Advanced Manufacturing

Adelaide, South Australia is Australia’s least costly place to set-up and do business, and one of the world's most cost-competitive cities for key manufacturing sectors, making it an ideal investment location for advanced manufacturing operations of all sizes.¹

Advanced manufacturing in South Australia is a diverse industry providing the tools, technologies and engineering services to support the competitiveness of the broader manufacturing sector in:

• Aerospace
• Automotive
• Electronics
• ICT
• Defence
• Bioscience
• Medical Devices
• Pharmaceuticals
• Light Metals
• Wine and Food
• Whitegoods
• Rail
• Renewable Energy

South Australia is home to the manufacturing operations of many international firms, including BAE Systems, Raytheon, GM Holden, Bridgestone, Kimberly-Clark, Owens Illinois, Alcan, Schefenacker Vision Systems, Siemens VDO, SAAB Systems, Hospira, Schneider Electric, Sola Optical, Novozymes and Electrolux.

South Australia has many advanced manufacturers that support these firms in areas such as systems integration, design and development of new products and materials, and programming and operation of automated equipment.

Such firms include Sage Automation, Precise Manufacturing, Alloy Technologies International, and Proen among others.

South Australia offers advanced manufacturing companies significant cost savings, access to major markets and investment opportunities to build on core capabilities in these sectors and other fields such as resources and shipbuilding.

Output

• Manufacturing contributed $8.9 billion (13.6%) to the State's Gross Value Added in 2007-08.²
  

Exports

• $6. billion in manufacturing exports in the year to September 2009, 70% of the State's total goods exports.³
• Key manufacturing export markets include the USA, the UK, South East Asia, China, the Middle East, New Zealand and Canada.³
  

Employment

• Manufacturing employment was  87,300 people in the year to August 2009, 11.0% of South Australia’s workforce.

Workforce Information Service

Research and development

• $378 million spent on manufacturing industry research and development in 2007-08, 41% of the State total.

Number of businesses  

• 7,551 manufacturing businesses at the end of 2006-2007.⁶

Geographic focus

• South Australian manufacturing operations are based largely in Adelaide.
• Several large operations are located in regional areas, including OneSteel’s iron and steelmaking plan at Whyalla and Kimberly Clark’s paper mills at Millicent.

Case studies
Alloy Technologies International
Precise Advanced Manufacturing Group
Proen Design Australia
SAGE Automation Ltd

Industry groups
BioInnovation SA
Centre for Innovation
Defence Teaming Centre
Engineering Employers Association, South Australia
Electronics Industry Association
Federation of Automotive Products Manufacturers
ICT Council

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1. KPMG, Competitive Alternatives, 2008, www.competitivealternatives.com

2. Australian Bureau of Statistics, Australian National Accounts: State Accounts, Catalogue 5220.0, spreadsheet 1 and 5, www.abs.gov.au

3. Australian Bureau of Statistics, International Trade in Goods and Services, Catalogue 5368.0, spreadsheet 15a, 36d and unpublished, www.abs.gov.au

4. Australian Bureau of Statistics, Labour Force, Catalogue 6291.0.55.003, spreadsheet 5 and data cube E06_aug94, www.abs.gov.au

5. Australian Bureau of Statistics, Research and Experimental Development, Businesses, Catalogue 8104.0, www.abs.gov.au

6. Australian Bureau of Statistics, Counts of Australian Businesses, including Entries and Exits, Catalogue 8165.0, www.abs.gov.au

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