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House of Assembly - Fifty-Fourth Parliament, First Session (54-1)
2019-12-03 Daily Xml
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Lot Fourteen

Ms LUETHEN (King) (14:50): My question is to the Minister for Innovation and Skills. Can the minister update the house on how the state government is delivering on its commitment to make South Australia the nation's leader in innovation?

The Hon. D.G. PISONI (Unley—Minister for Innovation and Skills) (14:50): Yes, I can. I thank the member for King for her advocacy for her constituents' access to modern jobs in the innovation sector. I am very pleased to update the house on the progress of the FIXE innovation hub at Lot Fourteen. Last Thursday marked the official launch event for the innovation hub manager, Stone and Chalk. Already, we have 130 resident desks at the centre and over 35 start-up businesses. Those businesses include people who are working in the industry of cybersecurity, defence, space, artificial intelligence, big data analytics, creative industries, medtech, agtech, fintech and robotics. It all sounds extremely exciting. I can see your excitement from here, Mr Speaker.

The opening of the FIXE innovation hub has been a major milestone in the Lot Fourteen redevelopment, and I thank the Premier for his leadership at Lot Fourteen to get to this stage so quickly. The Marshall Liberal government has an ambition for Lot Fourteen to be the largest innovation precinct in the Southern Hemisphere, where eventually 650 start-up workplaces will spread across multiple buildings.

Having Stone and Chalk as the curator of our innovation hub is a major coup for South Australia. They have proven expertise as hub managers. This expertise will create employment and global business opportunities right here in South Australia and assist with the government's goal of retaining and attracting the talent necessary for careers in new technologies here in South Australia. Stone and Chalk has also been celebrating the milestone of—

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Minister, could you be seated for one moment. Member for West Torrens and member for Waite, you can both leave for the remainder of question time.

The honourable members for West Torrens and Waite having withdrawn from the chamber:

The Hon. D.G. PISONI: Stone and Chalk have also been celebrating the raising of half a billion dollars in four years for their residents at their start-up centres in Sydney and Melbourne. Stone and Chalk are not only nurturing our local start-ups but also attracting new businesses from their start-up residents interstate and high-profile investors, who are partnering with local start-ups to create jobs and opportunities right here in South Australia.

One resident start-up at the hub is Ping, a company that uses machine learning to optimise the maintenance of wind turbines. It is incredible how, just by analysing the sound of the turbines blowing in the wind, they can actually determine if there is a crack in the wing, what size the crack might be or even if there is a chip at the end, which of course saves thousands and thousands of dollars in maintenance costs because they can get to the maintenance early.

The Ping Monitor recently won the Australian Technologies Competition in the new energy category, and they are tenants right here at the hub at Lot Fourteen. Another innovation hub resident is CyberOps, which has announced a partnership with the Department of Defence to determine how space technologies can be used for military purposes. I would say that fits in perfectly with the ambition that South Australia has to be the defence industry state.

As part of our growing space industry, this CyberOps contract will develop security for nanosatellites. I have to say how impressed I was to visit Inovor Technologies on Friday at Lot Fourteen with the minister, the Hon. Melissa Price, to sign the memorandum of understanding for another defence contract with the defence industries.

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