VPG Innovation Internships

Organisational Overview:

VPG Innovation is a forward-leaning design and engineering powerhouse, innovating in areas such as the defence industry, mining, medical products, and creative structural. VPG is one of few complete “end-to-end” teams that works from a napkin sketch right through prototyping, engineering, manufacturing and commissioning.

Internship Scope

VPG Innovation is currently seeking students in the disciplines of finance, industrial design, marketing, HR and project management.

These internships are focused on the broad scope of defence work being completed at VPG Innovation, including design of metal and plastic components, engineering validation, and full ground-up design and engineering work packages such as the NATO spec Cook Off Oven, for testing the BLU-111 item. The team is located in Camden Park, and is connected to the whole of the Starke-AMG group of companies.

Internship Duration:

3-20 weeks with flexibility to work part-time or full-time over different study periods

Expected learning outcomes for each role: 

1. Industrial Design intern will gain full visibility of true end-to-end design process of products for Department of Defence.
2. Finance intern will acquire an insight into the commercial structure and strategy as related to commonwealth and defence adjacent projects.
3. Marketing intern will be able to tune in to the defence space and learn to project the right image at the right time in a very dynamic business environment.
4. HR intern will learn how to hit the ground running and understand the workings of people behind the defence industry.
5. Project management intern will gain an understanding of live projects and learn how to make an impact straight away.

Anticipated Tasks for each role: 

• Industrial Design anticipated tasks – Hand sketching, CAD modelling, detail design reports
• Finance anticipated tasks – monitoring and tracking AR and AP, helping to strategize forward movement.
• Marketing anticipated tasks – use of Adobe Creative Cloud to experiment with marketing opportunities
• HR anticipated tasks – chatting with people across different departments to help connect everyone, establish and assist with centralizing the HR ecosystem, onboarding new staff.
• Project Management anticipated tasks – Gant charts, connecting people, suppliers and generally key stakeholders on active projects.

Student Eligibility:

Successful applicants must be:

• Australian citizens, residing in South Australia
• Enrolled as an undergraduate in one of the disciplines listed above at the University of Adelaide, University of South Australia or Flinders University
• Eligible to undertake a credit-bearing internship course for this internship experience

Application Closing: 12 November 2025 (11.59pm)

Anticipated Internship Commencement Date: From January 2026

Application Process:

To be considered for this internship and the Defence Industry Connection Program Scholarship valued up to $7,500, please submit your application here: https://defencescholarships.aigroup.com.au/submit-resume/

Once registered, ensure you click ‘apply for placement’ on this advertisement.

Shortlisted applicants will be advised of the outcome approximately two weeks after application closing date.

For any queries, please contact the DICP Team (Saba or Taryn) at dicp@aigroup.com.au.