Following the official announcement by Ambassador Willem Andrea at Ozwater'12, a broad group of Dutch companies and institutions has come together to lead the first Australia-Netherlands Water Challenge. Main partners are Van Oord and Royal HaskoningDHV. They are supported by HydroLogic, Fugro, Rabobank and the Netherlands Embassy. In addition, KLM is sponsoring a return ticket to the Netherlands for the winner. Main partner on the Australian side is the International Water Centre in Brisbane, a centre of excellence in water management representing four major academic institutions: University of Queensland, Griffith University, University of Western Australia and Monash University. Preliminary results of the challenge will be presented by students at the International River Symposium (Melbourne, 8-11 October 2012).