Australian Immigration Daily News

Embracing innovation, technology and science is critical to powering Australian economy to provide jobs and high living standards for all Australians. The National Innovation and Science Agenda (NISA) sets a focus on science, research and innovation as long-term drivers of economic prosperity, jobs and growth.

Innovation is critical to improving Australia’s competitiveness, standard of living, high wages and generous social welfare net, but it is not the silver bullet. We must also build on the successful economic reforms of the 1980s and 1990s, lift government efficiency and improve competition, as proposed by the Government’s response to the Harper Review.

While historically high commodity prices have driven the growth in our living standards over the last decade, fostering innovation and commercialising ideas will be a key driver of future jobs and growth.

Innovative firms are more competitive, more able to capture increased market share and more likely to increase employment than their competitors. Over the period 2006-2011, 1.4 million new jobs were created by firms aged less than three years old. Employment in mature businesses, in contrast, fell 400,000.

Too few Australian students are studying science, maths and computing in schools – skills that are critical to prepare Australian students for the jobs of the future. Australia also need to create an environment that attracts the world’s best talent to our shores.

The government will support all Australian students to embrace the digital age by promoting coding and computing in schools to ensure our students have the problem solving and critical reasoning skills for high wage jobs. The government will also link Australia to other innovative economies and change the visa system to attract more entrepreneurial and research talent from overseas.

In March 2018, the Government announced 2 pilot schemes targeted at supporting talent and innovation in Australia.

These schemes are the Global Talent Scheme and Supporting Innovation in South Australia.

Together, these aim to support business growth, skills transfer and job creation by attracting highly-skilled global talent to help foster innovative businesses in Australia.

These will support innovation in different ways:

The Global Talent Scheme will provide:

• businesses, including Australian startups, with a way to sponsor highly-skilled and specialised workers not covered by the standard Temporary Skill Shortage (TSS) visa (subclass 482) program
• the cutting-edge skills Australia needs to compete globally.

The Supporting Innovation in South Australia scheme will help support South Australia to attract foreign entrepreneurs to take forward innovative ideas and launch seed-stage startups.

For South Australia, startups are important for the future prosperity of the Australian economy. Startups generate new jobs, drive innovation and bring opportunities to diversify our economy.

This pilot scheme will:

• complement existing visas for startups and entrepreneurs in the Business Innovation and Investment program
• ensure Australia remains open and competitive in attracting the best and brightest entrepreneurial talent needed to drive innovative ideas to commercial reality.

According to South Australian Government website, fostering entrepreneurship and innovation and has given an undertaking to the Steven Marshall Liberal Team to pilot a new visa initiative in South Australia.

Under this initiative, new visa arrangements that allow State Governments to partner with business incubators in attracting foreign entrepreneurs to Australia will be piloted in South Australia, before a national rollout in 2019.

Under this initiative, foreign entrepreneurs and investors with an innovative idea and a supporting business plan will be able to apply for a temporary visa to take forward their venture in Australia.

Applicants will not need capital backing, unlike the current Entrepreneur Visa which requires demonstrated funding of at least $200,000.

Instead, applicant’s proposals will be vetted by State or Federal Government entities, with these entities able to partner with incubators and accelerators to identify potential applicants for nomination.

Entrepreneurs who are successful in establishing their business venture in Australia will become eligible to apply for permanent residence.

The South Australian Government is working with the Department of Home Affairs on the implementation details for the visa which will be available in the 2018-19 program year.

Further information is available here: https://www.migration.sa.gov.au/business-migrants/why-south-australia