Advancing innovation and productivity in the care sector
10.11.2025 - 03:31
Our latest research commissioned by Kismet Healthcare examines opportunities to advance innovation and productivity in Australia's care sector through targeted technological solutions. We identify four high-impact, low-risk opportunities that could deliver over $2 billion in annual productivity gains in the NDIS alone. This study highlights the need for governments to establish a strong digital care ecosystem to preserve the benefits of quality care while addressing rising demand from Australia's aging population.
Australia’s care system is facing significant structural challenges and solving them is essential for long-term economic performance.
There is rising demand from an ageing population with a higher chronic disease burden. There is also a drive to lift the quality of care for the disability, aged, and early childhood sectors to improve outcomes.
Improving sector productivity is a key priority for policymakers because it is essential to the Australian system’s ability to deliver world-leading outcomes.
We find four high-impact, low-risk tech opportunities that could generate over $2 billion in productivity gains in the NDIS alone, or over $13 billion if rolled out across the care sector.
We focused on four innovations in the NDIS that are feasible today, impactful, and able to safeguard against downside harm risks:
- Optimising NDIS matching and scheduling through digital care marketplaces, to make it easier for participants to get the care they need
- Automated NDIS invoice generation and processing, to help service providers generate invoices and plan managers process invoices faster
- Streamlining NDIS specialist and allied health referral pathways through a specialist platform, to improve the efficiency of connections between primary and secondary care
- Improving the efficiency of data exchange between NDIS service providers to make it easier for providers to communicate and reduce the burden on participants in retelling their story
Achieving this mission will require governments to develop four strong pillars in the care sector:
- Reliable digital infrastructure will provide the foundations on which providers can build innovative consumer-facing products that improve care outcomes
- An ingrained culture of innovation in care will create the comfort and social license for providers to introduce new digital tools into care settings
- Coordination between actors, including governments, innovators, care providers, community partners, and educators, to ensure alignment in priorities and actions across the sector
- Sophisticated public sector capability, to ensure the public sector has the skills and resources to deliver on the mission
Read and download the full report here.
Read our latest posts
How EV adoption insulates Australia against oil supply shocks
Mandala’s latest research finds that the adoption of electric vehicles is helping to insulate Australians from the oil supply shocks. This analysis looks at the contribution of Australia’s electric vehicle fleet to our petrol reserves, as well as the savings in fuel costs for Australian households.
16 Mar, 2026
Shaping the Australian banking system for a changing economy
Mandala’s latest research, prepared for the Commonwealth Bank of Australia, finds that Australian banking has been transformed beyond recognition by technology, globalisation, and regulatory change. However, policy has not kept pace. Major banks now face a shrinking revenue base while providing a growing suite of collective goods including regional branches, ATM networks, and payment infrastructure, that comparable financial institutions are not required to provide. The report finds that declining profitability and an uneven regulatory playing field amid rising geopolitical uncertainty place Australia's financial resilience at risk. It recommends three principles for policymakers to shape Australia’s banking system to best serve our national interest. First, consider system-wide impacts of policy settings. Second, apply the same obligations to firms conducting the same activities with the same risk. Third, assess how overseas firms operating in critical parts of the financial system would behave in a crisis.
15 Mar, 2026
The Fragmentation Tax
Australian retailers operate across a patchwork of inconsistent state and territory regulations that, left unchecked, will cost the economy $26 billion and households $9.4 billion over the next decade. Commissioned by the Australian Retail Council, this Mandala report finds that regulatory fragmentation in retail - Australia's second-largest employer, generating $649 billion in economic activity annually - is compounding the country's productivity crisis at the worst possible time. The report identifies specific issues in transport and logistics, and packaging and waste as priority areas for reform, where harmonisation alone would inject up to $1.65 billion into the economy over 10 years. It recommends the Federal Government use its National Competition Policy framework to drive reform - including a $260 million increase to the National Productivity Fund, a new National Harmonisation Council, and a mandate that Regulatory Impact Statements explicitly quantify fragmentation risks.
23 Feb, 2026
Reforming Victoria's Windfall Gains Tax
Victoria's Windfall Gains Tax (WGT), introduced in July 2023, has compounded a decade of new and increased property taxes that have made Melbourne the most costly major city in Australia for development. Commissioned by the Property Council Victoria, this Mandala report finds that developer taxes and charges now account for 18% of total costs on Melbourne developments - double the rate of Sydney - and that the average WGT liability pushes project returns below the viability threshold. The analysis estimates that removing the WGT could unlock $1.4 billion in additional annual investment, support 2,700 jobs and deliver the equivalent of 3,100 new homes per year by 2030. The report also presents a suite of targeted reforms across financial relief, predictability, and policy alignment that would restore investor confidence while balancing the government's revenue objectives.
23 Feb, 2026