The Australian research landscape is rich with talent and innovative ideas. However, there is a barrier to realising this impact. From 2009 to 2022, there has been consistent government, private industry and media attention on Australia’s need to improve the translation of research to commercial outcomes. The importance of this translation cannot be underestimated, as billions of dollars a year are lost to brilliant ideas not being used for their intended purposes. Recent evidence of this challenge is the formation of a new advisory committee for the Australian Research Council.

This newly appointed council is to provide guidance on the troubled agency’s governance and strategy as the government seeks to align publicly funded research with national priorities and improve commercial translation rates. Furthermore, in 2020 the Australian Government shaped policy options to address improved translation including a new $2.4 billion Science Future Fund to drive stronger research commercialisation.

This problem, as mentioned, is not new as there is evidence of this being a problem in 2009 when the Australian government introduced the Commercialisation Australia (CA) program. The policy objective of the CA program was to build the capacity of, and opportunities for, Australia’s researchers, entrepreneurs, and innovative small and medium-sized firms to convert ideas into successful commercial ventures. However, still in 2022, Australia faces the issue of conversion to impact. The vulnerability is in translating research results into commercial success and perhaps more fundamentally, making sure that research is commercially focused in the first place.

This application to the Australian Business Awards – Innovation Category – is based on Impact Innovation’s solution-driven initiative to this complex nature of translating research to impact with its Commercialisation Navigator®.

The Commercialisation Navigator® was built to address the issue of translating research to commercial outcomes by aiding decision-makers within the innovation process to validate assumptions. Through extensive research, Impact Innovation determined that an underlying issue with translation was that people were trying to commercialise based on assumptions. Assumptions include customers’ willingness to pay, the usability of the technology and the ease of integration into the supply chain. If these assumptions are wrong then the chances of successful outcomes are drastically reduced. The Commercial Navigator® highlights key failure points early in the commercialisation journey and helps to clarify the assumptions being used and the impact of incorrect assumptions. Furthermore, the Commercialisation Navigator® prioritises which assumptions are the most critical to validate to ensure efficient progression.

Therefore, Impact Innovation’s Commercial Navigator® is a tool to help commercialisation teams maintain focus on priority actions and uncover blind spots. This framework conducts gap analysis and then acts as a strategic planning tool. The tool was developed to strengthen the capability of a team. It provides objective insight into the priority of actions to address assumptions and innovation risk. The Commercialisation Navigator® has delivered on this, which is evident in the recent use of the tool with organisations such as CSIRO.

For information about Impact Innovation visit impactinnovation.com