The 2025 ANFF Staff Forum provided a great opportunity for the ANFF community to gather as colleagues and peers, share what’s new in our worlds, continue building a strong community and discuss how to improve and grow.
Held at the Brisbane Convention & Exhibition Centre, the program featured an array of sessions covering professional development, strategic planning and community networking, along with our Gala Dinner.
Our continuing theme, ANFF NEXT, encouraged our network to envisage and implement new ideas, leading to an even more valuable and effective service offered by ANFF across the country.
Innovation at ANFF doesn’t stop at the lab bench – it’s even woven into what we wear. This year, the corporate Polo Shirts were made from an Australian-developed wool–cotton fabric, created through a collaboration between ANFF-VIC Deakin and eqwools™.
eqwools™ is Michell Wool’s next-gen fibre product, created by a pioneering process that transforms low-value wool into fibres compatible with cotton’s short-spinning systems.
The result is a stronger, longer-lasting, biodegradable textile that is more accessible to global manufacturers and better aligned with how modern supply chains operate. By choosing these shirts, ANFF demonstrates how our community can embody innovation and sustainability, literally wearing the outcomes of Australian research.
From celebrating home-grown innovation to hearing from leaders shaping the future, the Forum program offered insights and inspiration from across the research and industry spectrum:
- Welcome to Country – Refiti Tovi on behalf of the Turrbal People of Brisbane
- Fiona Swee-Lin Price, Founder of Globalise Consulting – Effective Email Communication
- Tech Talks: Nano Vacuum, Realtek, Evident Scientific, Embedded Logic Solutions, DCA instruments and InnovoTechX
- Sach Jayasinghe, Executive Director – Academy for Collaborative Research Infrastructure (ACRI) –
- Keynote Speaker Dr Dylan Saunders, Principal Scientist, Asia Pacific at PsiQuantum – Useful Quantum Computing in Brisbane
- Brian Ruddle, Founder of Impact Innovation Group – R&D Impact.
As is tradition, ANFF unveiled its 2025 Casebook, ANFF NEXT, at the Forum. The 2025 Casebook highlights achievements from ANFF clients working across critical sectors – from quantum and defence to health, climate and clean energy. Download your copy of ANFF NEXT here.
At the Gala Dinner, ANFF announced the 2025 Frater and Career Development Awards, celebrating 8 exceptional individuals who will now have the chance to expand their knowledge, refine their skills and pursue advanced training opportunities. Read more about the Awardees and their winning projects here.
The Forum also focused on strengthening the connections that sustain our network. Through a collaborative problem-solving challenge and a lively elevator-pitch session, staff were able to deepen relationships critical to the success of the ANFF network.
Congratulations to the winning group of the Elevator Pitch Competition (l to r): CEO Jane Fitzpatrick, Eileen Stacey, Glenn Walker, Sruthi Kuriakose, Brandan Byatt, Huajun Shen, Sudhakar Sajja and Sarmad Aslam.
The 2025 ANFF Staff Forum embodied ANFF NEXT in every sense by showcasing ingenuity, strengthening collaboration and setting our sights firmly on the future of Australia’s nanofabrication network.
Posted 24 October 2025