Data61 was mostly gutted over the last few years anyway, the slide downhill started when it changed from NICTA. The politicians hate the idea of long term resea

Data61 was mostly gutted over the last few years anyway, the slide downhill started when it changed from NICTA. The politicians hate the idea of long term research funding, so they had the idea it would be self sustaining, but big Australian corporations spend nothing on external research, lowest in the OECD, and foreign corps don't reinvest in research overseas. Also, I remember Hugh Durrant-Whyte (robotics/SLAM pioneer, ACFR, former NICTA CEO) telling us that CSIRO culture would overwhelm Data61. So no surprise.