I was invited to Auckland last week to The Project: Digital Disruption to discuss what’s happening in the Wellington startup scene.
Here are my slides:
Wellington, New Zealand’s Startup Capital
Key points:
- Wellington’s key advantage is its scale. Everything is accessible within a 20 minute walk – but you need to plan for 30 minutes because you will bump into so many people on your way that are doing cool stuff.
- We have a high density of tech startups, and a great culture to back it up
- The weather is conducive to getting sh!t done
- We have a rich startup ecosystem, which is becoming increasingly antifragile
- Accelerators, incubators, investors, tertiary education providers, “big” tech, events, and support organisations all play their part
- Promising trends:
- Government “gets” it
- Talent, capital, ideas and expertise are being continually recycled and refined to help us level-up
- We’re attracting amazing people, and achieving critical mass
- Things just keep getting better in a cambrian explosion of startups
- The future is awesome, thanks to the hard work put in by many over a long time – we’re really starting to reap the rewards, and this seems certain to continue.
- It’s all about the people
Read with nodding head – wondering how the audience responded..? 🙂
I received a very warm reception – there was general recognition that Wellington is by far the best place to do a startup in New Zealand. Several of the international speakers said they regretted not having enough time to visit Wellington this trip, but would plan on it next trip. One of them is already scheduled.
Hey Dave,
Great article.
Just wanted to comment RE “The weather is conducive to getting sh!t done”
Dunedin basically takes this principle through the looking glass. If we had a few more larger spaces that weren’t completely derelict/freezing, we have some amazing quiet areas for people to plug away at things.
Keep on,
B. Morgan Murrah