Tag Archive for ‘New Zealand’ at diversity.net.nz

Tag Archive for 'New Zealand'

Finland and New Zealand, a comparison…

Published by Ben Kepes on July 1, 2008 in Design, Economic Development, Efficiency, IT, New Zealand, Society and Strategy. 3 Comments

It would be an understatement to say that broadband in NZ is a topical issue. Most of what I read isn’t objective or well thought out. I’ve said before the stated goal of the government to “get us into the top half of the OECD” is a nonsense without thinking about and supporting commercial enterprise to use these digital links and create wealth from it.

So I was really interested in this report from the ISCR. It’s really worth a read. It describes and compares the demographics and telecommunications infrastructure of the two nations and seeks to explain why Finland are 6th and NZ is 19th on the OECD lists.

It raises a bunch of questions to me, how about you? I’m really keen to get the thoughts of our readership community about this. More on this subject here and here.

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Selling meat as more than dead animal….

Published by Ben Kepes on February 14, 2008 in Business and the Environment, Governance, New Zealand and Strategy. 0 Comments

News this morning that a mega-merger between rival meat companies PPCS and Alliance is being talked about. I’ve said for awhile that Fonterra is an example of what good can come from mergers. Fonterra has created a dairy industry that is diversified, both geographically and in terms of product line. It markets a value added product and considers itself as much an IP company as a production one.

The meat companies however are where the dairy companies where before Fonterra was created. Basically they are price takers selling a completely commodity based item (cut up dead sheep and cow basically) to whomever will buy it. It just seems so ludicrous when essentially the dairy and meat industries are in similar positions that one industry is building the value while the other is steeped in the days of old.

The question remains whether the meat companies have the vision and leadership to put petty egos and empires aside and build something that could prove beneficial to all - given what I have witnessed from the meat companies I’m not overly confident that they can.

Note - this post does not address in any way the environmental impacts of increased dairying on New Zealand or the planet. I’ll leave that analysis for others!

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SWAGS - Interesting, but can you trust the research?

Published by Julian Stone on February 8, 2008 in IT and SaaS. 1 Comment

I just found this article about the size of the SaaS market in New Zealand. Have a quick read as it’s interesting Here’s the article (and the first paragraph)…

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Software-as-a-Service Ups Its Game in New Zealand
“Market Expected to Experience 65% Growth in 2007 and Grow to NZ$64 Million by 2010″
- http://www.crm2day.com/news/crm/123334.php

“Springboard Research, a leading innovator in the IT Market Research industry, today announced the results of its latest research on the Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) market in New Zealand. Increased vendor activity and the inherent appeal of SaaS have been responsible for the market growing 65% in 2007 to NZ$14 million. Together with Australia, New Zealand continued to be the most mature market in the region….”
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NZ$14 million? That seems a bit on the low side. I would have thought it would have been higher - perhaps double. But 14 million? I’ve known of software co’s in NZ that have been successfully renting software in a SaaS model for years. I also can tell you that we (ProActive Software - www.proworkflow.com - Project Management Software) were never interviewed or asked about our earnings in any survey and that would have added a chunk to the numbers. We’re a dedicated SaaS company! One of the few truly global established SaaS players in NZ. I wonder how many other companies weren’t included in this research? There’s plenty of great SaaS co’s around Wellington as well…

The point of this post? Firstly, that there is an emerging Software as a Service industry in New Zealand, and secondly, whilst interesting numbers and from a seemingly reputable source, never trust a SWAG (Silly Wild Ass Guess)