We were super excited to see the announcement of the creation of an Australian Space Agency, starting from July 1st of this year, as part of the 2018 federal budget. It’s been a long time coming, and we are pleased to see that the government has supported or supported in principle the majority of the recommendations from the Expert Review Group, led by former CSIRO head Megan Clark.
Much has been written elsewhere about the details of the funding arrangements, so I won’t repeat that here, but I will say we look forward with interest to see how the agency will move to support the exploding space start-up industry in Australia, as well as supporting the cross-fertilisation of ideas and resources between academia and industry which will help all of us benefit from the new space revolution.