University of Newcastle

🇦🇺 This Week in Australian Startups #179, 26th September 2026

Weekly roundup recording a dozen raises and acquisitions, Firmus's scheduled float, a new $50m venture fund, a founder share sale, grant winners, an accelerator intake, and an AI agent's government breach.

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NSW FLIP Opens Applications for Women Founders in 2026

Applications are open for the second 2026 intake of NSW FLIP, a free program offering training, mentoring and possible seed funding to women founders across New South Wales, run by the University of Newcastle.

Our investment in Facet Amtech: Rethinking how the world makes ammonia

Main Sequence explains its decision to back Facet Amtech again alongside Uniseed in a $3 million round, funding the startup's water-based ammonia catalyst work and its first pilot plant.

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First of a kind “carbon refinery” to embed emissions in concrete and other building materials

MCi Carbon has launched a Newcastle facility that converts captured carbon dioxide into sellable building products, beginning with Austrian customer RHI Magnesita.

First of a kind “carbon refinery” to embed emissions in concrete and other building materials

MCi Carbon has opened a Newcastle demonstration plant that converts industrial CO2 into sellable construction materials, beginning product testing for Austrian customer RHI Magnesita.

Remarkable, Catalysr and Indigenous pre-accelerators score NSW government support for diverse founders

Four organisations join a NSW government diversity pre-accelerator program as delivery partners, running programs for migrant, disability and First Nations founders alongside two university-based partners already on the roster.

UNSW to fast-track female founders in new $4m NSW Government program

UNSW Founders will run the NSW Government's new $4 million Diversity Pre-Accelerator Program for female and culturally diverse health founders, with the University of Newcastle also delivering support; applications open in July.

Minns Labor Government puts female founders in the fast lane with launch of Diversity Pre-Accelerator Program

The NSW Government has opened the first round of its $4 million Diversity Pre-Accelerator Program for female founders, appointing University of Newcastle and UNSW Founders to deliver training and mentoring for women-led startups.

NSW Govt backs new wave of female founders - Inside State Government

The NSW Government has opened the first round of its $4 million Diversity Pre-Accelerator Program for female founders, appointing University of Newcastle's I2N and UNSW Founders to deliver training and mentoring.

Australian printed solar technology used to power Coldplay world tour secures federal funding

Newcastle printed solar company Kardinia Energy has won a $2.1 million federal grant to scale up its flexible panel technology, following a state government grant the previous year.

Also RenewEconomy

Remarkable alumni ByStorm Beauty lands $30,000 in government-backed women founder program

Newcastle founder Storm Menzies' accessible makeup tools startup ByStorm Beauty won the federally backed Kickstarter Challenge, receiving equity-free prize money, with four runner-up startups also awarded smaller prizes at a Canberra grand final.

Also SmartCompany

Uniseed boss Peter Devine calls time on 20 years leading Australia's OG VC

Uniseed chief executive Peter Devine departs after two decades; Monash's Alistair Hick takes over in 2026. The piece recounts Uniseed's fund history and recent stakes in ENA Respiratory and Morse Micro rounds.

Here are the startups in the 2025 University of Newcastle I2N accelerator

Twelve ventures from the Hunter and Central Coast, several founded by University of Newcastle students or alumni, are through to the last stage of the 2025 I2N accelerator across cleantech, healthtech and all-industries streams.

From lab to launch: How CSIRO ON Accelerate 9 is powering the next big deep tech startups

CSIRO's ninth ON accelerator cohort of eleven research teams has completed the program, with three members winning grants, two filing patents, and individual awards announced.

Also Business News Australia

Here are the 11 deep tech startups to emerge from CSIRO's ON Accelerate

CSIRO's ON Accelerate program presents its ninth intake of eleven research startups, drawn from universities nationwide and the agency itself, spanning biotech, healthcare and sustainability, at a Melbourne showcase.

Green steam and thermal storage startup reboots pilot plant after “tough lesson”

MGA Thermal has its 5 MWh Tomago pilot plant working again after an 18-month fix, and is seeking significant new capital to scale up production.

Best of the week — the five most popular stories among readers, January 20 – January 24, 2025

Roundup of the week's five most-read manufacturing stories: a defence radio contract for Codan, university facility funding, a WEF white paper, ASCA missile-defence awards, and a port chair's farewell.

Green steam: US oil giant taps Australian thermal storage start-up for “real-world” trial

Chevron partners with NSW thermal-storage maker MGA Thermal on a FEED study toward a possible trial; the piece also recounts earlier raises from Main Sequence, ARENA, Melt Ventures, Jekara and Shell.

Chevron selects MGA Thermal for 5 megawatt-hour "clean steam" study

Chevron, MGA Thermal's first major customer, will run an engineering study of a five-megawatt-hour clean steam unit using the Newcastle company's thermal storage technology, with Anacapa as EPC partner; the budget is undisclosed.

“We designed the world’s best something”: winding up and finding the positives

Podcast interview with Diffuse Energy CTO James Bradley on winding up the wind turbine startup after chip shortages, its ARENA-backed telco tower trial, CSIRO ON origins and his accelerator work with University of Newcastle.

Manufacturing news briefs – stories you might have missed

Roundup: 1414 Degrees locks in as much as $4.7m from Lind Global Fund II; Queensland Hydro awards Borumba dam contracts; FWPA's research chief is retiring; La Trobe and BIRAC sign a biotech corridor pact.

Antler Investor Memo Series: Licode is the new no-code way to build AI-enabled Web Apps

A partner memo profiling Licode, a no-code platform for AI web apps founded by ex-Finder engineer Kelvin Htat, which took pre-seed backing from Antler Australia and is seeking follow-on capital.

Waste-to-hydrogen startup awarded $50,000 MVP grant

EM Energy receives a $50,000 state government grant to patent its method of producing hydrogen from organic matter, with the technology being validated at a Newcastle university.

Manufacturing news briefs – stories you might have missed

Manufacturing roundup: IDT Australia and Genetic Signatures announce capital raisings; Memphasys and Genetic Signatures appoint new chief executives; NIOA opens a US office; DefendTex holds acquisition talks with Brazil's Avibras; a cobotics PhD ends.

Manufacturing news briefs — stories you might have missed

News roundup: Cyclopharm's $20m placement, Eden Innovations' first Holcim orders, Rio Tinto and BHP electric haul truck trials, a hybrid boat's marine award, and a national rail procurement database launch.

ARENA awards $59.1 million to hydrogen, steel-related R&D projects

Australia's renewable energy agency handed out $59.1 million in grants across two rounds, backing 21 university, CRC and startup projects in green hydrogen and cleaner iron and steel production.

Also RenewEconomy

ARENA boosts funding and names winners for green hydrogen, iron and steel projects

The Australian Renewable Energy Agency has expanded its hydrogen and green metals research funding to $59.1 million across 21 projects, with recipients including Hysata, Curtin University and Fortescue subsidiary MIH2.

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$51 million for CRC-P industry research collaborations

Federal grants roundup: 21 Cooperative Research Centres Projects awards worth $51 million in Round 15, with EQ Plastics, Optiscan Imaging and NEXSEN BioTech each receiving $3 million for product development.

Also RenewEconomy

Here are the 12 deep tech startups CSIRO chose for its latest ON Accelerate program

CSIRO has picked twelve deep-tech teams, mostly from Australian universities, for the eighth edition of its ON Accelerate commercialisation program starting in February 2024.

Uniseed expands horizons, seeks new investment managers

University-backed investor Uniseed has brought in Monash and four NSW universities as partners and is recruiting technology and biotechnology investment managers in Melbourne and Sydney.

Pioneering VC fund Uniseed doubles its backers as five universities, including Monash, UTS and Macquarie, chip in

Uniseed adds Monash and a four-university NSW collaboration, lifting its third fund by $6.75 million to $56.75 million; the article recalls past portfolio sales to Novartis, Shire and Schneider Electric.

Here are the five amazing startups to emerge from UNSW's Climate 10x accelerator program

Five climate startups from UNSW Founders' Climate 10x accelerator shared $580,000 backed by Virescent Ventures and UNSW, presented at the 10x Demo Day featuring 25 ventures across several founder programs.

Ampcontrol and Steber launch hybrid boat

Ampcontrol, Steber International and the University of Newcastle have launched a 43-foot hybrid vessel in regional NSW, building on earlier prototype work backed by federal grant funding.

Meet the Founder: ARC Ento Tech on mining the power of bugs to tackle the global trash crisis

Profile of Australian startup ARC Ento Tech, whose black soldier fly process turns municipal waste into animal feed, fertilizer and an industrial reductant. Founders Ramon and Ricky Atayde explain the decentralised model; the company is fundraising, with no round stated.

MGA Thermal's pilot project awarded $560,000 backing from Shell

A NSW thermal energy storage startup won roughly $560,000 from Shell's GameChanger accelerator for its Tomago pilot, which earlier drew $1.27 million from the federal renewable energy agency.

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Manufacturing news briefs — stories you might have missed

Manufacturing roundup: MGA Thermal's production milestone, Downer's Queensland train contract, a Nyrstar Hobart appointment, Cooperative Research Australia's NRF submission, and Anteris Technologies' $35 million share placement.

MGA Thermal to demonstrate a fresh approach to energy storage

ARENA is giving MGA Thermal 1.27 million dollars to build a pilot thermal energy storage unit near Newcastle, demonstrating steam generation from stored heat for industrial and grid uses.

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10 promising climate change startups in the new EnergyLab accelerator program

EnergyLab's 2022 Climate Solutions Accelerator has taken ten Australian climate tech startups into its six-month program, backed by $750,000 in total pre-seed funding from angel investors, half again more than the prior year.

MGA Thermal unveils new Newcastle manufacturing facility

Thermal storage maker MGA Thermal has opened the first stage of its Newcastle manufacturing facility, with early output supporting a green hydrogen partnership backed by a federal government grant.

Also mgathermal.com

Federal government awards $50 million to new clean tech and recycling Trailblazer hub

A consortium led by two Australian universities has received a $50 million federal Trailblazer grant for recycling and clean energy research commercialisation, following hubs announced for Curtin and Adelaide under the same program.

Also @AuManufacturing