Business Grants

The Skills Development Fund supports production companies, game development studios and screen businesses to provide skills development through structured work-based learning.

This involves:

• the development of a detailed Skills Development Plan that:
  • addresses the key skills needs of “below-the-line crew” (“Crew”) and Gamemakers on a given production/s, games project or more broadly the national screen sector; and
  • supports diversity, equity and inclusion;

AND

• an appointed individual from within the company or an external consultant in the role of Skills Development Officer, to oversee the delivery and implementation of the Plan.

Funding of up to $80,000 is available to deliver an applicant’s Skills Development Plan. The fund is open to significant productions or projects across all formats and genres. Game development studios are eligible, as are film and TV production companies and screen businesses servicing the Australian screen sector. A co-contribution from the applicant is strongly recommended.

Multiple rounds for this grant will be available over the 2024 to 2025 period, see the grant web page for full details.

The Kickstarter Challenge gives five finalists the opportunity to take centre stage and pitch their new business idea for the chance to secure a share of $60,000 in equity-free funding. Finalists will also score a paid trip to the nation’s capital and support for the journey ahead with mentoring sessions, media training and more.

2024 categories

• Health, Wellbeing and The Care Economy
• Climate Change and Sustainability
• Community Impact
• Fintech or Ecommerce
• Popular Vote

The total value of the equity-free cash prize money is $60,000 AUD which will be shared amongst the Competition Finalists as follows:
(a) The Competition winner (Winner) will receive $30,000 AUD;
(b) Each finalist (Finalist) will receive $7,500 AUD.
(c) One (1) return flight to the Grand Final in Canberra (if they reside outside the ACT);
(d) Accommodation for the duration of the Grand Final;
(e) Media and PR training and social media support in the lead-up to the Grand Final;
(f) Grand Final presentation support from professional graphic designers;
(g) Mentorship opportunities;
(h) A chance to meet key decision-makers to help develop their business idea; and
(i) The opportunity to feature on an episode of Secrets of a Self Starter podcast.

The Aged Care Capital Assistance Program provides aged care infrastructure grants aimed at maintaining or increasing access to quality aged care services in thin market settings for people:

• from First Nations communities
• living in regional, rural, and remote areas
• who are homeless, or at risk of becoming homeless
• with other complex and diverse needs, including dementia.
• improve viability and sustainability of service offerings.

For this grant opportunity up to $200 million is available to support activities that will:

• deliver more mainstream residential care beds i.e., new residential care services and/or expansion of existing residential care services (excluding Multi-purpose Services (MPS) and National Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Flexible Aged Care Program (NATSIFACP) services)
• upgrade, or refurbish existing residential-based aged care services (including mainstream, MPS and NATSIFACP services)  

in the following locations:

• regional centres to very remote communities: Modified Monash Model - MM2 to 7
• metropolitan areas (MM1) for projects specifically targeting care to First Nations people.

The Skills Development Fund supports production companies, game development studios and screen businesses to provide skills development through structured work-based learning.

This involves:

• the development of a detailed Skills Development Plan that:
  • addresses the key skills needs of “below-the-line crew” (“Crew”) and Gamemakers on a given production/s, games project or more broadly the national screen sector; and
  • supports diversity, equity and inclusion;

AND

• an appointed individual from within the company or an external consultant in the role of Skills Development Officer, to oversee the delivery and implementation of the Plan.

Funding of up to $80,000 is available to deliver an applicant’s Skills Development Plan. The fund is open to significant productions or projects across all formats and genres. Game development studios are eligible, as are film and TV production companies and screen businesses servicing the Australian screen sector. A co-contribution from the applicant is strongly recommended.

Multiple rounds for this grant will be available over the 2024 to 2025 period, see the grant web page for full details.

Rural GPs providing unsupervised anaesthetics, obstetrics, surgery and/or emergency medicine may be eligible for the Rural Procedural Grants Program (RPGP) to help maintain and update your skills.

The Rural Procedural Grants Program (RPGP) provides financial assistance to GPs who provide procedural and/or emergency medicine services in unsupervised settings in rural and remote areas. This government funding supports GPs with access to relevant educational activities to maintain or update their procedural and/or emergency medicine skills.

Procedural GPs can receive up to $20,000 per financial year, and GPs providing hospital-based emergency services can receive up to $6000 per financial year. Additional funding of $6000 per financial year is available for eligible GPs providing emergency mental health services.

The Skills Development Fund supports production companies, game development studios and screen businesses to provide skills development through structured work-based learning.

This involves:

• the development of a detailed Skills Development Plan that:
  • addresses the key skills needs of “below-the-line crew” (“Crew”) and Gamemakers on a given production/s, games project or more broadly the national screen sector; and
  • supports diversity, equity and inclusion;

AND

• an appointed individual from within the company or an external consultant in the role of Skills Development Officer, to oversee the delivery and implementation of the Plan.

Funding of up to $80,000 is available to deliver an applicant’s Skills Development Plan. The fund is open to significant productions or projects across all formats and genres. Game development studios are eligible, as are film and TV production companies and screen businesses servicing the Australian screen sector. A co-contribution from the applicant is strongly recommended.

Multiple rounds for this grant will be available over the 2024 to 2025 period, see the grant web page for full details.

Public Lending Right (PLR) and Educational Lending Right (ELR) are Australian Government programs that compensate Australian creators and publishers in recognition of income lost through free multiple use of their books in public and educational lending libraries. These programs support the enrichment of Australian culture by encouraging the growth and development of Australian writing.

A creator or a publisher must register and submit title claims within five years from the year of publication. Books are surveyed in a sample of either public lending libraries (PLR) or school, TAFE and university libraries (ELR).

Eligible creators are:

• authors, editors, illustrators, translators and compilers
• Australian citizens, wherever they reside, or non-citizens who normally reside in Australia (eligibility ceases if residency in Australia ceases)
• those who receive on-going royalties from the sale of their book.

Eligible publishers are:

• companies whose business consists wholly or substantially of the publication of books and who regularly publish in Australia—'regularly publish' is defined as at least once in the preceding three year period
• non-profit organisations that publish to further their aims or objectives
• self-publishing creators.

Reopening of the Bin Trim Equipment Rebates Program for eligible NSW businesses, councils, and organisations. $6 million has been allocated to continue the initiative for three years until 30 June 2027, or until all funding is used.

Rebates up to $50,000 are being offered to cover up to 50% of the cost of small-scale, on-site equipment or technology that avoids, reduces, reuses, or recycles waste. The initiative is aimed at supporting businesses to transition to a circular economy.

Some examples of equipment and technologies that may be funded include but are not limited to:

• balers
• briquette presses
• bulk bag stands and bulk bags
• cardboard perforator
• commercial worm farms
• compactors
• glass crushers
• granulators
• organics rapid decomposition units (where output is sent to a licenced composting facility)
• plastic injection moulders
• shredders
• smart scales and other food waste monitoring equipment
• source separation bins, wheelie bins, skip bins and other bin equipment – with bin signs and stickers
• trolleys to transport waste and maximise waste separation and diversion.

Businesses applying for the Rebates Program must:

• have a commercial and industrial (C&I) waste service at a site in NSW
• have a valid ABN and employ one or more full time employees in NSW, and
• send C&I waste to landfill in NSW.

Businesses can include entities that are registered charities, not-for-profits, public entities (including schools and hospitals), and government organisations.

You can only apply for concessional this loan if your small business is currently or has been supplying goods or services relating to primary production to farm businesses in an affected area. This loan is not available to farm businesses.

The loan is for ten years and has no fees, 2 years interest free, 3 years interest only and 5 years principal and interest.

It may be used for:

• refinance your debt
• pay suppliers
• pay for operating expenses
• pay salaries, wages and rent

The Impact Investment Ready Growth Grant provides impact businesses and mission-driven organisations with grants of up to $140,000 for business, financial, legal and other capacity building support from providers to secure investment.

Growth Grants were created in recognition of the potential for impact investing to change the way Australia addresses social issues and the important role that access to capital can play in delivering better outcomes for people and communities. They support enterprises that are high growth, can deliver positive social outcomes and have the potential to secure capital investment.

The Newsagents Assistance Fund assists eligible agents to update their NSW Lotteries retail image and fit-out to align with the NSW Lotteries brand.

The Newsagents Assistance Fund is available to NSW Lotteries Agents that were active on 30 January 2015

Trial a young person to find out if they're the right fit for your business and get $1000 to help cover the costs of the trial. During the trial, you don't pay the young person. Instead, the Australian Government gives them $200 a fortnight on top of their income support and covers their insurance.

Businesses can also receive up to $10,000 (GST inclusive) through a Youth Bonus wage subsidy if they hire an eligible young person between 15 and 24 years of age.

The young person must:

• be a fully eligible participant, commenced with a jobactive or Transition to Work provider
• have received employment services from a provider (jobactive, Transition to Work, Disability Employment Services or Community Development Programme provider) continuously for the last six months
• have mutual obligation requirements at the time they commence in the wage subsidised job
• not been in a pre-existing employment relation with you in the previous six months
• not be an immediate family member.

Concessional loan to help farm businesses in the agriculture, horticulture, pastoral, apiculture, or aquaculture industryto prepare for, manage through, and recover from drought.

The loan is for ten years and has no fees, 2 years interest free, 3 years interest only and 5 years principal and interest.

It may be used for:

• refinance your debt
• pay for operating expenses or capital
• access new debt for operating expenses and capital

You can apply for this loan if you solely or mainly sell products into supply chains that are interstate or outside Australia, or plan to in the future.

It may be used for:

• improve long-term strength, resilience and profitability
• diversify your markets
• ​refinance existing debt
• prepare for, manage through or recover from drought
• access new debt for operating expenses and capital

Get Connected is Destination NSW’s website membership program. Simple and easy to use Get Connected membership is free and is open to all tourism operators within New South Wales.

With Get Connected, Destination NSW gives you the opportunity to showcase your tourism products on Destination NSW’s consumer websites FREE of charge and tap into over 1.7 million potential customers a month, both domestic and international - that’s 21.4 million people a year who are looking for tourism products.

ARENA’s Advancing Renewables Program supports a broad range of development, demonstration and pre-commercial deployment projects that can deliver affordable and reliable renewable energy for Australian families and businesses.

The program’s objective is to fund activities that contribute to one or more of the following outcomes:

• reduction in the cost of renewable energy
• increase in the value delivered by renewable energy
• improvement in technology readiness and commercial readiness of renewable energy
• reduction in or removal of barriers to renewable energy uptake
• increased skills, capacity and knowledge relevant to renewable energy

This fund is open to applications for all activities identified in the ARENA Investment Plan, except the competitive rounds. Applications for the competitive activities are accepted during competitive rounds.

IBA assists Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples to access the skills, knowledge and resources required to start and grow viable and sustainable businesses.

After hearing about your individual circumstances and identifying what stage of the business life cycle you are at, IBA can provide an assessment of the resources and assistance that will help you to achieve your business goals. They may also work with you to develop an action plan that will assist and better equip you to make informed decisions about your business future. Our locally based staff can work closely with you to support and guide you through your business journey in meeting the challenges of developing a successful business.

The Tradex Scheme provides an upfront exemption from Customs duty and GST for eligible goods imported to Australia that are then exported within one year or other approved period. This provides a cash-flow benefit to the importer.

The goods may be:

• exported in the same condition as imported
• processed or treated then exported, or
• incorporated in other goods which are exported.

Export may be carried out by the importer or a third party. The goods must be exported within one year although approval can be sought to extend this period.

The Tradex Scheme is an alternative to the duty drawback arrangements under the Customs Act 1901. Duty drawback allows the importer to claim back Customs duty paid on goods that are then exported.

Under this grant program the foundation are seeking to support Australian social enterprise changemakers who are finding new and innovative solutions to tackle the most pressing issues within their local communities and who are now looking to build capacity to overcome the challenges of taking their concept to scale to be impact investment ready.

The foundation are looking to partner with organisations who have developed their proof of concept and are now seeking ignitor funds to scale to the next stage of their development and demonstrate impact and “investor readiness”. This program could also apply to intrapreneurs in established grassroots charities who are looking to scale the sustainability of their model and diversify their funding sources.

CSIRO Kick-Start is a new initiative for innovative Australian start-ups and small SMEs, providing funding support and access to CSIRO’s research expertise and capabilities to help grow and develop their business.

The program offers eligible businesses access to dollar-matched funding of $10,000-$50,000 to undertake the following research activities with CSIRO:

• Research into a new idea with commercial potential.
• Development of a novel or improved product or process.
• Test a novel product or material developed by the company.

Their experienced SME Connect team works alongside SMEs to identify the relevant research capabilities best suited to their needs, and facilitates researcher introductions and project scoping. They also assist with the application process and maintain an end-to-end engagement with the SME and researchers to ensure favourable outcomes for all parties.

CSIRO Kick-Start projects must be under 12 months in duration and businesses are required to make a cash contribution that matches the funding voucher.