Map aims to showcase, grow ageing and aged care tech

A new platform focused on finding and promoting better ways to live in the later years has launched a map of Australian technology innovators in the ageing space.

Launched by Silver Futures last week, Australia’s Agetech Startup Map 2023 (above) includes tech many in the aged care sector will be familiar with among solutions for service providers, preventative health, independence, end of life and connection.

The map aims to showcase and grow new innovations that improve the quality of life of older people, said Silver Futures director Rachel Slattery.

“I’m hoping it will be used by anyone that’s interested in how tech can improve things. I think genuinely that a lot of people don’t realise that this tech is in our backyards,” Ms Slattery told Australian Ageing Agenda.

“But I’m hoping that the map will also show that there are gaps… If we could get people spotlighting on some of this and putting money now into accelerators, incubators and also government programs to increase the funding here, we might see that map grow.”

Grow in the number of innovators and innovations like in Canada – which doubled the number of startups after it got focused, said Ms Slattery, and grow into other areas not yet covered such as ageing and travel or financial technology, she added.

This is also where Ms Slattery sees opportunity for the aged care sector. “That’s a big one because a lot of the solutions currently for aged care are about day-to-day management, and servicing up to government,” she said. “If they could get funding and incentives to train and uptake some of the innovators, we could have a whole new paradigm.”

Home care and preventative solutions are of particular interest to Ms Slattery – who launched Silver Futures about a month ago as part of her passion to reinvent ageing and encourage new thinking and innovations to unlock the potential of later life.

“If there was massive investment into more ways to manage home care, it would change everything for a lot of the providers because they could provide more care, or better-quality care, with the use of technology. And that would be a game changer as well. I know some of them are using tech, but I don’t think there’s enough emphasis at this stage on preventative things.”

Silver Futures – who has been guided by publisher of the Global Agetech Market Map and international gerontechnologist Keren Etkin – is still working on the boundaries it will set for the map going forward. It currently includes businesses “still proving their business model,” said Ms Slattery. “I might even drop the word startup, eventually.”

For those missing from the map who think they should be on it, Ms Slattery said she and the team are interested in hearing from them along with all innovators about what could help them – send an email to startups@silverfutures.com.au.

“So we can shine a light to say this is what they’re doing. This is what they need,” she said.

Main image: Silver Future’s Australia’s Agetech Startup Map 2023

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