Among the entrepreneurs in Canberra Innovation Network’s coworking space you’ll find a mix of startups. Let us introduce you to Nick McNaughton, Founder and CEO of Campus Plus, as we find out more about what he does!  

Let’s start with the origin of Campus Plus? How did you get to where you are now?

Campus Plus was founded in July 2020 to help Universities with their industry engagement, strategic partnership development, unique IP identification, protection and commercialisation and, finally, researcher and research manager professional development.

Co-Founder and COO, Zoe Fieldhouse, and I both previously ran the ANU’s Venture Capital Fund – ANU Connect Ventures. Through this we became experts at talent identification, research translation and the creation of successful spinouts. We had a number of successful exits including Lithicon (sold to FEI), InterfereX (sold to Dolby) and Instaclustr (sold to NetApp).

We now have 15 consultants and 16 clients spread across Australia.

Amazing! Can you tell us about what you are working on?

We are about to release our Capability Guide for 2023 which will include three new offerings for our clients. We are also in the middle of significant project deliveries for the University of Canberra, University of Newcastle, UTS, La Trobe and CSU.g.

Describe your business journey in three words

Achieve More from Less (ok four words)!

What’s on your daily to-do list?

On boarding new consultants; pitching to new clients, bidding for tenders and issuing invoices (I like the last task a lot!).

So important to have fun! What are you looking forward to achieving in the next 12 months?

We want to grow from 16 clients to 20 and would like to see our existing customers consume more of our offerings. We will be expanding our product offerings and want these to be embraced by Universities across the country.

What’s your favourite thing about being part of CBRIN’s coworking space?

We love the people, the facilities and the camaraderie. Everyone here is on a mission to realise their dreams!

Is there something you’re proud of and would like to share with the CBRIN community?

We love the people, the facilities and the camaraderie. Everyone here is on a mission to realise their dreams!

Fantastic, thank you, Nick. You make such a wonderful contribution to our coworking community!

If you’re interested in finding out more about our coworking space, book a tour to come see us.