UniQuest was established by The University of Queensland. Through innovative and responsive management, and significant investment and support UniQuest has grown into a highly regarded, successful self-funded enterprise. Our commercialisation capacity and revenues have increased four-fold and various commercialisation challenges are now overcome.

UniQuest was launched by The University of Queensland on 1 July 1983 and incorporated as a company limited by guarantee on 10 July 1984. From the outset, UniQuest has played an important role in developing a significant Australian contribution to the world-wide market for technology-intensive exports.

Then UQ Vice-Chancellor, Professor Brian Wilson, established UniQuest as a "contract research and marketing organisation".  At the time, it was seen as an experiment in bridging the gap between basic research performance in universities and the development of new products and processes in industry.

The company was based on similar university technology transfer experiments in Silicon Valley, California and Cambridge, England.  In these locations, Professor Wilson argued, there was a critical mass of entrepreneurial brainpower stimulating the engines of industry, with the higher education institutions very definitely in their centres. 

In 1996, UQ made a significant investment which enabled the company to fund its commercialisation process and develop long term capability. Implementing a ‘Hub and Spoke’ operational model at this time bridged the divide between researchers and private sector clients.

In 2000, UniQuest facilitated the first of several mechanisms to overcome a funding gap for early stage university technologies: UQ in partnership with the University of Melbourne launched the $20 million seed fund, Uniseed Pty Ltd. Since then, through investment commitment from Westscheme, the University of New South Wales and further investment from founding Universities, the fund has grown to $61 million.

 In 2005, UniQuest established the Pathfinder proof of concept fund, an internally funded grant program to finance the work necessary for UQ researchers to demonstrate their innovations’ commercial potential. To build researcher interest and commercialisation engagement, UniQuest developed an education and events program. Since the program’s inception in 2003, more than 2000 UQ researchers and postgraduate students have taken part in at least one UniQuest program, helping to build a stronger university commercialisation culture.

Fundamental to our growth and success are the strategic commercialisation collaborations we have forged with Australia’s best research communities. Our partners include: University of Wollongong (2004); the Mater Medical Research Institute (Brisbane); the University of Technology Sydney and James Cook University (2008); the University of Tasmania (2009); and Queensland Health (2011).

Other milestones include: