“Quicklook” Assessment of Greater Adelaide's Assets & Challenges ...

• They are working with the local universities to influence their curricula and they
also obtain student workers
• They have had some very successful joint projects
• An export grant system is available along with a web site that describes all the
available programs.
• Concept Technology Demonstrator (CTD) helps get funding for new projects.
• START program/matching dollars for promising programs
Barriers/Obstacles
• It is a challenge for the small company to win a prime contract
• Their market is limited to one customer – the government
• Resources:
o Very difficult to attract and retain talent – especially electronic, software
and system engineers
o Not enough graduates are available
o There needs to be experienced as well as ‘fresh’ talent (a balance)
o Other companies like to compete for engineers – both in Adelaide and
abroad
o The culture of the youth is that they want to leave Adelaide
o Engineers work “on projects” NOT “for companies” – cannot hold them
even for matching offers of compensation
o Workers get bored due to the length of projects in defense – they are not
seeing results or feeling a part of them.
o Engineers ‘grow up’ to be managers – causing them to lose more
engineering talent.
• Adelaide is not the ‘center of commerce’
• They have MASSIVE peaks and troughs in their industry – projects are not
steady, making it hard to keep teams together. A balance is needed.
• They are influenced by what the US wants to do
• It is difficult to market in the US because of protectionism – US tends to take up to
90% of the proceeds
• Australian Industry Involvement (AII) is mandated
• Management processes need to be improved
• Project teams tend to lose sight of the business case for a project
• Companies (or possible new companies) have to find their own ways of
commercializing a product.
• IP
o The value that the government puts on IP is unrealistic
o Legal structure is long and expensive
o Not allowed to sell to third parties
o Government does not want to own it, just have rights
o Most companies say ‘no’ to third party rights
o Government is timid on pursuing IP rights
• The market gets saturated very quickly
• Adelaide is not seen as a technology leader in the global market – no one takes
them seriously until they are in North America or Europe
• Incubator programs/grants are difficult to obtain due to the massive amounts of
paperwork required
• They must compete with their own country for their market – govt should ‘lock in’
a center of excellence in a particular area to ease this internal competition
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