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Speaker 1: This week on the Business of Tech powered by Two

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Speaker 1: Degrees Business, we're talking about the future of Wellington. I'm

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Speaker 1: Peter Griffin and this is a subject close to my

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Speaker 1: heart as I'm now in my twentieth year living right

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Speaker 1: in the center of the capitol. It's a wonderful place

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Speaker 1: to live and to be honest, I never expected to

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Speaker 1: say that as an orchander via Dublin, who came here

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Speaker 1: to study creative writing and expected to be on the

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Speaker 1: first plane north after finishing my degree. But I fell

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Speaker 1: in love with the place and with a woman living here,

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Speaker 1: and the rest is history. But the city has some

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Speaker 1: big problems now. Our infrastructure is dilapidated, economic growth is stagnant,

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Speaker 1: and the public sector cuts have seen a lot of

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Speaker 1: smart people leave in the last couple of years. Wellington

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Speaker 1: used to be the center of our tech sector, with

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Speaker 1: huge successes like zero and Trade. Me founded here. Believe

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Speaker 1: that doubling down on tech, on startups and innovation a

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Speaker 1: massively successful film industry is the way to attract top

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Speaker 1: talent to the city, inject more capital into our companies

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Speaker 1: and create more high paying jobs. We're not alone in

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Speaker 1: having that idea. A couple of weeks back, during Tech Week,

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Speaker 1: Auckland's Mayor Wayne Brown launched a new innovation and technology alliance,

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Speaker 1: bringing together the public and private sectors to attract capital

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Speaker 1: and boost productivity. He wants Auckland to be the Silicon

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Speaker 1: Valley of the South Pacific. A little bit cringy, but

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Speaker 1: let's face it, Auckland is the center of startup activity

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Speaker 1: now and has a lot going for it. As for

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Speaker 1: the capital, a lot of smart people have been thinking

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Speaker 1: about how to revive some of the glory associated with

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Speaker 1: the city's golden run of tech and entrepreneurial success in

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Speaker 1: the early two thousands into the twenty tens. Last week,

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Speaker 1: the think tank Vision for Wellington, up of prominent Walentonians

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Speaker 1: who want a new direction for the city, featured tech

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Speaker 1: luminaries on a panel discussion giving their suggestions for what

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Speaker 1: we should focus on. For instance, Rod Drury, who after

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Speaker 1: a huge success with Zero divides his time between Wellington

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Speaker 1: and Queenstown, suggested the city is the perfect place for

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Speaker 1: young people to get a start in their career and

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Speaker 1: we need to do a lot more to attract them here.

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Speaker 2: I think the idea around how he pets Wellington's what's.

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Speaker 3: How unique about it. It's that great networking city early

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Speaker 3: in your working career. Sorry to you know kids discussion

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Speaker 3: twenty times for different things going on. But I think

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Speaker 3: what's called about an asset like don't need a car, So.

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Speaker 4: If you're a young person in the twenties, you don't

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Speaker 4: have to waste time with the car, the car insurance

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Speaker 4: and parking cars, or you need really as.

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Speaker 3: A laptop and somewhere to live.

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Speaker 4: So as a thing, I think we should have a

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Speaker 4: strategy of trying to attract people in their twenties, not

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Speaker 4: just people to go at a university, but people that

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Speaker 4: just want to come and have the big city experience

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Speaker 4: like I had coming from full State into some of

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Speaker 4: the floways cuts in the provinces.

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Speaker 3: Don't have to be super and to do the Uni track,

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Speaker 3: just come and live here. So how do you make

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Speaker 3: that easier? We have to make it affordable for them

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Speaker 3: to live.

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Speaker 1: That was Rod speaking at the Vision for Wellington event.

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Speaker 1: Also on the panel was Brooke Roberts, the co founder

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Speaker 1: and co CEO of Chaersease, which has become the go

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Speaker 1: to app for key We equity investors now. Brooke talked

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Speaker 1: about the city's proximity to nature and beaches being something

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Speaker 1: that we really have going for us, but also the

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Speaker 1: need for Wellington to invest more in the startups that

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Speaker 1: can produce wealth for the city.

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Speaker 5: On top of that, you know what I love about

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Speaker 5: Wellingtons being able to run around the waterfront and the

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Speaker 5: hills being able to super dawn and then go to

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Speaker 5: they need to meetings and then fund bilance is quite

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Speaker 5: rare in willing to make it possible than is needing

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Speaker 5: more into growing. I can't be even attracted color to day.

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Speaker 1: It's easy to live out here or purposely to raise.

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Speaker 5: Families and to recapital wall and face back to what

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Speaker 5: it was from what's possible and local standards for city can.

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Speaker 1: So the tone of the night was basically that we've

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Speaker 1: got a great compact city offering a fantastic lifestyle and

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Speaker 1: networking opportunities, but these networks have become disconnected, particularly in

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Speaker 1: the wake of COVID. To rebuild a vibrant tech sector,

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Speaker 1: we need to double down on those lifestyle factors the

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Speaker 1: city has going for it. We need to attract talent,

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Speaker 1: more investment and have better links between our universities and startups.

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Speaker 1: We also need leadership for the city with a clear

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Speaker 1: vision for the future. Sitting in the audience along with

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Speaker 1: me listening to that vision for Wellington panel was Ralph Heinem,

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Speaker 1: the co founder of Volpara Health, a startup that created

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Speaker 1: pioneering software for improving the accuracy of breast screening ma as.

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Speaker 1: The software is now used to screen literally tens of

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Speaker 1: millions of people worldwide, and last year, after a stint

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Speaker 1: on the Australian Stock Exchange, Volpara was acquired by South

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Speaker 1: Korean medical imaging software company Lunet in a deal value

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Speaker 1: at around three hundred million dollars, one of the biggest

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Speaker 1: exits from a Wellington company in the last twenty years. Ralph,

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Speaker 1: like me, came to Wellington and fell in love with

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Speaker 1: this place. He's now an active investor in startups in

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Speaker 1: the cety, including lit Maps, which I featured on the

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Speaker 1: podcast a few episodes ago. So I caught up with

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Speaker 1: Ralph on a sunny Wellington day at his Mount Victoria

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Speaker 1: home after the panel discussion to get his thoughts on

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Speaker 1: what he'd heard and his plans for wally Forge, a

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Speaker 1: new group he's formed that will act to promote events,

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Speaker 1: networking and investments for the Wellington startup scene. Here's the

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Speaker 1: interview with Volpara Health co founder Ralph Heinem. Ralph, Welcome

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Speaker 1: to the Business of Tech. Great to see you and

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Speaker 1: to have you on for the first time.

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Speaker 6: Great to be here, Peter, I mean, I'm going to

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Speaker 6: enjoy the conversation. Let's crack into it.

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Speaker 1: Well, there was a great conversation last night. You and

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Speaker 1: I attended this Vision for Wellington events. Some familiar and

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Speaker 1: iconic faces from the Wellington tech community, the likes of

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Speaker 1: Rod Drury, founder of Zero, Brooke Roberts, the co founder

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Speaker 1: of Chersey's Great Company, a lot of New Zealanders are using,

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Speaker 1: serge Van dam a serial investor in companies in Wellington,

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Speaker 1: and Stephen Cummings, the professor of Innovation and Strategy at

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Speaker 1: Victoria University. So it was a great panel. We're going

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Speaker 1: to get your thoughts on what they said last night

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Speaker 1: about the potential to use one of our strengths, which

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Speaker 1: is tech, to sort of reinvigorate the city, which, let's

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Speaker 1: face it has been in a bit of a funk

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Speaker 1: since COVID. But first I just want to remind listeners

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Speaker 1: off your success story coming to New Zealand after this

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Speaker 1: great academic career at Oxford and setting up Volpower Health,

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Speaker 1: which has been a huge success, grew to be listed

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Speaker 1: on the ASX. Has since been acquired by a South

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Speaker 1: Korean company, so a really successful exit there. Still based

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Speaker 1: in Wellington, still employing a lot of people here, dozens

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Speaker 1: of patents, so creating real intellectual property and helping women

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Speaker 1: all over the world with the AI powered screening software

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Speaker 1: that you've developed. So this is exactly the sort of

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Speaker 1: company as the people said last night, we need more

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Speaker 1: off and how do we do it? How do we

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Speaker 1: sort of ten x or one hundred times what's going

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Speaker 1: on here? But first just yeah, dial back to coming

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Speaker 1: out of Oxford University in the UK, what brought you

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Speaker 1: to New Zealand and the genesis of Volpower.

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Speaker 6: Yeah, the APHD in Oxford on breast AI applied to

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Speaker 6: Paragrams for the textion early texts of breast cancer. Tried

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Speaker 6: to commercialize that in nineteen ninety nine but it was

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Speaker 6: a bit too early, but we switched into brain imaging

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Speaker 6: instead and we were very successful at that and we

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Speaker 6: ended up selling the companies to effectively to Siemens in

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Speaker 6: two thousand and three, at which point Mike Kiwi partner

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Speaker 6: who is now. My wife said, look, she had to

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Speaker 6: come back here from Oxford to finish off a medical

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Speaker 6: degree a targo. Would I come back with her? And

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Speaker 6: I said, well started the company. I was kind of

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Speaker 6: free and easy and never been to New Zealand. It

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Speaker 6: was like, yeah, all right, I'm on the way, let's

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Speaker 6: go to go to Wellington and interesting kind of flying in.

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Speaker 6: Obviously that was always exciting flying into Wellington, and it

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Speaker 6: was particularly on my first visit here. I was very

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Speaker 6: exciting and I thought, this is the kind of place

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Speaker 6: for me. It's got big exciting storms and lots of activity,

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Speaker 6: lots of energy and the lots of interesting things going on.

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Speaker 6: That was two thousand and three, Peter, and then they

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Speaker 6: consulted for some of the top medical emagine companies right

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Speaker 6: around the world. In two thousand and nine, I come

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Speaker 6: back and talked to the guy in Oxford, professor Mike Brady,

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Speaker 6: and we said, all stuff we did fifteen years ago,

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Speaker 6: now is the time for And we could have done

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Speaker 6: it anywhere in the world at that point, but I

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Speaker 6: or we chose to do it in Wellington, to start

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Speaker 6: vol Pier in Wellington. And we did it because quite

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Speaker 6: quite simply, it was just so easy starters where we

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Speaker 6: started to have Skype, which meant kind of global stuff

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Speaker 6: started to play in quite nicely, and we had fairly

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Speaker 6: good internet too. It felt so easy here to access

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Speaker 6: the government, access early stage funding. And then as we

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Speaker 6: started growing, we realized actually there's a huge number of

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Speaker 6: really good software engineers in Wellington. In medical space were

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Speaker 6: to breastcoats, you need really high quality people who really

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Speaker 6: can test the head out of software, you know, no

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Speaker 6: bugs or that kind of stuff, and there was lots

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Speaker 6: of those around Wellington. But that thing that we found

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Speaker 6: as well was as we started to get going was

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Speaker 6: there was there's a lot of people around here with

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Speaker 6: computer vision or AI skills because of the film industry.

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Speaker 6: So back then typically an American would come over and

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Speaker 6: work Wetter They would very conveniently bring a partner along

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Speaker 6: and that part and would often come and work at

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Speaker 6: bop A. So there was a really good relationship and

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Speaker 6: it was a fantastic base to which to start to

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Speaker 6: grow the company. People say, well, you kind of developed

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Speaker 6: the company and the biggest market was the US. Shouldn't

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Speaker 6: you have done it in the US? But I actually

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Speaker 6: feel that well, with the Internet now, you don't have

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Speaker 6: such issues of the tyranny of distance, but also being

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Speaker 6: outside the market just makes you think about things in

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Speaker 6: a different way, and I think vob Ai was just

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Speaker 6: very good at looking at things in different ways from here.

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Speaker 6: And the other thing which as I look back and

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Speaker 6: reflect on now, is that lots of companies came in

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Speaker 6: to our space in the US, funded by USBC, and

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Speaker 6: they were always trying tens and tens and tens of millions,

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Speaker 6: but it all burned out within one or two years.

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Speaker 6: Because medical and a lot of deep tech stuff, you

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Speaker 6: can't do it in one or two years. It's a

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Speaker 6: long term game and you need to have a sustainable

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Speaker 6: company and a sustainable workforce.

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Speaker 7: So from day one at Volpira, it.

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Speaker 6: Used to kind of drive me mad that people weren't

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Speaker 6: working twenty four hours a day. On the other hand,

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Speaker 6: I kind of realized it made all these people they

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Speaker 6: were here for the long run and they weren't going

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Speaker 6: to burn out. So that was a real kind of

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Speaker 6: a real benefit of bit of being in Wellington, as

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Speaker 6: well being the ability to do deep tech, to be

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Speaker 6: patient to grow stuff over the long term.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, and that theme really came through last night because

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Speaker 1: it's a small city, but the access to the green

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Speaker 1: belt here, to surfing at Lyle Bay and cycle tracks

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Speaker 1: and all that. You know, people are able to do

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Speaker 1: their work. You can get out into nature. But your

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Speaker 1: story is quite similar to some of the people on

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Speaker 1: the stage last night, Like Rod came from the Hawk's

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Speaker 1: Bay and he relates his story of coming to the

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Speaker 1: city for the first time and why it was such

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Speaker 1: a good place. You came here through circumstances. You know,

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Speaker 1: your partner was a Kiwi and came back to Wellington

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Speaker 1: to complete his studies. But you could have gone in

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Speaker 1: the last few years. Rod could have gone. Cheersy's is

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Speaker 1: very big. He is operating in Australia now, Brooke could

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Speaker 1: have could have gone. But you're all still here. So

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Speaker 1: it's something about this place, even that it's gone through

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Speaker 1: tough times in recent years, that keeps you here and investing.

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Speaker 1: You're an investor in lip Maps, Wellington based startup, So

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Speaker 1: what is it that keeps you here?

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Speaker 6: Yeah, he's a great question. And you know you just

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Speaker 6: walked up around Mount Victoria, right. Yeah, we live in

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Speaker 6: such a stunningly beautiful place. You know, it's just stunning

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Speaker 6: weather and today and just stunningly beautiful. Along with that, though, yeah,

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Speaker 6: we do because because of that geography, we get big storms.

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Speaker 6: I actually love big storms, and I think Rod touched

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Speaker 6: on that last night. Someone touched on that last night.

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Speaker 6: It's very dramatic here when you get the big storms

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Speaker 6: coming through, and I actually loved I love being in

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Speaker 6: the office here or off downtown and the big storm

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Speaker 6: rolls through, bundles of rain against the window. You think

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Speaker 6: the windows are going to come in. It's all very

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Speaker 6: dramatic and exciting, but then it blows through and it's

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Speaker 6: just as stunning afterwards. So it's so I kind of

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Speaker 6: like all that. But the other thing that really came

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Speaker 6: over last night they used the word easy.

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Speaker 7: I used the word simple.

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Speaker 2: You know.

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Speaker 6: I love it goes to the US or wherever you

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Speaker 6: come back, and you fly into the airport and it's

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Speaker 6: just so simple. Get out taxi, ten minutes to the

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Speaker 6: city center, walk up the road to the house.

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Speaker 7: From the house here in malt Victoria, we're very lucky.

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Speaker 6: We can walk ten minutes to the beach, five minutes

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Speaker 6: to the green Belt, fifteen minutes downtown to Cuba Street.

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Speaker 6: You know, it's just it's all simple and easy. Yeah,

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Speaker 6: it was a theme last night around cars. You know,

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Speaker 6: we very rarely drive cars unless we really have to.

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Speaker 6: And there's just that simplicity of life and stuff, I guess,

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Speaker 6: you know, along with the location, the storms and that

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Speaker 6: simplicity is a very outdoorsy place where where you know,

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Speaker 6: we love the outdoors that you talked about going up

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Speaker 6: on the green Belt. I used to, especially at Volpira,

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Speaker 6: get stressed or whatever, walk along the top of the

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Speaker 6: green Belt.

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Speaker 7: You could see the whole world up there.

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Speaker 6: There were raging storm and it would battery, but it

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Speaker 6: would inspire you at the same time.

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Speaker 7: And you know, I kind of love that.

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Speaker 6: And I think all those factors really helped to form

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Speaker 6: the people, right the people. You know, there's that you know,

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Speaker 6: we often talk about the people being the most important,

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Speaker 6: you know, to me, only you can't come from Looton

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Speaker 6: is a working class town, kind of deck down South,

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Speaker 6: And yeah, we all support Looton Town, which is the best,

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Speaker 6: best team, best football club in the world. But you know,

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Speaker 6: there's always these jokes about Manester United and everyone that

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Speaker 6: goes to watching has pron cocktail, sandwiches and drinks, caviar,

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Speaker 6: and you don't get any of that crap in Wellington.

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Speaker 6: You know, it's all kind of down to earth people.

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Speaker 6: Everyone's everyone's friendly, helping people and all that kind of stuff,

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Speaker 6: and everyone's up for a beer or a coffee and

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Speaker 6: it's just the people really make it at the end

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Speaker 6: of the day.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, and two thousand and three, when when you got

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Speaker 1: here was really the start of this real nascent scene.

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Speaker 1: It started with trade me then you know, Rod was

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Speaker 1: working here on Glazier Systems and that the genesis of

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Speaker 1: Zero was more like two thousand and six, but you

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Speaker 1: had Over the Hill and Mirrima, you had really burgeoning

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Speaker 1: film scene happening with Sir Peter Jackson and Sir Richard Taylor.

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Speaker 1: So there was a lot going on that was twenty

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Speaker 1: plus years ago, and some of those people are still here.

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Speaker 1: But there's a sense that we've sort of lost what

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Speaker 1: was so great about the tech ecosystem. I mentioned COVID,

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Speaker 1: you know, and Rod talked last night about how the

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Speaker 1: towns sort of emptied out, particularly government, and it hasn't

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Speaker 1: quite come back. But what else explains that? What do

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Speaker 1: you think has happened so that we really don't have

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Speaker 1: that thriving tech ecosystem that we once did.

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Speaker 6: I agree co Cove has been a big impact, but

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Speaker 6: also it feels like we've kind of lost some of

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Speaker 6: the coherence behind the scenes that could be related to

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Speaker 6: the government and the Council and their views on staff.

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Speaker 6: Both those entities seem to be breaking things apart rather

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Speaker 6: than trying to help us bring things together. And as

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Speaker 6: we talked about a bit earlier, it kind of feels

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Speaker 6: like this constant disruption willing to nound all we want

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Speaker 6: to do. Well, I want to do is get companies moving.

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Speaker 6: All I want to do is my breast cancer research

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Speaker 6: to go on and save more families from cancer. But

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Speaker 6: I'm stuck, you know, fighting this seven story tower block

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Speaker 6: at the end of the road which is never going

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Speaker 6: to be built, and it's just a waste of their time,

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Speaker 6: it's a waste of my time. But there's some ideological

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Speaker 6: thing happening. I think a government and council level. There's

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Speaker 6: just not letting people get home with stuff. And I

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Speaker 6: think we're Rod touched on that yesterday as well, right

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Speaker 6: up and with his dreams of more bike paths around

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Speaker 6: the place, especially up in the green Belt and things

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Speaker 6: like this.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, it's about sort of being really intentional and deliberate

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Speaker 1: about where you want the city to go. And as

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Speaker 1: we sit here, we're just looking out at what you

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Speaker 1: were saying about this plot of land behind you, which

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Speaker 1: is going to have this massive place at the end

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Speaker 1: of a private road in a very poky space.

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Speaker 7: They want they want that.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, so they're being deliberate about de insification in

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Speaker 1: some areas, but it seems to be at the expense

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Speaker 1: of an economic vision for the city.

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Speaker 6: Yesterday was great because the vision for wanting to event

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Speaker 6: because there was kind of people were talking about economics

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Speaker 6: and you don't really hear that from the council and

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Speaker 6: certain things. Yeah, obviously COVID come along. But the other

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Speaker 6: thing that was very useful used to be very useful

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Speaker 6: was it used to be quite easy to kind of

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Speaker 6: get government funding early on, especially for SaaS companies, but

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Speaker 6: then the Labor government under Grant Robertson come in and

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Speaker 6: they changed it to this really complicated tax R and

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Speaker 6: D credit thing which only bigger companies could understand. So

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Speaker 6: Bobar actually ended up doing pretty well on that because

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Speaker 6: by that stage we were a bigger company. But in

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Speaker 6: my view, it really took away a lot of really

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Speaker 6: good funding for very early SaaS companies and waiting towards

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Speaker 6: a SAS central place. So yeah, you know it ended

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Speaker 6: up our MP in many ways championed this change to

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Speaker 6: the rule. In my view, that helped cripple some of

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Speaker 6: the kind of SaaS infrastructure that was going on. And

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Speaker 6: I'm not sure we ever recovered from that.

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Speaker 1: And then COVID and you know, objectively, the R and

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Speaker 1: D Texas sin of hasn't really achieved its aim was

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Speaker 1: still around one point four or one point five percent

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Speaker 1: of GDP spent on R and D. The whole idea

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Speaker 1: of this was to get more businesses investing in R

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Speaker 1: and D so that we would spend two or maybe

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Speaker 1: three percent of our GDP on R and E, which

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Speaker 1: is what other advanced small nations are doing. So it

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Speaker 1: hasn't really hit the mark, has it?

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Speaker 7: No?

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Speaker 6: As I say, and again it's good for big companies.

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Speaker 6: I remember we first did it. You need like ten

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Speaker 6: accountants and sixteen Deloitte people to work out what was

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Speaker 6: going on. Small companies can't afford that. And you know,

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Speaker 6: the thing, the way it was before, as a SaaS company,

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Speaker 6: you get some you get money up front, and that

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Speaker 6: would be such even if it's like fifty k or

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Speaker 6: sixty k. It would be so useful having that money

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Speaker 6: to help you go get ambitious and really go for growth.

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Speaker 6: And one of the things I think back on a lot,

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Speaker 6: and Brooke from shares his touch on this last night

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Speaker 6: was even though we'd already sold a company when I

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Speaker 6: come to Wellington started up Volpara, I always remember getting

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Speaker 6: ten k from I think it was grow Grow Wellington

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Speaker 6: at the point it was ten k to do some

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Speaker 6: capability buildings, have a quality system in the country to

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Speaker 6: start with.

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Speaker 7: It was just a real nudge.

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Speaker 6: It was like, you know, there is stuff around here,

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Speaker 6: there is people to support you. You know, it does

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Speaker 6: actually make sense to do it in Wellington. And so

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Speaker 6: and Brooke talked about it last night to early Stage

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Speaker 6: and you know, they went to Creative HQ and then

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Speaker 6: there was some nudge. They got some money and there

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Speaker 6: was this kind of nudge. And I really think that

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Speaker 6: one of the things that that SaaS funding used to

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Speaker 6: be that kind of nudge, that you know, supporting nudge,

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Speaker 6: and I think we've kind of lost that. And one

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Speaker 6: of the things I've been talking to a lot of

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Speaker 6: people about rebuilding the ecosystem, and that's what welly forged.

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Speaker 6: But also I really do believe we need early stage

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Speaker 6: nudge funding of zero to fifty k. You've got have

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Speaker 6: you've got a good idea, it convinced sort of whatever

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Speaker 6: it is, five or six people to put in ten k.

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Speaker 6: Let's get some nudge funding going in into those founders

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Speaker 6: who turn up. They might not be techie, you know,

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Speaker 6: they might not be rich, they might not be able

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Speaker 6: to go to their favorite or on call to get

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Speaker 6: the money. But you know there's a bunch of I

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Speaker 6: think there's enough people around Willington now that should be

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Speaker 6: able to come together and really do that kind of

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Speaker 6: true very early stage angel investing.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, and look there is angel HQ, which if you're

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Speaker 1: a wholesale investor you can put twenty five or fifty

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Speaker 1: k into something. There are a few opportunities like that,

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Speaker 1: but it really goes to the larger theme that Surge

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Speaker 1: van Dam was talking about. Here's actually a clip of

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Speaker 1: Surge talking about the constrained capital for high growth companies.

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Speaker 3: Yes, so just on the capital a's long that we

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Speaker 3: have a shortage of capital and the wall so probably these.

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Speaker 8: Themes about I've just written around numbers here, so doing

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Speaker 8: a quote media or a media personality one hundred billion

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Speaker 8: dollars and q WE saved over across a whole lot

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Speaker 8: of funds fifty billion and leans in two there or

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Speaker 8: fifty billion and probably speaking so well John billion dollars

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Speaker 8: on kiwi's money sitting there and managed, which two of

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Speaker 8: one percent of there is and great basics like what

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Speaker 8: we talk about here. So basically you've got one hundred

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Speaker 8: thousand bucks save for your retirement and aggregate two hundred

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Speaker 8: bucks of that is going to companies a lot.

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Speaker 3: Of years these as an investor.

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Speaker 8: So you're all of you who actually have KEYWI savers

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Speaker 8: or are actually saving through some other mechanism and have

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Speaker 8: influencing government, you can actually have your voice certain give

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Speaker 8: that feedback that you actually want.

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Speaker 3: To participate in the future companies of New Zealands.

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Speaker 1: So so towards Yeah, it's basically saying, now, you know,

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Speaker 1: we have a lot of money in iq WE saver,

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Speaker 1: pension funds, all that sort of thing, but only a tiny,

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Speaker 1: tiny fraction of that is going into high growth companies.

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Speaker 1: There aren't really any mechanisms for local investment where people

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Speaker 1: might want to support investing in Wellington's startups. What do

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Speaker 1: you think we need to do to address this.

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Speaker 6: I agree with Surged on that, and you know, I

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Speaker 6: can't understand where it's going on the key we saver staff.

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Speaker 6: I understand, you know, some of the other things again

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Speaker 6: mentioned we sit around waiting too much for the council

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Speaker 6: or for the government to come and rescue us.

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Speaker 7: You know they're not coming.

437
00:22:05,720 --> 00:22:09,000
Speaker 6: And the tech sector and you know, entrepreneurs around here,

438
00:22:09,160 --> 00:22:10,720
Speaker 6: we've got to get together and we've got to solve

439
00:22:10,720 --> 00:22:13,320
Speaker 6: this ourselves. Yeah, and I really believe it's kind of

440
00:22:13,359 --> 00:22:15,200
Speaker 6: it's time for wanting to people to put up the

441
00:22:15,240 --> 00:22:18,919
Speaker 6: hand to upcome this nudge fund for early investors to

442
00:22:19,000 --> 00:22:21,240
Speaker 6: get things moving. I'm certainly not going to wait around

443
00:22:21,280 --> 00:22:23,680
Speaker 6: for the government. You know that that could be a long, long, long,

444
00:22:23,760 --> 00:22:24,320
Speaker 6: long time.

445
00:22:24,560 --> 00:22:28,320
Speaker 1: What was your capital journey like obviously you ended up listening,

446
00:22:28,560 --> 00:22:30,879
Speaker 1: so that was great, and you had mechanism there to

447
00:22:31,000 --> 00:22:34,399
Speaker 1: raise money, But in those intervening years, what was the

448
00:22:34,440 --> 00:22:38,239
Speaker 1: real first influx of funding that allowed you to do

449
00:22:38,280 --> 00:22:39,800
Speaker 1: what you needed to do with full power?

450
00:22:40,520 --> 00:22:43,359
Speaker 6: Yeah, So if you go back to the first company

451
00:22:43,359 --> 00:22:46,760
Speaker 6: in Oxford, you know, we were very successful there. People

452
00:22:46,840 --> 00:22:50,240
Speaker 6: made where it was times ten the money and that

453
00:22:50,280 --> 00:22:53,040
Speaker 6: company started up on that very much was family and

454
00:22:53,080 --> 00:22:54,159
Speaker 6: friends money.

455
00:22:55,640 --> 00:22:55,959
Speaker 7: Was it good?

456
00:22:55,960 --> 00:22:59,080
Speaker 6: It's hugely stressful obviously because you know something your brother

457
00:22:59,240 --> 00:23:01,960
Speaker 6: or your sister and time you're seeing there like how's

458
00:23:02,000 --> 00:23:04,680
Speaker 6: my money going? And he's like wow, no, yeah, quite

459
00:23:04,680 --> 00:23:07,359
Speaker 6: a few more years. But you know they waited and

460
00:23:07,400 --> 00:23:10,080
Speaker 6: they got a really good return out of that.

461
00:23:11,480 --> 00:23:13,560
Speaker 7: Then. Yeah, when I moved here.

462
00:23:13,520 --> 00:23:16,359
Speaker 6: I started to company up with free professors then around

463
00:23:16,400 --> 00:23:18,760
Speaker 6: the world, and we went back to those early investors

464
00:23:19,000 --> 00:23:22,159
Speaker 6: in Oxford and said that we're going to do a company.

465
00:23:22,160 --> 00:23:24,680
Speaker 6: It's going to be Wellington, New Zealand.

466
00:23:26,160 --> 00:23:26,480
Speaker 7: Are you in?

467
00:23:27,040 --> 00:23:29,639
Speaker 6: And so yeah, the capital journey really was that those

468
00:23:29,960 --> 00:23:34,240
Speaker 6: first investors reinvesting into this kind of next company.

469
00:23:34,560 --> 00:23:37,760
Speaker 7: And again I think Phil Royal.

470
00:23:37,840 --> 00:23:40,960
Speaker 6: Touched on that last night though kind of the once

471
00:23:41,000 --> 00:23:44,000
Speaker 6: founders do one thing that they'll do it again.

472
00:23:44,240 --> 00:23:46,400
Speaker 1: And look at right and Atomic and I mean and

473
00:23:47,000 --> 00:23:49,040
Speaker 1: Sam Morgan, Row and Simpson, a lot of them at

474
00:23:49,080 --> 00:23:51,480
Speaker 1: Wellington based company. So it's really about people, isn't it.

475
00:23:51,480 --> 00:23:54,320
Speaker 1: If you weren't here in Wellington saying I want to

476
00:23:54,320 --> 00:23:57,920
Speaker 1: do Vulpower here, your supporters and all that would have

477
00:23:57,920 --> 00:23:59,600
Speaker 1: said okay, doing in Oxford.

478
00:23:59,400 --> 00:24:03,800
Speaker 6: Yeah they were, but they supported us here and so

479
00:24:03,920 --> 00:24:05,840
Speaker 6: in the Endia we were very kind of grateful for that.

480
00:24:05,880 --> 00:24:10,680
Speaker 6: But then over time we got we found there was

481
00:24:10,720 --> 00:24:15,320
Speaker 6: a really wealthy guy over in Australia, Roger Allen, who

482
00:24:16,480 --> 00:24:20,120
Speaker 6: just loved the whole saving families from cancer color view

483
00:24:21,320 --> 00:24:23,920
Speaker 6: and he got heavily involved in it. And I always

484
00:24:23,920 --> 00:24:26,400
Speaker 6: remember Roger because one of the things he said, and

485
00:24:26,440 --> 00:24:28,080
Speaker 6: I think this is pertinent to a lot of New

486
00:24:28,160 --> 00:24:33,000
Speaker 6: Zealand investor, is his viewpoint always was that what you're

487
00:24:33,000 --> 00:24:35,600
Speaker 6: doing is really good for the world. So you know,

488
00:24:35,640 --> 00:24:37,399
Speaker 6: I have a choice. I could give money to charity,

489
00:24:37,960 --> 00:24:42,480
Speaker 6: I could put into companies see innovation, and you know,

490
00:24:42,560 --> 00:24:46,000
Speaker 6: potentially get some money back. I can recycle. So he'd

491
00:24:46,000 --> 00:24:49,800
Speaker 6: always tend towards companies which are doing good as his

492
00:24:50,040 --> 00:24:50,560
Speaker 6: form of.

493
00:24:52,240 --> 00:24:55,440
Speaker 7: Whatever that word is. It has a hard one there.

494
00:24:56,600 --> 00:24:59,520
Speaker 6: And Joe we talked a lot earlier about kind of

495
00:25:00,840 --> 00:25:04,679
Speaker 6: some of the numbers. But for Para, at least a

496
00:25:04,720 --> 00:25:09,359
Speaker 6: year ago we were at obviously we were castro, it

497
00:25:09,400 --> 00:25:14,240
Speaker 6: was castro positive and it was bringing in ten tens

498
00:25:14,240 --> 00:25:17,679
Speaker 6: of millions of revenue, but also forty percent of all

499
00:25:17,800 --> 00:25:20,800
Speaker 6: US breast cancer screens were being done using volpar our

500
00:25:20,880 --> 00:25:25,920
Speaker 6: software's Yeah, that is you know whatever. It was fifteen

501
00:25:26,040 --> 00:25:29,960
Speaker 6: sixteen million women each year getting the benefits of our software.

502
00:25:31,119 --> 00:25:32,480
Speaker 6: So yeah, that was you know, that was that was

503
00:25:32,560 --> 00:25:36,320
Speaker 6: incredible buzz. And going back to the start of opera,

504
00:25:36,560 --> 00:25:42,359
Speaker 6: so we had Oxford sort of investors come in. We

505
00:25:42,359 --> 00:25:44,040
Speaker 6: we had Roger Allen come in. But then as we

506
00:25:44,080 --> 00:25:48,720
Speaker 6: came towards ASX, Neil Craig and Craigs re supported us

507
00:25:49,160 --> 00:25:52,040
Speaker 6: so that they ended up raising five million for us

508
00:25:51,880 --> 00:25:55,359
Speaker 6: as a pre IPO round and that led to the AX.

509
00:25:55,440 --> 00:25:59,960
Speaker 6: And what do you remember that journey for various things.

510
00:26:00,119 --> 00:26:02,720
Speaker 6: What one is because we got investment in from ox

511
00:26:02,840 --> 00:26:05,399
Speaker 6: to start with. From the very start, we had to

512
00:26:05,440 --> 00:26:09,520
Speaker 6: communicate a lot with the investors. So every month the

513
00:26:09,600 --> 00:26:11,719
Speaker 6: all reports going out to all these people in the

514
00:26:11,800 --> 00:26:15,480
Speaker 6: UK who probably thought, well, someone probably thought my money's

515
00:26:15,520 --> 00:26:19,680
Speaker 6: going to New Zealand. I'll never see that again. But yeah,

516
00:26:19,680 --> 00:26:22,520
Speaker 6: they are getting these regular reports and that whole report

517
00:26:22,720 --> 00:26:26,359
Speaker 6: reporting really set us up for the AX because we

518
00:26:26,359 --> 00:26:28,359
Speaker 6: were very used to gear to.

519
00:26:30,280 --> 00:26:31,439
Speaker 7: Reporting two people.

520
00:26:32,720 --> 00:26:36,840
Speaker 6: So yeah, the capital journey for us was Craigs. We

521
00:26:36,880 --> 00:26:39,639
Speaker 6: never really took any VC money for here for various

522
00:26:39,680 --> 00:26:42,000
Speaker 6: reasons that there was one VC got very close to

523
00:26:42,160 --> 00:26:45,080
Speaker 6: putting in a substantial amount, but then there was a

524
00:26:46,320 --> 00:26:49,080
Speaker 6: there was a disaster one of there other companies, and

525
00:26:49,080 --> 00:26:50,920
Speaker 6: they're to throw money into that one.

526
00:26:51,240 --> 00:26:55,040
Speaker 7: So I've all switched around. Yeah, very much.

527
00:26:55,119 --> 00:26:58,120
Speaker 1: So yeah, look and there is there's more more money.

528
00:26:58,200 --> 00:27:00,960
Speaker 1: Robbie Paul from ICE has to Interest just day a

529
00:27:01,119 --> 00:27:06,159
Speaker 1: graph showing the participation of international vcs in their funding

530
00:27:06,200 --> 00:27:08,600
Speaker 1: rounds and it and the curve is just going up

531
00:27:08,640 --> 00:27:12,879
Speaker 1: and up and up. So the international players are looking

532
00:27:12,880 --> 00:27:16,560
Speaker 1: down here. They're scouting for talent. So that the capital

533
00:27:16,640 --> 00:27:19,080
Speaker 1: thing is it's not it's not perfect. What you've said

534
00:27:19,160 --> 00:27:21,119
Speaker 1: is the real early stage stuff. We need more of

535
00:27:21,200 --> 00:27:23,280
Speaker 1: that obviously, and.

536
00:27:23,320 --> 00:27:27,719
Speaker 6: Then touched on that last night, the plant more seeds planted.

537
00:27:28,680 --> 00:27:31,800
Speaker 1: Yeah, we've talked about you you need a city that's

538
00:27:31,800 --> 00:27:35,520
Speaker 1: a great place to live. And we do have the wildlife.

539
00:27:35,560 --> 00:27:38,960
Speaker 1: We've talked about the landscape. The cultural heart of the

540
00:27:38,960 --> 00:27:44,080
Speaker 1: city is still still intact and people and Stephen Cummings

541
00:27:44,119 --> 00:27:47,199
Speaker 1: reflected on that last night, and you acknowledge that, you know,

542
00:27:47,320 --> 00:27:50,080
Speaker 1: the university hasn't particularly got this right to date, but

543
00:27:50,200 --> 00:27:54,680
Speaker 1: things are changing. There's a little incubator and shared working

544
00:27:54,720 --> 00:27:56,879
Speaker 1: space on the Pipotier campus, So we went in near

545
00:27:56,920 --> 00:27:58,560
Speaker 1: a couple of weeks ago to meet lit Maps who

546
00:27:58,560 --> 00:28:00,800
Speaker 1: are based there. So that's really coming along. Here's what

547
00:28:00,880 --> 00:28:04,199
Speaker 1: he said about what they need to get right and

548
00:28:04,280 --> 00:28:07,800
Speaker 1: do better to get that talent pipeline going for the industry.

549
00:28:08,160 --> 00:28:11,280
Speaker 3: I think, in fairness forcunity hasn't been the most receptive

550
00:28:11,880 --> 00:28:13,320
Speaker 3: university to.

551
00:28:13,400 --> 00:28:15,960
Speaker 2: Providing help for people from the community coming in. But

552
00:28:16,000 --> 00:28:18,960
Speaker 2: I think we're fixing that now and I think you

553
00:28:19,000 --> 00:28:22,520
Speaker 2: know that. The Tech Awards on Friday night was interesting

554
00:28:22,560 --> 00:28:25,160
Speaker 2: to me how many people thank the University of Autland

555
00:28:25,600 --> 00:28:28,240
Speaker 2: and thanks the Center for Innovations and Entrepreneurship with the

556
00:28:28,320 --> 00:28:31,720
Speaker 2: University of Auckland for the support that they have given them.

557
00:28:32,280 --> 00:28:35,680
Speaker 3: What don't we have The University of Auckland had when

558
00:28:35,720 --> 00:28:38,160
Speaker 3: it's set up a sense for renovation and entrepreneurship.

559
00:28:38,760 --> 00:28:42,280
Speaker 2: They had local government support like we did, like we do,

560
00:28:42,680 --> 00:28:44,560
Speaker 2: They had university support.

561
00:28:44,120 --> 00:28:47,680
Speaker 3: Like we do, but they also had private and corporate

562
00:28:47,720 --> 00:28:50,160
Speaker 3: investors investing.

563
00:28:49,720 --> 00:28:51,200
Speaker 7: In student entrepreneurship.

564
00:28:51,800 --> 00:28:55,600
Speaker 2: So that's my provocation, if you believe it's recorded, be

565
00:28:55,720 --> 00:28:58,800
Speaker 2: a mental outcome and support, but also think about maybe

566
00:28:59,200 --> 00:29:02,240
Speaker 2: what you could do to sort of scattered those manities

567
00:29:02,360 --> 00:29:04,320
Speaker 2: that the surge talked about.

568
00:29:04,800 --> 00:29:07,560
Speaker 3: That's my propilication, gearing high for money.

569
00:29:08,320 --> 00:29:11,760
Speaker 1: So Stephen Cummings is basically saying, yeah, there needs to

570
00:29:11,800 --> 00:29:16,320
Speaker 1: be a more collaboration, more cohesive way of fostering all

571
00:29:16,360 --> 00:29:20,600
Speaker 1: that entrepreneurial talent. What you've generally been like with Volpara

572
00:29:20,720 --> 00:29:25,320
Speaker 1: actually finding great talent from the Wellington area or attracting

573
00:29:25,360 --> 00:29:26,320
Speaker 1: people to this city.

574
00:29:26,680 --> 00:29:30,440
Speaker 6: We really didn't have a huge amount of issues. Obviously

575
00:29:30,560 --> 00:29:33,560
Speaker 6: during COVID and stuff that there was, there was issues,

576
00:29:33,680 --> 00:29:36,280
Speaker 6: and you know, it comes like Vaultpire a lot of

577
00:29:36,320 --> 00:29:38,720
Speaker 6: the deep tech ones you get out of universities, you're

578
00:29:38,760 --> 00:29:41,080
Speaker 6: always trying to do good and you're on a mission.

579
00:29:41,120 --> 00:29:43,760
Speaker 6: So for volt Pier of saving fans from breast cancer

580
00:29:44,200 --> 00:29:46,920
Speaker 6: and that was always a very powerful poll for people.

581
00:29:47,800 --> 00:29:50,440
Speaker 6: So yeah, we used to get some outstanding engineers from

582
00:29:50,480 --> 00:29:56,280
Speaker 6: ron Wellington. We did bring in FDA skills from overseas.

583
00:29:56,320 --> 00:29:59,640
Speaker 7: But again, you know a lot of these people, especially in.

584
00:29:59,480 --> 00:30:03,880
Speaker 6: Today's year us, were keen to know, keen to try

585
00:30:04,000 --> 00:30:07,200
Speaker 6: try somewhere else and so that again that was relatively

586
00:30:07,200 --> 00:30:09,040
Speaker 6: easy to find those people and pull them down.

587
00:30:09,600 --> 00:30:13,440
Speaker 1: And because Oxford and Cambridge are I mean, Cambridge is

588
00:30:13,440 --> 00:30:17,000
Speaker 1: one of the biggest innovation ecosystems in the world in

589
00:30:17,040 --> 00:30:22,400
Speaker 1: its own right. When you have a highly innovative, successful

590
00:30:22,480 --> 00:30:25,680
Speaker 1: university at the heart of it, the stuff that spins

591
00:30:25,720 --> 00:30:28,239
Speaker 1: off and the capital that attracts the talent from all

592
00:30:28,280 --> 00:30:30,200
Speaker 1: over the world, and we do. Yeah, we've got a

593
00:30:30,200 --> 00:30:33,080
Speaker 1: pretty good at university here in Victoria and mass as well,

594
00:30:33,080 --> 00:30:35,880
Speaker 1: plus all the Crown Research Institute, so we do have

595
00:30:36,000 --> 00:30:39,720
Speaker 1: quite a good sort of base of scientific expertise.

596
00:30:40,520 --> 00:30:43,960
Speaker 6: No, absolutely no, there was a whole science city concept

597
00:30:44,600 --> 00:30:48,200
Speaker 6: which I'm actually a real believer in. The well Itto's

598
00:30:48,240 --> 00:30:51,360
Speaker 6: ability of science was amazed when you know, whenever you

599
00:30:51,440 --> 00:30:53,920
Speaker 6: go into the Hut for example, and you know, you're

600
00:30:53,920 --> 00:30:56,840
Speaker 6: always sitting down with someone random and they're telling you

601
00:30:56,880 --> 00:31:01,440
Speaker 6: their fifty year journey of understanding MRI or coils or.

602
00:31:01,440 --> 00:31:02,040
Speaker 7: Whatever it is.

603
00:31:02,080 --> 00:31:05,360
Speaker 6: And I do really believe that Wellington has got like

604
00:31:05,400 --> 00:31:09,680
Speaker 6: an outstanding science based around here, and I actually do

605
00:31:09,760 --> 00:31:11,640
Speaker 6: believe a lot of it is getting There's a certain

606
00:31:11,640 --> 00:31:14,360
Speaker 6: amount of wastage there, people getting laid off or retiring

607
00:31:14,880 --> 00:31:19,720
Speaker 6: when they should be continuing to contribute to Wellington and

608
00:31:19,800 --> 00:31:22,719
Speaker 6: to you know, to the overall new Zealand economy. One

609
00:31:22,720 --> 00:31:25,560
Speaker 6: of the things I did about a year or eighteen

610
00:31:25,560 --> 00:31:29,000
Speaker 6: months ago was started called something called Welly Breast Hub.

611
00:31:29,320 --> 00:31:31,800
Speaker 6: It's kind of using my experience in breast cancer try

612
00:31:31,800 --> 00:31:36,400
Speaker 6: and raise up the breast cancer research across the country.

613
00:31:36,720 --> 00:31:39,320
Speaker 6: It's kind of expanding now into Australia. It's about to

614
00:31:39,400 --> 00:31:43,320
Speaker 6: kind of go global as well. But I first felt well,

615
00:31:43,360 --> 00:31:46,480
Speaker 6: if I could do that, then you know, one of

616
00:31:46,480 --> 00:31:49,920
Speaker 6: the guys who won those MRI experts or experts on

617
00:31:50,000 --> 00:31:53,080
Speaker 6: coil could equally do a community like that to try

618
00:31:53,120 --> 00:31:56,480
Speaker 6: and raise the whole level up as well. And yeah,

619
00:31:56,480 --> 00:32:00,600
Speaker 6: the key to doing it is you want people. We

620
00:32:00,600 --> 00:32:03,680
Speaker 6: were very grounded. We've put people with a good mix

621
00:32:03,760 --> 00:32:07,680
Speaker 6: of academic and commercial kind of views on stuff. And

622
00:32:07,720 --> 00:32:10,920
Speaker 6: you have to use digital technology. So you know, bob

623
00:32:10,960 --> 00:32:14,280
Speaker 6: Pya becomes successful. Well, one of its big successes was

624
00:32:14,400 --> 00:32:17,480
Speaker 6: using a system called Yama at the heart and Bob

625
00:32:17,920 --> 00:32:22,240
Speaker 6: was very very science based and anything in the world

626
00:32:22,360 --> 00:32:26,040
Speaker 6: happened around breast cancer, whether it was detection, diagnosis, treatment

627
00:32:26,120 --> 00:32:28,640
Speaker 6: or whatever, we wanted to know about it. We wanted

628
00:32:28,640 --> 00:32:31,880
Speaker 6: to teach everyone in the company about it. So even

629
00:32:31,920 --> 00:32:35,120
Speaker 6: if you're an accountant or the salesperson, we would teach

630
00:32:35,160 --> 00:32:37,880
Speaker 6: you that science. The whole company kind of grew this

631
00:32:37,960 --> 00:32:41,760
Speaker 6: culture of science and understanding of breast cancer in all

632
00:32:41,840 --> 00:32:44,479
Speaker 6: its forms, and I really believe that that was one

633
00:32:44,480 --> 00:32:46,880
Speaker 6: of the big reasons. And I'd love to see some

634
00:32:46,960 --> 00:32:51,000
Speaker 6: of that kind of thinking and science city concepts kind

635
00:32:51,000 --> 00:32:53,960
Speaker 6: of come through. And the other thing Peter which touched

636
00:32:54,000 --> 00:32:56,320
Speaker 6: on it is Welly Forge as well, and part of

637
00:32:56,400 --> 00:33:00,720
Speaker 6: that is part of that is building on side city

638
00:33:00,800 --> 00:33:05,000
Speaker 6: and yeah where where things like it just really annoyed me.

639
00:33:05,040 --> 00:33:07,760
Speaker 6: Over the last couple of years. I'd hear about a

640
00:33:07,880 --> 00:33:12,160
Speaker 6: talk via some LinkedIn post and I'd turn up there

641
00:33:12,200 --> 00:33:14,320
Speaker 6: and it'd be fifteen people sitting in a room and

642
00:33:14,320 --> 00:33:17,520
Speaker 6: I'm like, if you circ, if you told people about this,

643
00:33:17,760 --> 00:33:20,040
Speaker 6: there'll be journalists here, there'd be students here, they'll be

644
00:33:20,080 --> 00:33:22,520
Speaker 6: public here, the agent invested here, they be you know,

645
00:33:22,960 --> 00:33:25,760
Speaker 6: be real movac and these guys would come along as

646
00:33:25,760 --> 00:33:29,360
Speaker 6: well and just start to hear your message and start

647
00:33:29,400 --> 00:33:32,480
Speaker 6: to kind of get your branding, you get your name known,

648
00:33:32,600 --> 00:33:34,080
Speaker 6: and start to kind of build up that kind of

649
00:33:34,080 --> 00:33:36,640
Speaker 6: base level of understanding. But there's a whole series of

650
00:33:36,640 --> 00:33:40,600
Speaker 6: these kind of talks and which i'd miss or I've

651
00:33:40,600 --> 00:33:44,400
Speaker 6: got to hear about secondhand somehow and go along with

652
00:33:44,440 --> 00:33:46,840
Speaker 6: it to be empty. And I'm like, these are great

653
00:33:46,880 --> 00:33:49,959
Speaker 6: networking events, these are great learning opportunities. These these are

654
00:33:50,040 --> 00:33:56,640
Speaker 6: kind of things where Wellington should be here learning, building, growing, networking,

655
00:33:56,760 --> 00:33:59,360
Speaker 6: getting inspired to actually go out there and do it themselves.

656
00:33:59,360 --> 00:34:01,760
Speaker 1: And we used to that around in two thousand and three,

657
00:34:01,760 --> 00:34:04,640
Speaker 1: and I remember going to some of those events and

658
00:34:04,680 --> 00:34:07,560
Speaker 1: they were humming, and there was a lot more shared

659
00:34:07,600 --> 00:34:10,800
Speaker 1: working spaces. There was more of a vibe around tech

660
00:34:11,040 --> 00:34:13,160
Speaker 1: in this in the city. We seem to have lost that.

661
00:34:13,280 --> 00:34:15,960
Speaker 1: What's the goal with Welly Forge? How are you going

662
00:34:16,000 --> 00:34:17,719
Speaker 1: to get involved in trying to foster that?

663
00:34:18,280 --> 00:34:22,399
Speaker 6: Yeah, so again I'm always a big fan of using

664
00:34:22,560 --> 00:34:26,400
Speaker 6: using tech tech well, but I've always had you know,

665
00:34:26,440 --> 00:34:30,239
Speaker 6: I've used tech many times now. PI was built around

666
00:34:30,480 --> 00:34:33,879
Speaker 6: Yama Tech, right, and actually we're about to use Yama

667
00:34:33,960 --> 00:34:36,000
Speaker 6: I think Rod talked about it at some point. That's

668
00:34:36,040 --> 00:34:39,000
Speaker 6: sort of video we'll try that. I think they moved

669
00:34:39,000 --> 00:34:40,880
Speaker 6: away for it, but it was it was next.

670
00:34:41,120 --> 00:34:42,960
Speaker 1: Went through a period from about a decade yea. It

671
00:34:43,000 --> 00:34:45,160
Speaker 1: was massive. It wasn't as a tool for collaboration, and that.

672
00:34:45,360 --> 00:34:47,560
Speaker 6: So it's always been a big fan of building communities

673
00:34:47,840 --> 00:34:51,560
Speaker 6: kind of digitally and welly Ford is going to be that. Yeah,

674
00:34:51,560 --> 00:34:53,920
Speaker 6: it's it's going to be an email list. But the

675
00:34:54,080 --> 00:34:55,680
Speaker 6: kind of the news that is going to cover all

676
00:34:55,680 --> 00:34:59,920
Speaker 6: the Wellington success stories. We don't celebrate success enough in Wellington.

677
00:35:00,440 --> 00:35:04,799
Speaker 6: You know, lip maps, buying research Rabbit. Let's just you know,

678
00:35:04,880 --> 00:35:08,600
Speaker 6: recap on that. So a small weddingtor company raises money,

679
00:35:09,040 --> 00:35:12,920
Speaker 6: hits a million dollars of URR and buys an American competitor.

680
00:35:14,280 --> 00:35:16,760
Speaker 7: That's quite a unique story, right, yeah, yeah.

681
00:35:16,719 --> 00:35:18,480
Speaker 6: And I think you covered it. I don't remember the

682
00:35:18,480 --> 00:35:21,799
Speaker 6: Dominion Post covering it. Probably not all the story you

683
00:35:21,840 --> 00:35:25,640
Speaker 6: talked about earlier. VOPI got brought by South Korean company

684
00:35:25,719 --> 00:35:30,120
Speaker 6: last year and that's one of the biggest exits in Wellington.

685
00:35:31,719 --> 00:35:34,239
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, absolutely, it's three hundred million dollars for.

686
00:35:34,200 --> 00:35:37,200
Speaker 7: A long long time. Yeah. So but you know, I

687
00:35:37,239 --> 00:35:38,920
Speaker 7: didn't see anything that don post about this.

688
00:35:39,280 --> 00:35:41,680
Speaker 1: And that goes to what Stephen Cummings was saying. You know,

689
00:35:41,680 --> 00:35:44,120
Speaker 1: we celebrated our sports stars and that and this is

690
00:35:44,120 --> 00:35:48,600
Speaker 1: a common sort of complaint through New Zealand's recent history.

691
00:35:48,880 --> 00:35:52,719
Speaker 1: Are entrepreneurs and that don't really get much of a

692
00:35:52,760 --> 00:35:54,959
Speaker 1: look in so Peter Beck and that obviously rocket lab

693
00:35:55,320 --> 00:35:58,799
Speaker 1: or inspiring success, but yeah, there's just so many of

694
00:35:58,840 --> 00:36:01,840
Speaker 1: them really in this town. You don't really hear much about.

695
00:36:02,120 --> 00:36:04,800
Speaker 6: Welly Ford is going to celebrate those successes and hopefully

696
00:36:04,880 --> 00:36:08,279
Speaker 6: journalists like yourself and others will go, oh, actually that's

697
00:36:08,280 --> 00:36:11,919
Speaker 6: an interesting story. I'll I'll write that up and yeah,

698
00:36:11,920 --> 00:36:15,600
Speaker 6: that'll inspire the next generation of people coming through.

699
00:36:15,800 --> 00:36:17,719
Speaker 7: We're going to cover all the wedding. It's an event

700
00:36:17,760 --> 00:36:18,680
Speaker 7: in Wellington.

701
00:36:19,400 --> 00:36:23,600
Speaker 6: Which is kind of science translational or tech tech translational.

702
00:36:23,680 --> 00:36:25,160
Speaker 6: You know, we want to want to know about it

703
00:36:25,160 --> 00:36:29,000
Speaker 6: and tell everyone and so and yeah, we're gonna start

704
00:36:29,000 --> 00:36:33,200
Speaker 6: to bring together the the whole ecosystem. So there's something

705
00:36:33,239 --> 00:36:36,880
Speaker 6: called the Wellington Startup Collective, for example, run by Brent's

706
00:36:37,160 --> 00:36:40,719
Speaker 6: by Sir Jimmy McGee and then Surge and a few

707
00:36:40,760 --> 00:36:44,719
Speaker 6: others and Trent as well. And again you know, not

708
00:36:45,200 --> 00:36:47,040
Speaker 6: a huge amount of people know that. So it's start

709
00:36:47,120 --> 00:36:50,799
Speaker 6: linking up this email news that we'll start mentioning the

710
00:36:50,840 --> 00:36:53,560
Speaker 6: angels that you mentioned earlier. We'll start mentioning this collective

711
00:36:53,719 --> 00:36:57,040
Speaker 6: and I'd love to build that up and then introduce

712
00:36:57,080 --> 00:37:00,000
Speaker 6: this early stage venture fund as part of it as well,

713
00:37:00,160 --> 00:37:02,719
Speaker 6: and then moving on and it was a topic last

714
00:37:02,760 --> 00:37:05,359
Speaker 6: night as well as that, you know, we really need

715
00:37:05,360 --> 00:37:08,719
Speaker 6: somewhere to interact, you know, in a casual way. So

716
00:37:09,600 --> 00:37:12,160
Speaker 6: Welly Forge is going to host an event Undercurrent on

717
00:37:12,239 --> 00:37:16,200
Speaker 6: the junior team and it's a great little venue and

718
00:37:16,200 --> 00:37:18,560
Speaker 6: it's all designed for talking.

719
00:37:18,880 --> 00:37:23,320
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's great underground on Tory Street in center Wellington.

720
00:37:23,480 --> 00:37:24,520
Speaker 7: Yeah, it's just good.

721
00:37:24,560 --> 00:37:27,520
Speaker 6: It's an excellent venue for kind of the atmosphere we

722
00:37:27,600 --> 00:37:30,359
Speaker 6: want to create. But you know, we need to start

723
00:37:30,360 --> 00:37:34,200
Speaker 6: creating that space where if I go and have a

724
00:37:34,200 --> 00:37:37,759
Speaker 6: coffee somewhere downtown and there's surgeries standing there and we

725
00:37:37,800 --> 00:37:40,800
Speaker 6: have a little chat or some of the other people

726
00:37:41,320 --> 00:37:43,600
Speaker 6: prefer me it's an incubator kind of more in the

727
00:37:43,640 --> 00:37:46,799
Speaker 6: center of town with open doors where there's much more

728
00:37:46,880 --> 00:37:50,000
Speaker 6: flow of people coming in and out and stuff, just

729
00:37:50,000 --> 00:37:52,080
Speaker 6: to get those casual interactions moving.

730
00:37:52,320 --> 00:37:54,799
Speaker 1: Yeah, and these are all things that you know, you

731
00:37:54,840 --> 00:37:58,239
Speaker 1: don't need the Council to give its approval to. I

732
00:37:58,239 --> 00:38:00,359
Speaker 1: mean there's a lot of things where I mean last

733
00:38:00,440 --> 00:38:02,640
Speaker 1: night that you can get off the ground. It's really

734
00:38:03,280 --> 00:38:07,360
Speaker 1: reclaiming our own destiny. And deciding what I said he

735
00:38:07,440 --> 00:38:08,879
Speaker 1: wants to be. And there was a lot of talk

736
00:38:09,200 --> 00:38:12,520
Speaker 1: about people getting more engaged in the democratic process. Actually

737
00:38:12,719 --> 00:38:17,319
Speaker 1: Rod said it should be compulsory to vote. So there's

738
00:38:17,360 --> 00:38:20,160
Speaker 1: a few interesting views on that. But there's the things

739
00:38:20,200 --> 00:38:22,680
Speaker 1: that you're doing with wellly forward and that, as Rod

740
00:38:22,719 --> 00:38:25,359
Speaker 1: and other said, it's very competitive and if you want

741
00:38:25,400 --> 00:38:29,000
Speaker 1: to attract the best talent and the capital, you've got

742
00:38:29,000 --> 00:38:30,799
Speaker 1: to roll out the mount and say this is what

743
00:38:30,800 --> 00:38:31,480
Speaker 1: we're good at.

744
00:38:32,000 --> 00:38:32,239
Speaker 7: No.

745
00:38:32,160 --> 00:38:35,799
Speaker 6: No, I loved you know, I cycle ever walk every

746
00:38:35,800 --> 00:38:39,800
Speaker 6: out and I'm grateful for some of those bike paths.

747
00:38:39,800 --> 00:38:42,400
Speaker 6: But you just can't force people to do stuff like that.

748
00:38:42,480 --> 00:38:44,480
Speaker 6: And you can't, you know, you have to take them

749
00:38:44,520 --> 00:38:47,839
Speaker 6: along the journey. So you can't have some ideological things

750
00:38:47,880 --> 00:38:51,240
Speaker 6: saying from now on, everyone's going to walk or cycle.

751
00:38:51,560 --> 00:38:55,239
Speaker 6: It doesn't work for the older generation, disable people, you know,

752
00:38:55,320 --> 00:38:56,400
Speaker 6: all that kind of group.

753
00:38:56,400 --> 00:38:58,759
Speaker 7: It's just it's just not the right way doing it.

754
00:38:59,120 --> 00:38:59,319
Speaker 1: Yeah.

755
00:38:59,719 --> 00:39:03,400
Speaker 6: Yes, you know, we heard that vision from Rodolph and

756
00:39:03,440 --> 00:39:05,680
Speaker 6: it just it was just beautiful term this, you know,

757
00:39:05,800 --> 00:39:08,799
Speaker 6: with the capital of urban adventure. To me, it really

758
00:39:08,800 --> 00:39:14,000
Speaker 6: resonated because it really touches on you know, adventure, extreme winds,

759
00:39:14,080 --> 00:39:18,160
Speaker 6: extreme rain, beautiful sunny days, biking, walking up the green Belt,

760
00:39:19,000 --> 00:39:23,680
Speaker 6: plus starts and being creative and the council and others.

761
00:39:23,760 --> 00:39:26,520
Speaker 6: You know, they talk about creativity and in their mind

762
00:39:26,560 --> 00:39:29,880
Speaker 6: that's all about arts and stuff. But you know, science

763
00:39:29,920 --> 00:39:33,440
Speaker 6: is incredibly creative, Tech is incredibly creative, and it's it's

764
00:39:33,480 --> 00:39:37,280
Speaker 6: when you start mixing all together you get magic happening. Yeah,

765
00:39:37,560 --> 00:39:40,880
Speaker 6: and that's kind of Welly Forward and other initiatives that

766
00:39:41,160 --> 00:39:42,920
Speaker 6: we need to get magic happening again.

767
00:39:43,120 --> 00:39:45,759
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's that sort of intersection, like like you were

768
00:39:45,800 --> 00:39:48,440
Speaker 1: saying that the people from the film industry who came

769
00:39:48,680 --> 00:39:51,000
Speaker 1: and worked at all para. That's a great thing about

770
00:39:51,640 --> 00:39:54,440
Speaker 1: about Wellington as you've got these you know, you've got science,

771
00:39:54,520 --> 00:39:56,920
Speaker 1: you've got tich, you've got the creative, you've got a

772
00:39:57,000 --> 00:39:59,759
Speaker 1: strong arts scene, and you've got just massive film in

773
00:39:59,800 --> 00:40:04,720
Speaker 1: this over there, so many entrepreneurs and startups cross over

774
00:40:05,120 --> 00:40:06,320
Speaker 1: those sectors.

775
00:40:06,560 --> 00:40:09,680
Speaker 6: And then and because we're a small compact city, yeah,

776
00:40:09,840 --> 00:40:11,480
Speaker 6: you walk around, you bump into them, right.

777
00:40:11,560 --> 00:40:12,960
Speaker 3: Yeah.

778
00:40:11,920 --> 00:40:15,120
Speaker 1: So I think we both came away by sounds of

779
00:40:15,320 --> 00:40:18,200
Speaker 1: feeling pretty inspired by what we heard last night. Do

780
00:40:18,239 --> 00:40:21,560
Speaker 1: you think it's going to translate into meaningful action. We've

781
00:40:21,560 --> 00:40:25,160
Speaker 1: got a mayoral election coming up, Andrew Little looks to

782
00:40:25,160 --> 00:40:28,280
Speaker 1: be the front runner, and that he's obviously former labor

783
00:40:28,880 --> 00:40:33,080
Speaker 1: MP left leaning. To what extent do we need? A

784
00:40:33,160 --> 00:40:36,680
Speaker 1: real leadership change and a vision change for the city.

785
00:40:36,680 --> 00:40:39,120
Speaker 1: Doesn't need to be led, but how important is it

786
00:40:39,160 --> 00:40:41,360
Speaker 1: to have a strong leader in the council who buys

787
00:40:41,360 --> 00:40:45,080
Speaker 1: into this vision. Playing to our traditional strengths like tech

788
00:40:45,480 --> 00:40:46,400
Speaker 1: absolutely critical.

789
00:40:46,600 --> 00:40:49,279
Speaker 6: We need someone who is at the top who understands tech,

790
00:40:49,440 --> 00:40:54,480
Speaker 6: understands commerce, understand businesses, understands creativity and understands the kind

791
00:40:54,480 --> 00:40:57,239
Speaker 6: of the energy and stuff around Wellington that if we

792
00:40:57,280 --> 00:41:01,000
Speaker 6: can pull it together, and we do need rallying kind

793
00:41:01,040 --> 00:41:03,560
Speaker 6: of vision and love. We heard about being the capital

794
00:41:03,560 --> 00:41:06,200
Speaker 6: of urban adventure feels to me like that that is

795
00:41:07,560 --> 00:41:11,080
Speaker 6: a rallying vision because it does pull together some cycling,

796
00:41:11,120 --> 00:41:14,400
Speaker 6: but in a pragmatic kind of way, but it plays

797
00:41:14,400 --> 00:41:17,160
Speaker 6: to all our strengths and as talking to Americans and

798
00:41:17,200 --> 00:41:19,200
Speaker 6: talking to them about you know, we're the capital of

799
00:41:19,320 --> 00:41:22,319
Speaker 6: urban adventure and stuff, I think it will become a

800
00:41:22,400 --> 00:41:25,799
Speaker 6: very attractive place to come and interesting thing is right

801
00:41:25,840 --> 00:41:27,560
Speaker 6: you turn up and it kind of almost sets sex

802
00:41:27,600 --> 00:41:30,920
Speaker 6: affectations as well, it's kind of you don't turn up thinking,

803
00:41:31,440 --> 00:41:33,480
Speaker 6: oh it's going to be calm and mild and we're

804
00:41:33,520 --> 00:41:36,879
Speaker 6: going to drink a caveat and every day you come,

805
00:41:36,960 --> 00:41:39,319
Speaker 6: you know, this is the city of action. That's one

806
00:41:39,320 --> 00:41:42,080
Speaker 6: of the words down there on the waterfront. This is

807
00:41:42,080 --> 00:41:44,160
Speaker 6: the city of action. And we need to get back

808
00:41:44,200 --> 00:41:45,680
Speaker 6: to being the city of action. And we need that

809
00:41:45,800 --> 00:41:49,239
Speaker 6: rallying vision from the top. And I'm really hoping that

810
00:41:49,760 --> 00:41:52,799
Speaker 6: Andrew Little or Rachel or some of these people you

811
00:41:52,840 --> 00:41:57,040
Speaker 6: start to pull out this positive rallying cry that yeah,

812
00:41:57,040 --> 00:42:01,200
Speaker 6: we can do stuff. But also I mean, as were

813
00:42:01,239 --> 00:42:03,840
Speaker 6: ready forward and other things. Yeah, we can't wait for

814
00:42:03,840 --> 00:42:05,480
Speaker 6: the gard and we can't wait for the council to

815
00:42:05,560 --> 00:42:07,840
Speaker 6: do this. We have to do it ourselves.

816
00:42:15,120 --> 00:42:17,840
Speaker 1: So thanks to Ralph for coming on and giving his perspective,

817
00:42:17,920 --> 00:42:20,600
Speaker 1: and I'll post a link to the full Vision for

818
00:42:20,680 --> 00:42:23,840
Speaker 1: Wellington panel audio in the show notes too. I recorded

819
00:42:23,880 --> 00:42:26,080
Speaker 1: it on my phone, so it's not great audio, but

820
00:42:26,440 --> 00:42:28,400
Speaker 1: it's worth a listen. There was some great stuff that

821
00:42:28,400 --> 00:42:31,520
Speaker 1: came out of that discussion. Thanks for tuning in. If

822
00:42:31,560 --> 00:42:34,640
Speaker 1: you're not subscribed, you can do so entirely for free

823
00:42:35,080 --> 00:42:39,680
Speaker 1: on iHeartRadio or your favorite podcast app next week. A

824
00:42:39,719 --> 00:42:42,839
Speaker 1: business coach who has written a book that cuts through

825
00:42:42,880 --> 00:42:45,960
Speaker 1: the AI hype to help figure out what you actually

826
00:42:46,000 --> 00:42:50,200
Speaker 1: need to do to integrate artificial intelligence into your business.

827
00:42:50,640 --> 00:42:53,520
Speaker 1: That episode's dropping next Thursday, and I'll catch you then