The Australian government has launched Round 3 of Innovation Partnership Grants with funding of 1.5 million AU$ for Australian and Vietnamese partners' innovation initiatives that have already been piloted and are now ready to be replicated.

Taking ‘Enhancing Digital Transformation’ as its theme, this round of grant will seek initiatives that have the potential to enhance digital transformation in the economy and deliver inclusive social impacts.

Suggested focus areas include smart manufacturing, smart agriculture, digital health, smart education, smart cities, finance and banking, e-government and natural resources and environment.

The above-mentioned initiatives should be able to develop innovative products, services, or business models and solutions that build on emerging digital technologies to help improve the efficiency, agility, and productivity in a specific sector or across the economy.

Individual grants of between 100,000 AU$ (77,587US$) and 1 million AU$ (775,870 US$) will be awarded on a competitive basis to existing partnerships between Australian and Vietnamese institutions to support tested initiatives that are ready to scale-up.

It is expected that the funded activities will be completed within 12 months from the time of signing the grant agreement.

Applications for the event are now permitted at https://csiro.smartygrants.com.au/ by 4 April.
Innovation Partnership Grants are designed to address emerging challenges or opportunities in Viet Nam’s innovation ecosystem and strengthen Viet Nam-Australia partnerships.

The Grants are an important part of the 11 million AU$, four-year (2018 - 2022) flagship Aus4Innovation programme with the aim of helping strengthen the Vietnamese innovation system and prepare for Viet Nam’s economic and digital future.

The programme is funded by the Australian Department of Foreign Affairs and managed by CSIRO in strategic collaboration with the Ministry of Science and Technology of Viet Nam (MoST).

Last year, under the Aus4Innovation, the Australian government announced its financial support of 650,000AU$ (504,351US$) to a new initiative that enables the application of artificial intelligence (AI) to assist economic recovery in Viet Nam after the COVID-19 pandemic.

By PHONG LAN- Translated by A.T