Underwriting manufacturing success
A dozen interest rate increases in a year have made money more expensive. While venture funding has slowed in total, manufacturers of high capability are still attracting financial backing.
AMGC has often played a role in helping to de-risk companies on the way to securing private funding and convincing deeper investment in local manufacturing.
Among recent positive developments is Melt Ventures’ $15 million investment in AMGC project alumni, Endua, which first received its backing from AMGC via a $984,240 co-investment to develop its first generation of clean hydrogen technology.
In addition, Endua has raised $7.5 million in equity funding to assist its development of modular hydrogen-based energy storage. Founded by Tritium co-founder Paul Sernia, Endua is focussed on microgrid and standalone energy storage.
Alloy technology company Kinaltek received a $500,000 co-investment from AMGC. Since then, it has gone on to announce a “significant milestone” in commercialising its new production process in May this year with a $15 million Series A round from a private source.
Founded by ex-CSIRO Senior Principal Research Scientist Dr Jawad Haidar, Kinaltek has a one-step method of creating metallic powders and pigments, able “to synthesise any combination based on 27 different metals.”
Battery storage and the move to electrify transport have led to many opportunities for Australian companies. Electric motorbike manufacturer Savic Motorcycles closed a $1,224,049 equity crowdfunding round on the platform Equitise in May.
The capital will be used to bring its C-Series to production, fulfilling 250 pre-orders of the motorcycle, which passed ADR certification in late-2022.
Prior to its raise, Savic was assisted through a co-investment of $657,482 from AMGC to support the design, development, and production of the bike, following a first production prototype in 2021.
While investors are operating in a more disciplined world, it is a world where there is plenty of space for innovative manufacturers to earn capital to move to the next stage. The real challenge is to ensure that Australia has the policy and programs in place to offer appropriately-sized, targeted, and fast co-investment to help manufacturers scale and commercialise – precisely what AMGC has proven to do.