The Victorian Government’s Innovation Voucher Program (IVP) supports businesses wanting to improving their competitiveness and productivity.

Vouchers of up to $10,000 are provided by the program to be used for training, services, goods, advice, or expertise provided by any of the sixteen approved suppliers of the Victorian Government Innovation Skills Voucher Program.   By supporting greater business innovation, the IVP aims to facilitate improved performance particularly with respect to productivity and growth of businesses.

 

What can they be used for?

Victorian companies can use the $10,000 Innovation Skills vouchers to access innovation skills development opportunities provided by approved suppliers. For example, to work with a supplier to develop or improve:

• intellectual property and/or knowledge management
• commercialisation skills
• technology road mapping
• communications skills
• idea generation, selection and implementation.

Workshops available from Treadstone

Treadstone is an approved supplier for IVP. We work closely with clients to gain deep insights into their business to produce tailored and practical workshops aimed at accelerating business growth.

Treadstone’s skills development workshops are designed to have an impact on the innovation capability of the entire company. For example, a Victorian company could use the voucher to develop or improve:

Treadstone has been conducting workshops since February 2013. Workshops are delivered as 4 tailored half-day sessions, scheduled to suit each individual organization’s needs.

Funding time line

We will continue running workshops until funding from the Victorian Government for the ISV Program is discontinued, which is expected to happen at the end of 2014 or early 2015.

 

Eligibility for Vouchers

The innovation skills vouchers are open to Victorian small to medium businesses that:

• Employ less than 200 employees
• Are registered in Victoria or carry out more than 50% of their business activity in Victoria
• Not be currently involved in litigation with the state government of Victoria

Voucher conditions of use:

• Are required to make a minimum cash co-contribution from the business/organization of 25% of the voucher amount requested (i.e. $2,500 cash contribution for a $10,000 voucher)
• Must apply individually or jointly with other applicants. Vouchers may be pooled to a maximum of $50,000 and may be used to commission development of a tailored program for a number of companies or facilities with shared training needs
• Cannot redeem vouchers to pay for services already funding through other local, state, or federal government grant programs
• Must be an entirely separate entity from the supplier(s), with no financial or other ties (companies/organizations and suppliers may not be owned by the same parent company, share governance, or have common directors)
• Declare any existing governance relationships between themselves and the nominated supplier(s), including whether any of the project suppliers:

o   Are subsidiaries or related bodies, corporate within the meaning of Corporations Act 2001

o   Share common directors, officers, or senior managers

• Must commence the project within 6 months and complete the project within 18 months of the date of voucher issue
• Must not make any public announcement or issue any press release regarding the receipt of a voucher, except in consultation and with the approval or the Department of Business and Innovation

Find out more

For more information about how Treadstone can help support your business growth or productivity call us now for a confidential discussion and our brochure on 03 9008 5937.