Hey everybody,
There’s heaps of budget news out this week, with some bright points for tax reform and charities. Lots of spin about research commercialisation in what will end up a much leaner public sector. Get a coffee with your public sector friends. If you have cool jobs in our actually buzzing 🐝 innovation sector, make sure to let them know!
Rule #1 - Celebrate the Wins
The Access Activator pilot programme (Creative HQ + Whaikaha) is bringing $400k to six awesome accessibility tech projects, including Wellington-based People First 🥳
The Floeting diamond, an amazing Welly innovation, hits the counter at Harrods 💎
Blacklock looks to raise $5M for the new spinoff of its white-hat software business Cyra 🔐
Wellington Chocolate Factory moves to bigger premises and makes a big bet on our delicious little town 🍫
Optimal retains its G2 Leader status for user research 😎
Congratulations again to Movac for winning the Venture Capital Investment of the Year 🥇
Congratulations to AROTEC Diagnostics for winning Manufacturer of the Year at the Advancing Manufacturing Aotearoa!
New GameFit website is officially live 🥽
Two hundred people packed the first Claude meetup 💥
There will be two Kiwis in Summer Davos, both Wellingtonians! Nicely done to Kauri Tearaura and our very own Ipshita Mandal-Johnson 🤘
Rule #2 - Understand Your Environment
It’s an election year budget so lots to unpack. There are heaps of roundups out there, here are two by BDO and Shellock Consulting that I found useful, plus some callouts by NZ Herald. And then some more:
An update to the RDTI (tax incentive scheme) will introduce in-year payments to alleviate year-end cash flow barriers 💸
Local Angels backing offshore ventures can celebrate as Budget 2026 doubles the Foreign Investment Fund de minimis threshold from $50,000 to $100,000 and purports to reduce compliance costs and surprise tax bills.
We have $294 million over four years being deployed to roll out a brand-new digitised, centralised planning system to replace the RMA, paving the way for slicker data standards and hazard-resilient tech builds.
$10 million capital allocation for: Startup Support Package – Emerging Managers’ Programme.
The tax-free net income threshold for non-profits is jumping from $1,000 to $10,000. That’ll leave some moolah in the coffers 💰
IAB New Zealand (an advertising and media advocacy organisation) launched its first region-based Industry Council in Wellington, bringing together 16 members across technology, media, and government.
Wellington mayor surprised by Government's plan to slash public sector is sadly not a headline I just made up as stinging satire. The benchmark for local tech to be taken seriously is, apparently, “whether New Zealand had AI companies operating at the scale of global platforms such as Claude or Copilot”. Reaction 1: good that the Mayor pushed back with big names such as Sharesies, Hnry, and PartsTrader. Reaction 2: Absurd challenge… accepted? 🛠
Conversely, a similarly small country that is also seen as way far away geographically organises an innovation festival in its capital. The Prime Minister attends enthusiastically and takes every photo op he can. Why is it not a given that our PM would be in attendance at a local innovation event? Let’s make that happen, email any and all Chrises! We had a stack of mayoral candidates attend WellyForge #3, so start lobbying the people who seek the mantle.
Two roundups of reactions to the science system shake-up. One reaction is “RIP”. Yeesh. NZAS and SMC are understandably not the place to look for silver linings, so here’s one: there is $37M for commercialisation and partnerships and ~$1.5 million extra on startup funding support. So if you have a TRL-mature scientific technology, this is the time to tell Gov all about it—especially if you fit within the $65.8 million 'Technology for Prosperity' pillar.
Rule #3 - Nothing Falls Thru The Gaps
Junior engineers are missing out on learning from first principles. It’s a chorus we’ve heard since the chatties got good at coding. But why would we assume that the way pre-chatty learners learned is the best or even the only way to learn? The best I’ve heard this argument made was Lora Vardarova’s talk at NZ Tech Rally (on YouTube).
The public energy innovation centre, Ara Ake is set to shut down 🫡
Manage My Health and Health NZ breached Privacy Act, according to Priv Comm assessment. Welly, this is one for our particular set of security skills! 🗝 Plenty of scope for secure tech to take the place of this first iteration in managing our health data.
Two Wellington design stories: NZ Cleantech Impact Report and CullBeck.
Hey, psst, you wanna be a BioTech NZ ambassador?
The Digital Government Target State looks to remove duplication across our public services, among other goals.
Lots of listings on funding, savings, and opportunities in What Founders Want June edition.
A neat writeup of Creative Tech Activate, it’s one of our absurdly big strength on a global scale 🎨
NZIAT are looking for a Head of Intelligence, 12 Month fixed-term based in Auckland but hybrid, share with your network!
Reminders:
Register your interest for the Aotearoa Al Hackathon Festival—Welly edition at AWS.
Plenty of office, lab, workshop and technical spaces available for lease at Gracefield. Get in touch with Jo McFarlane to get your science/startup sorted.
The Royal Society’s Tāwhia Te Mana Fellowship application portal is now open for a new round to support science, tech, and innovation leaders, established and future.
Rule #4 - Get Inspired, Meet the Locals
Highlighted entries are new from last week.
Coming week:
Thu, Jun 4th, RIMPA Roadshow Wellington at Te Papa
Thu, Jun 4th, 12pm, Scaling Welly Tech at Hnry Stadium 🏟 with lots of illustrious Welly CEO/CTO types in attendance!
Thu, Jun 4th, 5–7pm, Wellington AI Meetup at Hnry—office, not Stadium 😎
Sun, Jun 7th, 2–3pm, Regenerating Te Whanganui-a-Tara Wellington at City Gallery asks “what does Wellington become in 20 years?”
Tue, Jun 9th, 8:15–8:45am, Women in HealthTech coffee meetup at Bellagio.
Coming eight weeks:
Thu, Jun 11th, 11:30am–2pm, Post-Budget Lunch with the Finance Minister at Parliament.
Thu, Jun 11th, 5–8pm, The Unseen Hand: A Cybersecurity Adventure for Founders at Creative HQ.
Thu, Jun 11th, 5.30pm, Welly Fintech: The Trade-offs at Hnry
Wed, Jun 17th, 5.45–7pm, Café Scientifique: How nature inspires modern medicine at Southern Cross 🍻
Wed, Jun 17th, 12:30–1:30pm, Clinical change makers: disrupting in digital health is about nurses and midwives driving digital transformation in the health domain.
Thu, Jun 18th, 9am–2pm, Future Talent Summit at the National Library will be Connecting people to build Wellington's future.
Thu, Jun 18th, 2–4pm, Let’s Talk SaaSpocalypse at Taiawa.
Thu, Jun 18th, The Great NZ AI Roadshow at Tākina is a “masterclass for Kiwi leaders who want to use AI”. Be that leader 🦸
Thu, Jun 18th, 5pm–late, International SaaS Day party 2026, a “mid-winter celebration of the fastest-growing sector in the New Zealand economy” 🥳
Jun 18–20, New Zealand Skin Cancer Summit.
Tue, Jun 23rd, 5pm - 9pm, Teulo Talks Live: Wellington for architects who wanna build good and do other things good, too. WellyForge people get a 10% discount with code: TALKER.
Tue, Jun 30th, 12pm, Modelling Rainfall-Induced Landslide Susceptibility and the Impact of Climate Change.
Jun 29th to Jul 3rd, Research Bazaar Aotearoa, free and online.
Thu, Jul 30th, Aurora Climate Tech Summit
Recurring events:
The Atom at Victoria is open for any unfunded Founders (Students, Early Stage, Idea Stage) and is run by Entrepreneur in Residence, Parisa Shademan - Email [email protected], or join the Facebook community.
Mondays 8–9am, Atom - Founder Mentoring ON-LINE
Weds 12–1pm, Atom - Founder Support Drop-In Hour
Thursdays (every other) at 8am, Kapiti Start-Up Network Meet-Ups
Fridays (every other) at 5pm, Founders Meet Up at Southern Cross hosted by Jack Shennan, Alistair St Pierre and Adiraj Gupta.