Despite a global slowdown, Melbourne’s startup ecosystem is thriving, with startup growth outpacing most leading ecosystems. The State of Victoria’s startup agency, LaunchVic, actively supports Victoria’s entire startup ecosystem, which now has an enterprise value of AU$91 billion. LaunchVic’s support includes the Alice Anderson Fund, a $10 million sidecar investment fund to ensure female startup founders have equal access to early-stage funding. It has so far unlocked $33 million in co-investments from private investors of an expected AU$40 million ($26.6 million) for female founders by 2024. Additionally, LaunchVic’s 30X30 is an executive education program for scaleups with a goal to accelerate the number of unicorns in Victoria by 2030.

More broadly, the Victorian government’s AU$2 billion ($1.3 billion) Breakthrough Victoria fund aims to stimulate commercialization activity. In June 2022, Breakthrough Victoria unveiled its AU$100 million ($70 million) University Innovation Platform, which will form pre-seed funds with universities. The same month, the University of Melbourne announced the Tin Alley Ventures Fund, an AU$100 million ($66.6 million) fund in partnership with Tanarra Capital, to support the commercialization of research. University RMIT was ranked #2 globally for Blockchain by CoinDesk, and its RMIT Blockchain Innovation Hub is the world’s first research center dedicated to the social science of Blockchain. In August 2022, UST launched its first Innovation Lab in Australia at Melbourne Connect.