The emerging precinct model aiming to scale social innovations

Precincts use tried and tested formulas to move innovations quickly through a research, translation, and commercialisation pathway. But what if the precinct is the innovation, without a blueprint to follow?

This was the challenge behind Professor Abid Khan and team at Melbourne Care Futures District, an emerging innovation hub that connects players across the social and community-based value chain.

With a background in Engineering, Physics and Nanotechnology, Prof Khan had already helped establish two major precincts and was familiar with the pathway between concept to scalable solution.

But in this sphere, a new approach was needed – one that solved practical care challenges in new ways.

“When you’re accelerating a medical technology, you know how to get from A to B,” Khan said. “The process uses clear, established protocols, and it’s a matter of getting the resources and workflows in place to support that as efficiently as possible.

“In community services, you need to reimagine things entirely. Say you are looking at an intervention for youth mental health. You’re going to be weighing up various solutions and the process of getting those ready for adoption in the public sector will look very different.”

Scaling challenges

Without a clear pathway, governments can face challenges in scaling social interventions beyond initial research and trials.

Nutrition programs, for example, often secure government funding and succeed in trials, but have no clear pathway to adoption once these end.

“With medtech there are clear next steps beyond research and trials: scale, refinement and manufacturing,” Prof Khan said. “But with a community nutrition or mental health program there is often no obvious avenue to create lasting impact. The value-chain from research through to user is highly complex and poorly integrated.

“People might receive nutrition or mental health education at school and then not encounter it again until a late-stage intervention is needed.”

Investment challenges

Investment is another scaling hurdle, with venture capitalists (VCs) often favouring technology and process familiarity and baulking at projects where the pathway from concept to commerciality isn’t clearly mapped.

With many accustomed to product-based value chains, social interventions are often filtered out, on the basis they fall outside the VC’s expertise.

“Migrating from the technology precinct sector, I’ve grown conscious of the gap between innovation and investment for community and social solutions. It’s a gap that research quality alone cannot fix,” Prof Khan said.

“Social interventions can generate substantial revenues, as we have seen in the rapid growth of online tools that support wellbeing, exercise, and nutrition. But many require VC’s and government agencies to work with universities and NGOs - so the pathway is complicated.

Social challenges

The bridge for that investment gap is an innovation of its own and one Prof Khan treats with the same importance as the solutions themselves.

That’s because Melbourne Care Futures District looks for solutions to some of Australia’s most pressing social challenges, meaning the consequences of success are significant.

One example is “bed blocking” in aged care – a phenomenon where patients remain hospitalised because community support alternatives are lacking.

“We are looking for ways to support older people in the home to alleviate pressure on critical care systems. This requires substantial change in the healthcare delivery model and its workforce. Needless to say the social significance of this is huge,” Prof Khan said.

Laying down the concrete

To deliver this new approach, ACU is building a coalition of key industry and community stakeholders, with whom it will hold a series of roundtables.

Prof Khan said that while the pathway to commerciality isn’t yet concrete, it is far from “soft”.

“It is subject to the same rigour as any other development model,” he said. “It’s not separate from mainstream science.

“Universities already have deep knowledge of psychological care, preventative health and other wellbeing models. The issue is that the science hasn’t followed the same sustained delivery track as physical sciences.”

Finding direction

To ensure the path to success is at least going in the right direction, Professor Khan said the team engages in community conversations early, as this is often where the success of an innovation hinges.

For example, the efficacy rates of vaccines mean little if community fears towards them are not addressed.

Leading with community issues also ensures innovations are solving genuine community problems. Traditionally, technology innovators have often begun with a solution, before translating it outward, Prof Khan said.

“Even the most impressive innovations won’t succeed if there isn’t a real-world appetite for them. When you begin with the problem, you’ll greatly improve your chances of success,” Prof Khan said.

Individual differences

Prof Khan also stressed the importance of centring on the individual, their personal differences, and communities and a shift towards more tailored interventions, rather than one-size-fits all.

He said science has tended to flatten populations for research purposes, obscuring important nuances that might influence how well the interventions work.

The shift would echo that already seen in tailored drug development, Prof Khan said.

“It’s something we are increasingly talking about in the context of social interventions, and I hope it follows the same evolution it has in personalised medicine”.

Further insight

Professor Abid Khan will share more on ACU’s place-based approach to human flourishing at the upcoming National Health & Innovation Precincts Summit.

Here he will bring expertise from academia and industry. On the academia side, Prof Khan is Deputy Vice Chancellor, Research and Enterprise at Australian Catholic University (ACU). On the industry side, Khan has helped establish the London Centre for Nanotechnology within UCL’s Bloomsbury Precinct and the Melbourne Centre for Nanofabrication within the Monash Technology Precinct.

This year’s Summit will be held 2-3 December 2026 at Melbourne Connect.

Learn more and register your tickets here.