Western Sydney University is pleased to announce it is joining Uniseed – Australia's longest-running venture fund.
In a significant expansion of Uniseed's research partners, Western Sydney University is one of a number of NSW universities joining the collaboration which includes the University of Newcastle, the University of Technology Sydney (UTS) and Macquarie University. In addition, Monash University also joins Uniseed as a full research partner.
Deputy Vice-Chancellor Research, Enterprise and Innovation, Professor Deborah Sweeney, said the University is delighted to be part of such an important collaboration which will strengthen Australia's research output, and most critically, will boost opportunities for all-important research commercialisation.
"We are incredibly pleased to be joining this important research commercialisation initiative. As a young, internationally-ranked University we are dedicated to cross-disciplinary research and innovation that is actively tackling some of our most pressing challenges and driving meaningful change for communities around the globe," said Professor Sweeney.
"Western Sydney University has significantly invested in our own research commercialisation ecosystem, including the Innovation Futures program, to translate, commercialise and amplify our research endeavours which we anticipate will strongly complement the work with Uniseed and future R&D collaborations.
"Our local and global impact is evidenced by our being been named number one in the world for the second year in a row in the prestigious Times Higher Education Impact Rankings, including being ranked first in the world for partnership for the UN's Sustainable Development Goals.
"Working collaboratively with government, industry and our local and international research partners we are committed to driving world-class commercialisation that can boost Australia's productivity and economic growth."
The five new partners join Uniseed along with the Universities of Queensland, New South Wales, Melbourne, and Sydney, and Australia's national science agency CSIRO, each of whom currently spend over $1 billion a year on research.
The newly expanded set of partners are all ranked within the top 25 Australian universities for research expenditure, collectively spend around $7.7 billion on research annually.
Uniseed's Chief Executive Officer, Dr Peter Devine, said that the expanded partner set demonstrates the important role Uniseed can play in investing in researchers, technologies and businesses that will change the world for the better.
"Since the foundation of Uniseed in 2000, we have helped fund 66 start-ups, each born from Australian research and ingenuity. Seventeen of these have achieved commercial deals with international companies, which is a very high conversion rate. Notable examples include the sale of Spinifex Pharmaceuticals to Novartis AG in 2015, Fibrotech Therapeutics sale to Shire plc in 2014, Aurtra's sale to Schneider Electric in 2022 and Kinoxis Therapeutics' collaborative deal with Boehringer Ingelheim in 2023.
"The existing partners and I are proud to welcome five new universities to the Uniseed partnership…Each university represented in the partnership is of excellent quality and reputation – each ranked within the top 25 of Australian universities, and joined by CSIRO, Australia's preeminent scientific institution.
"This is a very significant partnership expansion as it considerably expands the reach we can offer in funding new startups and commercialising technologies developed by Australian research institutions. Where previously we had the ability to support 42% of spin outs from research organisations in Australia, our partners will now cover more than half of all commercial research output generated by Australian institutions."
