Quick guide to start-ups

Research impact is limited if the only outcome from research is publications. There are other pathways to impact, and one way is through a start-up.

A start-up is a new company, founded and run by researchers with the support of the University. Launching a start-up aims to create and grow a self-sustaining business. The business is based on the founders’ research ideas.

Researchers have many reasons for founding a start-up company. It can mean you play a significant role in achieving impact, you can explore an alternative career, create employment for your students and reap financial reward.

Although some start-up founders become very wealthy, most don’t. It's more likely that your financial situation won't change much, but you enjoy some or all of the non-financial benefits.

As a researcher, you already know about running a business. The research business has a lot in common with commercial businesses. Research groups share important characteristics with commercial ventures, but not all research ideas can become successful businesses.

The most suitable ideas are the ones that solve significant and immediate problems for customers. Novelty and scientific excellence are integral to research. In the commercial world they're only valuable when they meet customers’ needs.

If you’re thinking about a start-up, you must understand who your customers are, what problems they face, and what they value.

There are many tools to help you see your proposed product or service from the viewpoint of your potential customers.

There are tools to help you identify the product or service you will offer, develop your value proposition, and consider how to build a commercially sustainable business.

While a start-up inherently involves risk, you want strong evidence that these ideas will succeed before you commit your time, energy, reputation and potentially your family’s savings to it. The University will also want confidence in your business ideas before it supports you.

The most valuable way to find this evidence is the customer interview. Approaches like those used in the scientific method, familiar to many researchers, can be used here.

The next step in creating your start-up is to develop a commercialisation plan and a business plan. These plans are closely linked and are often developed together.

The commercialisation plan details how you will develop a saleable product or service from the University intellectual property (IP) coming out of your research. It gives you a clear understanding of the steps you need to take to work out what funding, people and resources you’ll need and what level of risk you’re taking on.

The commercialisation plan is also one of the documents the University will ask for before it considers giving you rights to use its IP.

The business plan sets out in detail the financial goals of the start-up, and the plan to achieve them. It describes how you, as founders, plan for the start-up to become profitable, and also financially self-sustaining.

The University will ask for a credible business plan from you before giving you rights to use its IP.

You can validate your plans by interviewing customers. This process will probably lead to many revisions and iterations to both plans.

Your first point of contact for help with any part of the start-up process is your Faculty’s Business Development team member. If they don’t have the information you need, they will know where to get it.

Many successful technology entrepreneurs have succeeded without any formal support or training. But first-time founders may find it useful to take part in an accelerator or incubator program. These are becoming more common and popular in Australia.

The University offers two programs, and other corporations, industry bodies, venture funds and related organisations offer similar programs.

There are some things you should get professional legal advice about. These include company structure, agreements and contracts.

Legal advice is expensive, but not getting it can also be costly. This is especially so for first-time founders with no experience dealing with contracts, negotiations or professional investors.