SMEC AI opens applications for largest free AI founder program in Australia

The Small to Medium Enterprise Centre of AI (SMEC AI) has opened applications for the fifth cohort of its AI Pathfinder program, aiming to enrol more than 1,500 participants in what it describes as the largest free AI founder program run in Australia.

Pathfinder is an eight-week online program designed to help Australians build and launch AI products that address real business problems. It is free to join, delivered entirely online, and open to people already working in an industry or running a business - not only those with a technology background.

SMEC AI is an AI Adoption Centre operating under the Australian Government's AI Adopt program. Four previous cohorts have produced 502 graduates. Applications for the fifth cohort close 16 October 2026, with the program beginning 21 October and concluding with a showcase in December.

Participants work through building a minimum viable product, applying current AI tools, validating an idea with real customers, running customer conversations and pitching an AI startup. The program is delivered by Andrew Lai, managing director of SMEC AI, and Amir Nissen, head of programs.

Lai said the program targets a gap in the national AI conversation - people who understand a problem deeply but have never considered themselves a founder.

"You no longer need to be a technologist to start an AI company, you just need to have domain knowledge," Lai said.

"Australia has hundreds of thousands of people who know a problem worth solving inside out and have never once thought of themselves as a founder. That is the gap Pathfinder was built for, and it is why we are opening it as wide as we can this time.

"Most AI programs either teach theory or sell tools. Pathfinder does neither. Over eight weeks people build something, speak to real customers, and find out whether it works. Some of them come in with an idea and leave with a business. Others find out in week three that the idea was wrong, which is also worth eight weeks of anyone's time."

In July, SMEC AI launched the AI Information Line, a free national phone service that aims to give SMEs practical assistance on adopting AI in a single phone call.