Australia’s Economic Accelerator (AEA) Grant

  • Grants from $50,000-$5,000,000 depending on project stage
  • Innovate Stream – Applications open until August 29th, 2025
  • Ignite Stream – Applications open until September 3rd, 2025

This program is currently open for applications under two distinct streams:

•AEA Innovate Stream – closing 29 August 2025 - Offers up to $5 million in funding for early-stage research and development projects.

•AEA Ignite Stream – closing 3 September 2025 - Offers up to $500,000 in funding for later-stage projects that are closer to market and require support to scale or commercialise.

Key Requirements

Project must fit into one of the Australian Government identified priority areas of the economy, outlined in the National Reconstruction Fund Corporation (Priority Areas) Declaration 2023.

Priority areas for this round include:

  • Critical and strategic minerals processing
  • Sustainable fuels
  • Agriculture and food technology
  • Space
  • Renewable energy
  • Quantum
  • Artificial intelligence
  • Advanced manufacturing

Co-contributions can be cash, in-kind, or a combination of cash and in-kind. The contribution is a minimum of 10% for Ignite and a minimum of 50% for Innovate.

What is eligible for funding?

AEA Ignite Stream

Eligible expenditure items may include:

  • Personnel, including:
    • salaries and on-costs for personnel directly employed for the project activities
    • paying assistance to research students for the duration of the grant
    • backfilling (teaching relief) costs for academic staff who are assigned to the project
  • Expert services of a third party directly related to and essential for the project, for example:
    • business development and knowledge transfer costs
    • design costs associated with constructing, assembling, installing and/or commissioning plants or prototypes
    • advice required to obtain relevant regulatory approvals
    • access to and use of specialist equipment
    • use of manufacturing facilities to manufacture prototypes or components.

Travel costs essential to the project, including economy travel costs for domestic and/or international travel and accommodation, for example to access specialised expertise.

Verifiable Plant and Equipment costs, for example:

  • running costs for new or pre-existing plant
  • hire, rental, or leasing costs

Other costs directly relevant to the project, which may include:

  • staff development and training that supports the achievement of project outcomes
  • IP protection expenditure, such as costs associated with patenting
  • acquisition of new and leading-edge technology where adaptation to that technology will contribute directly to the success of the project.

AEA Innovate Stream

Eligible expenditure items may include:

Personnel, including:

  • salaries and on-costs for personnel directly employed for the project activities
  • paying assistance to research students for the duration of the grant

Expert services of a third party for example:

  • design costs associated with constructing, assembling, installing and/or commissioning plants or prototypes
  • advice required to obtain relevant regulatory approvals
  • access to and use of specialist equipment.

Travel costs essential to the project, including economy travel costs for domestic and/or international travel and accommodation, for example to access specialised expertise.

Verifiable Plant and Equipment costs, for example:

  • depreciation costs of constructed, new or pre-existing plant
  • running costs for new or pre-existing plant
  • hire, rental, or leasing costs
  • use of manufacturing facilities for the purpose of manufacture of prototype, or
  • where new equipment is purchased, the eligible costs claimed must be proportional to the time used for the project.
  • purchasing of materials, equipment or services from overseas

Other costs directly relevant to the project, which may include:

  • staff development and training that supports the achievement of project outcomes
  • IP protection expenditure, such as costs associated with patenting
  • acquisition of new and leading-edge technology where adaptation to that technology will contribute directly to the success of the project.
  • participation of lead or named participants in business or research Accelerator or Incubator programs available in Australia
  • costs of independent audit of project expenditure.

What companies are eligible for funding?

What companies are eligible for funding?

Only the following organisations are eligible to submit an AEA grant application:

    • an Australian public (‘Table A’) university, or
    • an Australian private (‘Table B’) university, or
    • an Australian organisation in the ‘University College’ category.

Is this grant competitive or entitlement based?

Competitive. Your application will be assessed among other applications by a judging panel.

How can I increase my chances of winning this grant?

By engaging an accredited government grants consultant, such as Avant Group.

Competitive grants often require significant business case development and project analysis to support the application, this may include detailed presentations supporting the project’s merit, projected sales, cost-benefit analysis and more.

As part of your engagement with Avant Group, your account manager will assess the required documents and will provide the following as needed to support your grant submission.

Grant application writeup including a detailed presentation illustrating how the grant funding will contribute to your project, how the funding will contribute to the project’s budget, a project milestone plan, delivery timeline, impact on employment if applicable and a breakdown of the management and leadership team for the project

  • Industry analysis presentation
  • Competitor Analysis Presentation
  • Marketing and Sales Analysis Presentation
  • 3-5 year Cashflow Forecast
  • 3-5 year Balance Sheet Forecast
  • Cost-Benefit Analysis of Grant Funding
  • End-to-end grant application including information collating, analysis and application writing
  • CAPEX (Capital Expenditure) cost-benefit analysis
  • Stakeholder relations and Risk Mitigation Plans
  • Any other relevant forecasting that will support your application

How can I get help with my application? Or know if I’m likely to win funding?

Avant Group offers a no-obligation assessment of your eligibility for funding and will assess your likelihood of a successful grant application.