as a novel substitute to autografts for Anterior Cruciate Ligament (ACL) reconstruction | $484,396 |
| TOTAL | $8,060,194 |
