Businesses who are majority (at least 51%) female founded (owned and run) are encouraged to consider applying for expansion funding under Round 2 of the Boosting Female Founders Initiative grant program.

The program offers co-contribution grants (up to 50% of eligible project costs) of between $25,000 and $400,000 (or up to 70% and $480,000 for regional head officed, or indigenous, disability or migrant-owned businesses).

Successful applicants are responsible for the remaining eligible project expenditure, plus any ineligible expenditure. Contributions to the project must be in cash (either privately funded, a bank loan, private investor or industry partners). In-kind contributions are not eligible.

The objectives of the program are to:

• Stimulate private sector investments into innovative startups led by women.
• Help women entrepreneurs overcome the disadvantages faced in getting access to finance and support to grow their startups.
• Enable female founders to scale-up, expand into domestic and global markets, and become self-sufficient.

How to apply
Stage 1 of the competitive process is via an Expression of Interest (EOI).

Key criteria assessed at Stage 1 includes:

• Explanation as to how the grant will help to remove barriers to scale up, expand into domestic and global markets, and become self-sufficient.
• Explanation of what growth (revenue and employment numbers) look like.
• How ready the product or service is to go to market. NOTE: the application form mentions a “Technology Readiness Level (TRL) 6 or above”, giving some indication that the review board is looking for new-tech driven businesses. While this isn’t mentioned specifically elsewhere in the documentation, our team posed the question for further clarification and was advised this should be taken as a reference to “how ready your product or service is to take to market”.  If your product or service can be categorised using the Technology Readiness Level (TRL), then this will assist with evaluating applications, but is not a pre-requisite.
• Capacity, capability and resources to grow (about the team, financial resources, networks, advisors etc).
• Amount of funding required, how you will fund your contribution and the impact funding will have on your business.

Projects will need to help the business to scale into domestic and/or global markets, with eligible activities including (by way of example):

• Developing software and apps.
• Launching and scaling products.
• Product development and marketing – for you, this could include additional marketing under the NDIS, or in domestic or international markets.
• Purchase of equipment to enable growth – for you, this may include additional fitout of plant and equipment to produce more stock, more quickly to enable expansion (note, furniture and office equipment is excluded).
• Expansion to other markets – unfortunately, you can’t include rent or purchase of new facilities, however if you could finance new facilities, you could get plant and equipment.
• Access to independent management (for example C-suite, advisory board).
• Access to relevant professional development – you may seek additional management/marketing support to develop your plans and skills to grow.

Applications for Round 1 (EOIs) close 22 April 2021.

Progressing to Stage 2

Those who are successful in being selected for Stage 2 will then have 6 weeks to prepare their full Stage 2 submission. This submission covers much the same criteria as Stage 1: EOI, albeit in greater detail.

Projects should be estimated start in November 2021.

Round 1 – Successful Projects

To assist in determining the types of projects that the Department may be looking for, we suggest you refer to the list of Round 1 Recipients.

To discuss the details of the program, your eligibility and to gain expert assistance through the 2 stage process, please Contact Us.

You can also read more about the program here.