Victoria opens round two of $15m NBN business fund

The Victorian Government has launched a second round of grants for local businesses that are built around high-speed broadband.

Round two of the collaborative Internet Innovation Fund (cIIF) pledged a pool of $5 million to businesses looking to develop and pilot projects in preparation for the National Broadband Network.

It offered up to $500,000 to community and industry groups, and up to $1 million to public sector projects.

State ICT minister John Lenders highlighted remote music lessons as one of 22 projects that won part of the first round of the cIIF in January this year.

Those 22 projects were expected to be implemented by 2012, and included a real-time, mobile-based carpooling matching system, and web 2.0 tools for teaching Aboriginal Languages in schools.

Lenders described Victoria as "Australia's ICT capital", following its selection to host NBN Co's network operations centre (NOC) in July.

The cIIF totalled $15 million and was part of the State Government's $300 million Innovation: Victoria's Future statement (pdf) announced in 2008.

Applications to cIIF round two would open early next month, and the Victorian Government planned to make available a further $10 million regional-specific broadband fund, Re-Innovate, in mid-2011.