Driving innovation and productivity for Australia’s grape and wine sector

The amount of research funding available for the Australian grape and wine sector is set to increase, with the creation of new funding pathways aimed at fast-tracking innovations that address its most critical challenges.

Wine Australia has designed the Australian Wine Future Fund to increase funding opportunities, create additional value, accelerate investments and deliver impactful solutions for the sector through two complementary streams:

1. Research & Innovation Fund: a target of $35 million over 5 years through external grants and partner co-investment, funding co‑designed projects that deliver practical outcomes for vineyard performance, product innovation, sustainability and production efficiency.
2. Venture Investments Portfolio: a target of $15 million over 5 years through attracting private capital that will be strategically invested to address critical innovation gaps. 

The creation of the Australian Wine Future Fund is in response to 2024’s One Grape & Wine Sector Plan, which identified the urgent need to unlock additional investment for innovation while the sector’s levies remain flat.  

Wine Australia CEO Dr Martin Cole said the Australian Wine Future Fund builds on existing research and innovation strategies, but leverages changes to the amount of Commonwealth Government matching available to Wine Australia for research and innovation, which recently increased through changes to legislation. 

“The grape and wine levy system for research and innovation is tied to the size of our sector’s production. It rises and falls with the size of the crush each year. The changes to the available Commonwealth Government matching enables Wine Australia to actively seek non-levy funding opportunities,” Dr Cole said.

“For research partners contributing funding, the additional income helps grow the scale and impact of innovation. It also provides a mechanism that allows the sector’s levies to go further, in more areas along the value chain. The Australian Wine Future Fund is working to future-proof investments that deliver tangible impact where it is most needed in response to challenges facing grapegrowers, winemakers and wine businesses.” 

Research & Innovation Fund: working in partnership to secure additional funds for the sector 

Building on Wine Australia’s investment priorities in the Wine Australia Strategic Plan 2025-30, the Research & Innovation Fund’s co-investment model works in partnership with research organisations, private sector, state governments and industry representative associations. These investments will complement – not replace – existing levy‑funded research.   

“Already this financial year, $4.77 million of additional co-investment in research has been unlocked through the Research & Innovation Fund mechanism. This is enabling transformational research, commercialisation and capability‑building through extension and adoption that directly address the sector’s challenges and opportunities,” Dr Cole said. 

This co-investment model is actively supporting sector growth, including:

• Improvements to Sustainable Winegrowing Australia: working with Australian Grape & Wine and the Australian Wine Research Institute to co-invest the membership fees of its members towards efficiency improvements and future-proofing the program.
• Improving the environmental sustainability, profitability and competitiveness of the Western Australia wine industry: co-investment with Wines of Western Australia and the Western Australia Department of Primary Industries and Regional Development (DPIRD) has led to the appointment of an industry engagement officer to drive the adoption of sustainable practices in vineyards and wineries. It has also renewed support for the sustainability and industry project manager to improve sustainability initiatives, conduct a lightweight glass campaign and relocate the Western Australia Vine Improvement Association germplasm collection. 

A further 10 research projects have received additional support through the Research & Innovation Fund, including with Agriculture Victoria, La Trobe University, amaea Limited, Best’s Wines and Agri Automation, Farmers2Founders, and the Australian Wine Research Institute. 

The Research & Innovation Fund is also intentionally pursuing strategically aligned grants, with or without Wine Australia co-funding. Grants secured through the Fund include the recently announced Australian Economic Accelerator: Ignite Grant to Queensland University of Technology to develop fast, affordable and portable sensors capable of detecting smoke taint in winegrapes before fermentation, and the Business Research and Innovation Initiative (BRII) towards alternative packaging to reduce the sector’s carbon footprint.

Venture Investments Portfolio to attract private capital to back targeted innovation

Wine Australia has partnered with Tenacious Ventures to find, fund and support companies building impactful solutions. Under the Venture Investments Portfolio, Wine Australia will invest $2.5 million of non-levy funds alongside Tenacious Ventures’ existing funds and other investors towards a combined target of $15 million over 5 years.  

“We’re delighted to partner with Tenacious Ventures on a key part of the Australian Wine Future Fund, to encourage the wider innovation ecosystem to develop solutions that deliver greater value for the sector,” Dr Cole said. 

Tenacious Ventures is Australia’s leading agri-food investment and insights platform. Their portfolio supports companies including Azaneo, Jupiter Ionics, SwarmFarm Robotics, Cecil and Agovor.

Tenacious Ventures Founding Partner Matthew Pryor said, “As a firm dedicated to driving impactful change in agri-food from the outset, we are delighted to strengthen our long-running collaboration with Wine Australia through the Australian Wine Future Fund. Wine Australia understands that new models of identifying, supporting and scaling up sector benefits are needed, and we are looking forward to working closely with them to catalyse investment into solutions that will deliver sector benefit.”

The Venture Investments Portfolio will back early-stage, high-quality, technology-driven companies with the potential to transform viticulture and wine production and strengthen the long-term resilience of the Australian grape and wine sector. 

Investments in companies may include sensors, robotics, advanced production systems, software and data systems, artificial intelligence, biotechnology and biosecurity technologies and others — particularly where the innovations create a defensible market advantage and deliver measurable environmental and sector benefit.

Wine Australia will maintain autonomy of investments, to ensure they align with industry priorities and Impact objectives, embedding sustainability and capability building at the core of operations and translating research into commercially viable innovation.  

For more information, visit www.wineaustralia.com/australianwinefuturefund.