Last night, the Federal government unveiled their budget for the coming year. The old days of "smokes are up, beer is up" are well behind us with the government's economic centrepiece now a collection of promises and wishes that are meant somehow to make us feel better about today and have confidence in tomorrow. This year, there were plenty of tech angles in the budget. Here are my five highlights.

The Federal Government has given the Industry Skills Fund, which offered skills and training grants to small and medium businesses (SMBs), the chop.

The single biggest roadblock to creating your own startup usually comes down to funding. Without that initial investment, even the best business idea will remain just that -- an idea. This infographic examines Australia's small businesses landscape with an emphasis on how to overcome those initial financial challenges.

Prominent American biologist Ronald Germain has recently published a remarkable suggestion about research funding in the top bioscience journal Cell. He argues for a switch from a project proposal based system to a people-based system. The phrase you'll hear a lot more often is "person-not-project". Here's how a similar funding model could benefit Australia.