Archived Grant Opportunity View - GO3792

The Boosting Female Founders Initiative (the program) will run over three years from 2020-21 to 2022-23. The program is part of the Women’s Economic Security Package, which helps to support more Australian women into work and supports Australia’s international obligations under the Convention on the Elimination of all forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW). The program will provide targeted support on a co-contribution basis to female founders of startup businesses (startups) to launch and scale their businesses into domestic and global markets.

The Australian Government has announced a total of $18 million. For this round, $6 million is available.

The objectives of the program are to:

• stimulate private sector investments into innovative startups led by women
• help female entrepreneurs overcome the disadvantages they face in getting access to finance and support to grow their startups
• enable female founders to scale-up, expand into domestic and global markets, and become self-sufficient
• boost the economy through increasing the diversity of startup founders.

The intended outcomes of the program are:

• increased number of startups founded by women
• new products and services are brought to market by startups founded by women
• increased financial investment in startups founded by women
• women improve their earning potential through entrepreneurship
• increased job creation and economic growth.

The grant amount will be up to 50 per cent of eligible project costs - unless you can meet additional requirements (see the grant opportunity guidelines for further information).

To be eligible you must:

• be a female founded (majority owned and led by women) startup
• have an Australian Business Number (ABN)
• be registered for the Goods and Services Tax (GST)
• be one of the following entities:
• an entity incorporated in Australia
• an incorporated trustee on behalf of a trust
• an Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Corporation registered under the Corporations (Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander) Act 2006 (Cth)
• a partnership
• a sole trader.

In addition, we can only accept applications where you can:

• show evidence that your startup is a female founded (majority owned and led by women), see section 14 of the grant opportunity guidelines for further information on the definition of a female founded business
• provide evidence to support your source of funding (e.g. letter from contributor/s confirming funding amount) (Stage Two applications only)
• provide evidence from your board (or chief executive officer or equivalent if there is no board) that the project is supported, and that you can complete the project and meet the costs of the project not covered by grant funding (e.g. ineligible expenditure see Appendix B of the grant opportunity guidelines) (Stage Two applications only)

You are not eligible to apply if you are:

• income tax exempt
• an unincorporated association
• any organisation not included in section 4.1 of the grant opportunity guidelines
• a trust (however, an incorporated trustee may apply on behalf of a trust)
• a Commonwealth, State, Territory or local government body (including government business enterprises)

Up to 12 months for Tier One and up to 24 months for Tier Two

$6,000,000.00

From $25,000.00 to $480,000.00

To apply, go to: www.business.gov.au/bff

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