Venture capitalist Rod Bristow is the new head of Breakthrough Victoria, joining the company responsible for the state government’s $2 billion innovation fund on Monday with a pledge to steer it into a capital recycling stage.
He arrives as chief executive from Sydney and Singapore-based VC firm Investible and says the state investment lever is critical to crowding in private capital and ultimately helping transform the Victorian economy.
“We’re not the single solution to future economic, social and environmental benefit for Victoria, but we’re certainly part of it,” he said.
“The ability for government investment to work alongside private venture capital and the wider investment community to back sectors that otherwise may not receive investment is highly synergistic.”
Breakthrough Victoria has backed 33 companies with direct investments of over $300 million, helping to commercialise local IP and create new jobs in Victoria.
But after a small loss last year, a budget cut and questions about its expenses and portfolio performance, the company is under scrutiny from the state opposition about its sustainability.
Then- shadow industry and innovation minister Bridget Vallence last year claimed the fund is “gambling $2 billion of Victorian taxpayers’ money” and was in “financial strife”.
Inaugural Breakthrough CEO Grant Dooley defended the company’s performance last year, before announcing in August he would step down after three years in the role.
His replacement Mr Bristow led Investible, a VC firm which began as an investment syndicate of wealthy tech entrepreneurs and investors, since 2021.
He said his priority is to transition Breakthrough Victoria to an evergreen, perpetual fund that can deploy hundreds of millions of dollars annually.
“We’re early in our investing journey,” he said. “Key focus areas will include identifying and investing in founders and companies aligned to our mission and supporting to successfully exit, delivering a strong capital recycling model. Execution is key—we can have the best strategy in the world, but without great execution, it’s just theory.”
According to Breakthrough Victoria, its backing of 33 companies has helped attract more than $1 billion in co-investment and bolstered local supply chains.
Investees include US-based observation balloon company World View ($37.5m) and quantum firm Infleqtion (previously ColdQuanta) ($29 million), local energy startup RayGen Resources ($20m) and Canberra-born startup Liquid Instruments ($15.2m).
The company has also the founding funder of the Jumar bioincubator labs at CSL and the $100m University Innovation Platform that is expected to seed as many as 50 startups.
According to Breakthrough Victoria, more than half its portfolio companies are already exporting and 83 per cent are planning to by June, while almost 90 per cent are commercialising Victorian IP or innovations.
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