The Systemic Infrastructure Initiative was announced by the Government of Australia in January 2001 as part of Backing Australia's Ability – An Innovation Action Plan for the Future.
The Government announced that $246 million would be allocated over five years "to upgrade the basic infrastructure of universities, such as scientific and research equipment, libraries and laboratory facilities" to support research and research training.
Those eligible to apply are restricted to universities and other higher education institutions specified in Table A of the Higher Education Support Act 2003, Bond University and the University of Notre Dame Australia.
Early committees
In 2002, as part of the SII funding, the Minister committed $250,000 to two committees, the Higher Education Information Infrastructure Implementation Steering Committee (HEIIAC) and Higher Education Bandwidth Advisory Committee (HEBAC). These committees were to formulae further broad projects to be considered for SII funding in the following year.
The Final Report of the Higher Education Information Infrastructure Advisory Committee was completed in November 2002.
Australian Research Information Infrastructure Committee
As part of SII the Minister for Education, Science and Training, Dr Brendan Nelson, MP established the Australian Research Information Infrastructure Committee (ARIIC) in August 2003 to advise the Government on the information infrastructure requirements.
2002 round
IMS Global Australia - Core Funding
IMS COLIS Testbed
Business Intelligence Lab (BIT Lab), University of New South Wales
Clinical Trial Data and Information Network, Flexetrials, NHMRC Clinical Trials Centre, University of Sydney Australian Academic & Research Library Network, La Trobe University Joint Academic Scholarships On-line Network (JASON) Dataset Acquisition, Accessibility and Annotation e-Research Technology Project (DART) BIAcore 3000 for Discovery & Characterisation of Novel Pharmaceuticals Australian Research Libraries Collection Analysis Project Australian Partnership for Advanced Computing (APAC) 2004-2006 Towards an Australian Partnership for Sustainable Repositories (APSR)
Facilities and equipment
Acquisition of next generation instruments in micro- and nano-analysis of solids and fluids in the geosciences and materials sciences, located in a purpose designed shared lab located at Macquarie University High Sensitivity, High Accuracy Mass Spectrometry for Advanced Molecular and Biomolecular Research, University of New South Wales Establishment of a nanofabrication facility at the Institute for Superconducting and Electronic Materials at the University of Wollongong Establishment of an Advanced Materials Manufacturing and Performance Centre, Deakin University Provision of high through-put DNA analysing machines for Population Biology Research and Research Training at La Trobe, the University of Queensland and Monash University Spatial and Sonological Information Laboratory, Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology. Digital Design Precinct Integrated Microfabrication Facility, Swinburne University of Technology Large Scale Experimental Building Fire Facility, Victoria University of Technology Improvements to the equipment and instrumentation level of the hypersonics facility at the University of Queensland A SHRIMP Ion Microprobe Facility for Earth Sciences, Curtin University of Technology ACIGA-LIGO High Optical Power Test Facility 3D-Imaging of Intact Root Systems in soil, University of Adelaide Upgrade of UV Radiation Monitoring Capabilities, University of Tasmania Upgrade facilities at Siding Spring Observatory, Australian National University