The National Reconstruction Fund Corporation has provided Emesent with an A$10 million venture debt facility. The loan sits inside A$25 million of new funding that includes A$15 million of equity. Emesent, the Brisbane company, announced the package on 8 July 2026.
The equity syndicate is Main Sequence, QIC Ventures, Orion Resource Partners, Hostplus and NGS Super. Emesent said the NRFC facility is the organisation's first venture debt deployment to a deep technology company.
Proceeds will scale manufacturing at Emesent's plant in Wacol, Queensland, and advance Cortex AI, its onboard autonomy software, and Aura, its cloud platform for 3D processing. Emesent makes autonomous mapping systems, including Hovermap.
Emesent, led by Chief Executive Charles Miller, was spun out of CSIRO in 2018 and employs 109 people in Australia. Hovermap is deployed at more than 200 mine sites. The company named Rio Tinto, BHP and Glencore among operators using the product.
Miller said NRFC support would let Emesent "scale our manufacturing, push our AI and autonomy capabilities further, and deepen our presence in the sectors that matter most to Australia's future, including mining, defense, and critical infrastructure."
David Gall, Chief Executive of the NRFC, said the corporation was supporting the commercialisation of intellectual property developed in Australia. He said robotics and autonomous systems were emerging as critical segments of the Australian economy and that the investment would help keep those capabilities in Australia.
Main Sequence, an early backer, invested in Emesent's Seed and Series A rounds. CSIRO said Main Sequence led Emesent's A$3.5 million seed financing in November 2018, with ACAC Innovation. Emesent closed a $32 million Series A in February 2022, led by Perennial Partners, with Tiger Global, TELUS Ventures, Main Sequence and Archangel Ventures participating. Mike Zimmerman, a Partner at Main Sequence, said the firm had backed Emesent since 2018 and was continuing to support it as the company scales.
The NRFC is a corporate Commonwealth entity with an A$15 billion mandate. It invests through direct loans, equity and loan guarantees across seven priority areas: renewables and low emissions technologies; enabling capabilities; defence capability; transport; value-add in resources; value-add in agriculture, forestry and fisheries; and medical science. It was established by the National Reconstruction Fund Corporation Act 2023 in September 2023.