After a 50-plus year career in technology Ann Moffatt is a living legend of the Australian industry. Certainly she is a pioneer, both as a technologist and as a woman pushing ahead in an industry that became increasingly dominated by men. It’s been a wild ride, and a life well-lived and Ann Moffatt has stories to tell. She has just published a memoir, The IT Girl – 50 years as a woman working in the information technology sector.

Australian software developers complain the R&D Tax Incentive is too risky and tricky to access for their style of innovation, but there may be a quick-fire method of ensuring a software company’s RDTI claim is above board. In this Commercial Disco podcast, James Riley talks to Innovation and Science Australia committee member and serial entrepreneur Marty Gauvin and Evado chief technologist Ross Anderson about methodologies for claiming software under the R&D tax incentive scheme.

Gilmour Space Technologies, the Australian rocket startup gunning for business from SpaceX and its Starlink satellite broadband constellation, will soon begin the search for more venture capital ahead of its premier commercial space launch in 2022. “We are going to do another capital raise at the end of the year,” Gilmour Space Technologies chief and co-founder, Adam Gilmour, told InnovationAus. Gilmour Space, a Queensland-based hybrid rocket launcher, raised $19 million in a Series B in 2018 from Main Sequence Ventures and Blackbird Ventures, which led a $5 million Series A round a year earlier with backing from US-based 500 Startups.

In this episode of the Commercial Disco, Frederic Kerrest, co-founder, executive vice-chairman and COO of Okta, talks about launching his digital identity company in 2009 during the post-GFC recession - and why such periods of turmoil are full of opportunity for fast-moving disrupters. Okta is now an 11-year-old, US$25 billion market cap global identity platform. He also offers his take on today’s global tech and geopolitical issues, including e-voting and the future of the internet. There are lessons here for Australian startup companies wrestling with the COVID recession and looking to the future.

Professor Lesley Seebeck is the chief executive officer at the ANU’s Cyber Institute and is a member of the Australian Government’s Naval Shipbuilding Advisory Board. In this episode of the Commercial Disco, Prof Seebeck takes a hard look at the federal 2020 Cyber Security Strategy and laments its lack of an ‘organising principle’. There is much work needed to put some structure and shape in the strategy.

In this episode of the Commercial Disco host James Riley talks to Cicada Innovations chief executive Sally-Ann Williams about Australia’s deep tech entrepreneurs and the big problems they are focused on solving. Based at the Australian Technology Park in Sydney, Cicada Innovations is the nation’s most successful deep tech accelerator, with a 20-year track record in helping grow highly-technical startup companies into commercial successes. Ms Williams joined Cicada a year ago after a 12-year career at Google in Australia, where she was responsible for leading the company’s efforts in entrepreneurship and startup engagement, research collaborations and STEM education & outreach (K-12).

In this episode of the Commercial Disco, James Riley talks to the Minister for Industry, Science and Technology about the rapid response of the manufacturing sector initial phase of the COVID-19 health crisis, and discusses the shape of the economic recovery and the role of the technology sector in that process. This big picture interview covers everything from the role of data sharing in rapid decision-making on policy responses, to the R&D Tax Incentive, the Manufacturing Modernisation Fund to the Accelerating Commercialisation program.

Larry Marshall is the chief executive officer at the CSIRO – the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation – Australia’s national research agency. In this podcast, Dr Marshall discusses the role of science and industrial innovation in the post-COVID economic recovery. Ever the optimist, he points to the many wealth creation opportunities for Australia that can be built on the back of Australian expertise. He also details the CSIRO’s role in the health response to the coronavirus, including helping to develop a vaccine, and its collaboration with scientists in China.

Michael Biercuk is Professor of Quantum Physics and Quantum Technology at the University of Sydney, and founder and chief executive officer at quantum startup Q-CTRL. In this episode of the Commercial Disco, James Riley asks Prof Biercuk what the view looks like from his vantage point that sits at the centre of university-based deep-tech research and the demands of driving a VC-funded deep-tech startup. Prof Biercuk has strong views about research, commercialisation strategies and the policies needed to drive successful medium and long-term outcomes for the nation.