Our Venture Studio is a specialised team of expert venture builders.

Cohort 2 opens for registration and application on Monday September 2. Early applications close on September 22. Full applications close on September 29 at 9pm Australian Eastern Standard Time (AEST).

Cohort 2 Phase 1 will start November 18 2024 to February 21 2025. The top 8 innovators will be selected for the final, which will be held between February 24 and 28 2025.

In Phase 1, the innovators are expected to commit a minimum of 1 day per week to participate. This would include cohort-based sessions and 1:1 working sessions that spread across a minimum 3 days per week.

Cohort 2 Phase 2 will start March 31 2025 to February 28 2025.

In Phase 2, the founders are expected to commit full time to participate. The innovators are not expected to commit to Beanstalk Venture Studio.

The Venture Studio is free, although only selected innovators can participate following a competitive selection process.

None. For the next two years, the Drought Venture Studio is funded by the Australian Government’s Future Drought Fund. Due to the nature of this partnership, the Drought Venture Studio is not currently taking equity in new ventures. The investments made into new ventures are all non-dilutive.

During Phase One of the program existing IP ownership will not be affected. For example, the IP associated with your innovation may be owned by a university or other research institute. If your innovation forms one of the new ventures in Phase Two of the program, we will work with the existing IP owner(s) to negotiate an IP licensing agreement to enable commercialisation of your innovation.

We are interested in research that helps build drought resilience in agriculture technology. This includes research in water, financial resilience, soil, crops & horticulture, livestock, pests & weeds, the environment, community resilience and wellbeing, information and knowledge sharing, and supply chain management. The proposed solution/innovation could be a data model, software, hardware or more.

We have a very broad interpretation of what constitutes “drought resilience”. We have broken the broad theme of the venture studio into 10 challenge areas, with examples of technologies that could fit within the broad definition we apply.

• Water: This includes water management and storage; Irrigation and water use, water sources.

• Financial Resilience: This includes alternate revenue streams, insurance and access to capital, new markets, employment, and risk.

• Crops, Horticulture and Planting: This covers crop practices, crop choices, crop information availability, ground cover, animal feed crops and more.

• Livestock: Including animal production, animal health and welfare, animal reproduction, grazing, carrying and stocking rates, and livestock biosecurity.

• Soil: This includes land management, soil health and quality, soil moisture and more.

• Pests and Weeds: This covers anything to do with pest management, weed prevention, and fertilisers.

• Environment: Including environmental ecosystems, environmental sustainability, natural resource management, bushfires and back burning, forecasting and more.

• Community Resilience and Wellbeing: This includes personal and familial wellbeing and mental health, cost of living, community resilience, and social connection.

• Information and Knowledge Sharing: This covers things like drought-specific information, knowledge sharing, decision-making, planning tools and software.

• Supply Chain Management: Including crop yield and quality, cost and price volatility, supply chain and logistic disruptions, market access, waste management, and more.

These areas cover a very wide spectrum of potential innovations across things as diverse as biology, hardware, biotech, data and algorithms, IoT and sensors, software applications, and much much more. We encourage you to apply to the EOI even if you’re not 100% sure your innovation qualifies, and we can respond to you with any more information you might need to include.

Allied services are startup support services like brand design and strategy, legal support, product development advisory, or related services that support early-stage venture creation.

Ventures that are formed and selected for Phase 2 of the program will receive support and investment for the entire duration of that phase, irrespective of when they achieve early commercial success. Each venture will have a commercial plan that defines success, and that plan will be executed with support and investment from the Studio over the course of Phase 2. If a venture achieves commercial success earlier than planned, this will be viewed positively and the Studio will continue to support the venture to push to their next milestone or success metric.

We aim to have a diversity of quality innovators from various states and regions, so we won't be implementing a weighting or quota but encouraging those with a passion to making a difference to apply.

No, innovators that have participated in other accelerator programs can still be considered for the Drought Venture Studio. However, if innovators have already commercialised their research or IP through these programs, and are already onboarding customers or securing investment, they are not a relevant fit for this program.