We Lag The Rest In Start-up Stakes
Sydney Morning Herald
Friday January 21, 2000
Australia was behind the rest of the world when it came to fostering small, high-tech start-ups, a visiting Israeli incubator expert claimed yesterday.
Mr Amihai Ben-David, chief executive of one of Israel's most successful privately-funded incubators, DCL Technologies, said local incubators needed to do more than merely provide a ``roof over start-ups' heads" and instead offer a more comprehensive service. Mr Ben-David is in Australia this week as part of a consortium bidding for the $78 million up for grabs in funding from the Federal Government. The money is part of the $158 million the Federal Government last year pledged to its BITS (Building IT Strengths) program.
Of the $158 million, derived from the second sale of 16.6 per cent of Telstra, $78 million has been allocated to establish incubator centres for small businesses in the IT&T sector, $40 million to fund test-beds and other information infrastructure and $40 million to Tasmania, to establish the state as the `intelligent island'. All consortia bidding for a piece of the $78 million had until yesterday afternoon to lodge their proposals.
Other members of Mr Ben-David's consortium include Melbourne management consultancy RBZ and Mr Adir Shiffman, the 25-year-old medical student who co-founded online shopping mall Supershop.com.au.
South Australian IT incubator The Playford Centre is part of another consortium bidding for funding.
If the Melbourne consortium's bid is successful, Mr Ben-David said he planned to establish a new incubator in Victoria which would provide occupants with not only real estate, but strategic management and mentoring, marketing, administrative assistance and between $600,000 and $1 million in finance.
``The incubator would be much more robust than those here," Mr Ben-David said. ``Here there are very bright young students coming out of university and lots of ideas are floating around. And Australia has the same problems as Israel, being far away and small but since this model has had success in Israel, I see no reason why we can't duplicate that here. But you're at the beginning of the road."
A spokesperson for Federal IT minister Senator Richard Alston said the 40 bids for funding would now be examined and checked against certain financial criteria. He said at least one consortium from each State and territory would receive funding and all monies would be allocated before the end of June.
© 2000 Sydney Morning Herald
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