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Our B:HIVE kiwi conservators have been a tad busy over lockdown.

First there’s the name change – from Kiwis for kiwi to “Save the Kiwi”. And a little bird tells me that The Hatchery, a branding agency at the B:HIVE, helped with the rebrand.

Next came scoring New Zealand’s GOAT in a boat – Lisa Carrington. For those of you who are not sure what that means , it’s the title “Greatest of All Time – in a boat” that the NZ Herald gave Carrington after she won three gold medals at the Tokyo Olympics.

Carrington has become the latest Save the Kiwi ambassador, joining Sir John Key and Helen Clark among others. Part of Carrington's involvement with Save the Kiwi will include an education campaign about dogs and kiwi over the summer holidays, featuring her own canine Colin.

Carrington said serving as an ambassador was one way she can give back to New Zealand after receiving so much support during her Olympic campaign this year.

"The kiwi is so important to our identity as New Zealanders; not only are we known as 'Kiwis' around the world, Aotearoa has such unique wildlife," she said. "I want to be a part of it surviving for the future generations." Carrington was named an ambassador during Save the Kiwi Week late October.

The team gave us a couple of facts to think about: An average of 27 kiwi are killed by predators every week. That's a population decline of around 1,400 kiwi every year, or two per cent. At this rate, kiwi may disappear from the mainland in our lifetime. Just one hundred years ago, kiwi numbered in the millions. A single roaming dog can wipe out an entire kiwi population in a matter of days.

For more information, and to check out Save the Kiwi's new re-brand click here.

Paul O’Donohue and his SalesStar team are having to sit on their hands before they find out if they have won in the New Zealand International Business Awards.

Supposed to have been announced at a big black-tie event in October, COVID and its interminable lockdown/levels has seen the results pushed out until February 2022.

SalesStar is a finalist in two categories – Excellence in Digital Transformation and Australia-New Zealand business leader Kat Davey is a nominee in the Inspiring Women Leaders Award.

Paul says he and the team are proud, as these are the first awards SalesStar has entered:

“What is it they say about the painter’s house, or the mechanic’s car? As someone reminded us recently: ‘You’re a fantastic transformational sales company, but what are you doing about selling yourself?’.

“A good look in the mirror and we decided it’s time the world heard more about SalesStar and our determination to go global.”

SalesStar already has established practices in Australia, the United Kingdom, Sweden, the United States and now in Mexico.

And in a perfect case study for how the B:HIVE encourages collaboration, Simon Anderson (Level One) has just partnered in and set up SalesStar Digital with the global team. Just as SalesStar has taken itself global by digitalising its sales training, that has now been extended to lead generation for SalesStar and its clients.

The B:HIVE’s indie ad agency Yarn created headlines around the world recently when it stung Swedish climate activist Greta Thunberg in her home town!

Yarn creative directors Rich Robson and Matt Sellars saw Thunberg hit out at New Zealand for not doing anything to tackle the climate crisis and the team thought “hell” our pizza client might have something to say about that.

Yarn founder Heath Davy says billboards that suggested Thunberg could go to Hell Pizza for 100% carbon neutral deliveries in New Zealand, first went up around the country. The campaign immediately attracted a complaint to the Advertising Standards Authority. That got squashed.

Next, the team targeted Stockholm, placing one billboard 300 metres from Thunberg’s home. But that was not before one that country’s largest agencies was served with a legal threat to stop the billboards being erected.

Davy says a multi-national agency stepped up to the plate to help and the rest is history. Photos of the billboard went around the world.

Hell CEO Ben Cumming says: “The campaign hits all the right notes for us – engaging, polarising opinions and generating discussion on an important matter.”

If you have ever had a cheeky wee red at the B:HIVE Friday drinks (don’t we all miss it!), chances are it may have been from one of our fellow B:HIVEr's Toi Toi Wines.

You might be interested to know that Toi Toi’s Pinot Noir Clutha 2020 has won a gold medal in the recent New World Wine Awards. That means it scored 95 points and is one of the top 50 wines across all varietals.

Kevin Joyce, the principal of Toi Toi who you will (usually) find with his team on Level Two, is delighted as it’s the first time the pinot noir has been entered in the awards for wines under $25. But winemaker and viticulturalist Tim Adams is even more chuffed after having to deal with challenging grape growing conditions, coupled with COVID-19 restrictions.

“I kind of let the wine make itself,” he says. “It’s wild fermented and we did gentle plunging, treating the fruit with gentle hands. We wanted to enhance the fruit, not over extract the tannins.”

Congratulations to the Toi Toi team. We can’t wait to taste it… if there’s any left after shoppers get the score. It is on special at New World stores this month at $21.99 or at Blackmarket.

Cryptocurrency and the world of decentralised finance (DeFi) is probably still a mystery to most of us.

But the B:HIVE is the home of one the world’s leading disruptors when it comes to unlocking the value of digital assets. Unvest is a cross-chain DeFi protocol for trading unvested tokens and it has attracted investors and traders from throughout the world.

It’s the brainchild of Kiran Matthews. You may have seen him, often sporting a wide brim hat and a growing amount of ink, hanging out at Friday drinks before lockdown.

It all started when the majority of his early investment in a crypto project was locked for a two-year period. When those tokens increased significantly in value, Kiran was a tad annoyed he couldn’t cash out some of his gain.

So back in April this year he invented a platform to change that. Unvest’s first product is “Liquid Vesting Tokens” or LVTs, that means projects who distribute using Unvest’s protocol can offer their early investors the option to realise gains early by selling the LVT within the vesting period. The LVTs can then be redeemed 1:1 at the end of the vesting period, or be traded an unlimited number of times securely on-chain.

As we have all seen, crypto like Bitcoin, Ethereum and Dogecoin have huge surges and crashes – Doge did on the back of a flippant remark by Elon Musk.

So how does Unvest make any money? Unvest’s protocol takes a 2.5% fee every time an LVT is transferred between wallets. In the future these rewards will also be made available to the Unvest community who will be able to stake their UNV holdings to receive a share of the fees accumulated by the various projects using Unvest’s services. 

Unvest raised funds from international investors including GD10 Ventures and x21 Digital, so COO James Rohloff says it can quietly grow its product offering over the next few years without having to be too concerned by the high volatility of the crypto industry. 

Suffice it to say Unvest intends to be a one stop powerhouse to assist the launch of new crypto products. And from a platform that kicked off at the beginning of September it has shown plenty of muscle. According to CoinMarketCap.com, the price of Unvest (UNV) coin is sitting at around US$0.09, up over 300% from its listing price.  UNV coins can be bought and sold on exchanges such as Uniswap and Pancakeswap.

To learn more click here.

Sky Reidy is a huge fan of flexible working spaces and it was inevitable she would eventually lead her team to the B:HIVE.

As Moustache Republic’s chief strategy officer and general manager (NZ) Sky was thrilled to settle her team on Level three in the last week of February.

Sky’s passion for flexible working was fuelled when she was lucky enough to visit the world’s WeWork in 2016 in the United States, on an International Business Exchange while attending The Australian Graduate School of Management (AGSM) at the University of New South Wales.

“We visited WeWork San Francisco as part of our MBA business exchange and were lucky to meet one of the founders Adam Neumann,” she says. That same year WeWork was chosen by  Fortune magazine as one of its three unicorns to bet on.

Flexible workspaces fit well with Sky’spassionate for digital transformation and design thinking and are a crucial part of Moustache Republic’s strategy to offer a remote first policy to its 30 Kiwi staff.

Moustache Republic’steam of digital commerce innovators, designers and developers are based in Auckland, Sydney and Manila. The company has grown by 30 per cent in the past year in NZ and has doubled the size of its Australian office.

Newsflash: Moustache Republic has been announcedas winners of the 2021 @Bigcommerce ‘Agency Partner of The Year Award | APAC’ and the ‘B2B Excellence Award | APAC’ for their work with Bobux. What an amazing start to enjoying the team’s new home at the B:HIVE.

Ellie Shedden is a true international citizen.

Born a Kiwi, she lived a chunk of her childhood in Australia, returned to New Zealand and boomeranged back to Oz.
But Melbourne was a mere bounce for a degree and to start work in the construction sector. By age 26 Ellie, a now well-travelled business woman, was promoted to the Czech Republic as a senior corporate services manager with a portfolio of projects - budget US$40 million.

Then love entered the picture – of her Venezuelan partner Sarkis Agobian and the Czech Republic.
“Who wouldn’t love being in the centre of Europe with the ease of travel and such culture,” she laughs. “Sarkis and I love it there.”

But there was only one way to meet the visa rules around staying – quit her job and start her own company. OOP Clicks was born (the name comes from Ellie and references “ Alley Oop”, an old song  and French circus acrobatic move).

Ellie built a substantial digital affiliate marketing business, think retail, tourism, banks, airlines… by reaching out to her network and aligning with one of the world’s biggest affiliate networks.

Next came COVID. The pair needed somewhere safe and Ellie, a Kiwi by birth, soon found Sarkis could get a partner visa as a permanent resident to join her in Auckland. She sold the business and secured the Australasian market for the affiliate network.

Elle brought OOP Marketing into the B:HIVE in February this year and quickly found out that New Zealand marketers don’t really understanding the value of affiliate marketing.

That’s something she is helping change – with agility that would be the envy of any circus acrobat.

Remember what your grandmother told you – “take a deep breath”? It might sound old fashioned, but it works. Breathing is one of a suite of tools at our fingertips as we travel through Omicron, according to our resident B:HIVE preventative medicine expert Dr Louise Schofield.

Put more scientifically, slow breathing allows the prefrontal cortex, the part of the brain associated with rational thought to come back in charge instead of the more emotional amygdala; which processes emotions associated with fear.  

Louise, whose PhD is in public health, co-founded PreKure® three and a half years ago with her husband Prof Grant Schofield and a group of nine academics and health professionals.

PreKure’s team of health coaches, mental health coaches, researchers, and cliniciansfocus on helping us to live longer, healthier lives without chronic disease.

PreKure is the third start up in the medical field that Louise has headed. The previous two were The Real Food Publishing Company (2015) and Vitality Works NZ (2010).

“They have all been in health and wellbeing,” says Louise, “because if you haven’t got your health nothing else matters. Little changes can make a massive difference.”

If you don’t see Louise around the B:HIVE as much these days, it is because she and Grant have relocated to the Coromandel. Louise travels to the B:HIVE a couple of days a week. The couple was worried how their previously active son Danny (12) was spending all day on a computer station during covid lockdown. School work? Maybe…
Now he is riding round town on his bike, swimming in the ocean, or building huts down the creek.

Louise is helping the family walk the PreKure talk.

A B:HIVE based mother and daughter team are on a mission to promote the trade industry.

Trade Jobs NZ founder and director Colleen Getley, who has 30 years of experience in HR and recruitment, joined her designer daughter Kim to establish Trade Jobs NZ in May, 2020.

The aim was to provide a purpose-built platform for the industry and grow the reputation of trades people.
“It’s great because we have different skill sets,” says Kim. “Mum in HR and recruitment, and me in advertising, marketing and the creative side.We have a close relationship and say it how it is - we respect each other’s side of things.

Both spotted a gap in the market when they started Trade Job NZ.

Covid created growing demand. Increased building activity and government-backed infrastructure projects, combined with border restrictions reducing the flow of skilled workers into the country, has meant the industry has been facing a skills shortage for some time - 178,000 tradies are needed in New Zealand.

They also want to improve the reputation of tradespeople.
“Tradies across the board for a long time have had a bad rap,” says Kim. “Oh, you drop out of school and become a tradie is the thinking. In reality, it can mean earning incredible money and it is really reliable.”

Trade Jobs NZ also educates tradies themselves about how to get a job. Word-of-mouth is the most common go to - nearly 60% rely on it.

“They often go through Facebook, but it is not always going to work if you are hiring your mate’s cousin,” she says.“It also might not be the best way to find your dream job.”

We have a super rugby clash playing out at the B:HIVE!

Bayer’s Elevit is partnering with the Hurricanes. Apricity Finance is behind the Blues… Fortunately they are supporting different genders. Both B:HIVE-based businesses say they can see the value in supporting one of New Zealand’s strongest sporting codes.

For Bayer partnering the Wellington-based Hurricanes women’s team is a no brainer for Elevit, which provides vitamins and minerals for before, during and after pregnancy. Jarrod Rhodes, senior brand manager, says the Hurricanes Poua is heavily involved in partnering women’s health and Elevit. “They are excited about being asked for help to develop events and social media campaigns that would reach a diverse range of kiwi women,” Rhodes. “During the year-long contract we will be helping the Hurricanes grow and connect with culturally diverse audiences.”

Back in Auckland, Apricity Finance is appearing on the sleeve of the Blues Under-20 and Under-18 teams, and is partnering with several Blues events, during a three-year partnership. In announcing the deal Blues CEO Andrew Hore, said the values of teamwork, respect, enjoyment, discipline, and sportsmanship are at the core of Apricity Finance and closely shared at the Blues.

Hore said the partnership will pave the way for new relationships and overall business growth for Apricity Finance as the Blues connect it with friends and family of the club.

Chris Ellison has travelled most of the world as a professional snow boarder and a corporate suit. When Chile exploded in riots and with COVID he and his Chilean wife and children came back to the safe haven of New Zealand.

“I ended up living over the back fence of Long Bay College where I had been to school a couple of decades ago,” Chris says. “While familiar, the culture shock of coming back to New Zealand has been huge for both Fran and me.”

Chris’ B:HIVE business partner Chaz Savage grew up in Gisborne. But he too has been away home for nearly a decade. After finishing uni, he left a promising rugby career and hightailed it to Australia where he worked for Telstra. That’s where he first met Chris. Then when Chaz went to work for Multichoice, a pay TV company that was ripping through Africa, as Chief Customer Officer he naturally nominated his old workmate as head of the marketing department.

The pair were based in Dubai but saw little of it as they travelled through Kenya, Nigeria, Uganda, Malawi, Mozambique and 20 other African countries empowering local teams to set up prepay TV for their customers. “I travelled so much that I earned 3x platinum status on Emirates,” Chris laughs.

Chaz eventually headed home to the family business, Scarpa Shoes, but was quickly wooed to become Chief Revenue Officer of Sky TV.

Meanwhile, Chris continued on his travels adding digital banking to his many talents as he worked through South America.

Once back in New Zealand, the pair teamed up again on a contract advising a Canadian company, Certn, that does employment and criminal checks. Certn has just finished a Series B capital raise that will value it at about NZ$720 million.

Chris and Chaz tag-team on Certn’s marketing and consumer business and decided to join the B:HIVE so they could work the project more efficiently.

“In reality while we could both work from home, we missed the workplace camaraderie and we have certainly found that around where we are on Level One,” Chris says. “We both have other businesses and we have been able to build connections with other people and their companies to help us with those too."

“It could also be true that we enjoy the few beers that our level one team pull out from time to time. It’s relaxing and talking, that we discovered there are also lots of people around us who have worked or had their own businesses overseas. So they are very familiar with the ex-pat feeling.”

"Hiring is no longer about choosing the right candidate, it’s about candidates choosing you", warns Eighty4 Recruitment's consultant Lexi Jones. How do you go about holding on to the talent you’ve got and attract newcomers in a market where there is a growing shortage of skilled people?

During a record quarter for the business, Lexi says Eighty4 asked its network of candidates what employers could be doing better. Of course, the usual ‘more money’ and ‘more flexibility’ came up plenty of times, but there were a few other answers worth attention.

A common complaint was: “I feel like I’m doing the jobs of three people”. Feeling stressed, burnt out and exhausted has become the norm for a lot of employees since COVID hit.

Perhaps someone on your team has left and you haven’t managed to hire a replacement yet. It’s extremely important to support those who are picking up extra work, even if that’s simply hiring administrative support or getting someone in on a temporary contract part-time.

“It might cost you up-front but losing that skilled person, combined with the cost of onboarding and training someone new, means that more often than not, it’s worth hiring help,” Lexi says.

“Next, having a good culture alone won’t do the trick. Are you realising your employees’ full potential and providing them with opportunities to grow? When was the last time you sat down with them and asked them about their goals?”

The Eighty4 survey also highlighted that the days of getting home after the kids are in bed have gone, as an increasing number of people are updating their policies regarding family time.

“People are less willing to give up those important moments to celebrate milestones and be with their families - and they don’t have to anymore,” Lexi says. “Companies that show understanding and actively encourage their employees to make time for their families are winning the recruitment race."

“The reality we are facing right now is that it’s so incredibly hard to hire good people. We still have limited international immigrants coming to NZ to fill the gaps, despite the borders slowly starting to open so it's more important than ever to invest in our local talent.”

Joseph Darby could be excused for having a wee skip in his step.

He has just successfully merged his 10-year-old company Milestone Direct with Become.nz to form Become Wealth, creating one of the few 100% New Zealand-owned financial service providers with no ties to specific product, or product provider. Fundamentally that independence means it can offer its clients the product it thinks best suits their needs.

Joseph had no sooner dried the ink on that deal, when the new entity then acquired the books of a couple of “baby boomer” advisers who were looking to retire.

And he is not stopping there: “Become Wealth, as we are now known, is rolling up the businesses of several more advisers who want to retire rather than face recent changes in financial markets, regulations and the need for additional scale and specialisation.”

Joseph, who retains his CEO role, says the merger and acquisitions will assist with strong future growth and build upon Become Wealth’s nearly $1 billion in funds under advice, including those managed under a Discretionary Investment Management Service (DIMS) licence.

Become Wealth has as clients major NZX and ASX-listed companies, a government department, medical professionals through the Medcapital brand, and around 17,000 individual clients.

The company is headquartered at the B:HIVE, with staff in Christchurch, Queenstown, Australia, and the Philippines.

Has your credit card ever been hacked? Suddenly there’s a couple of dodgy payments “pending” that you just know is not something you have bought?

Hacking into the payment tokens that are generated for your legitimate purchases is easier than it should be says Pete Bailey, head of cyber security for Theta on Level Three.

The hybrid working environment has helped thieves. Working between the B:HIVE, your favourite local to home café and home has real security challenges. Attackers are out there constantly looking for vulnerabilities.

“Recently people have been trying to find software to make dividing personal life and work life easy,” Pete says. “They have downloaded ‘free’ software to split their hard drive into home and work sections. What they don’t realise that this ‘free’ gift is only free for hackers to get malware in and find passwords via your browsers and folders to get your information and money out.

“Never let your browser, like Chrome, store your passwords. You should use password lockers or managers for security.

Pete has a diverse background in process improvement, training and digital marketing, and has spent the last decade in security, previously running one of New Zealand’s largest information security consultancies.

Pete says there are five main focus areas for companies to prepare for smart cyber-attacks:

1. People - Do your teams know what cyber-attacks look like, and the impacts they can have on your systems? You need to invest in good training for tools, processes, and awareness for your staff. Combine that with having the best filter/alerting tools in place to instantly spot an attack.

2. Hybrid working risk assessments - Your systems and processes should adjust according to new risk factors as they arise with people working on multiple sites.  You should conduct a threat assessment – where is your organisation's greatest security risk? Prevent your staff from taking shortcuts - ensure you understand how they are working and what they need to achieve this. Review constantly.

3. Artificial Intelligence (AI) - AI and machine learning (ML) have grown 28% in the past year and is already being used in several security applications. Users, asset and network profiles are built using these behaviour histories, allowing AI to detect and respond to deviations from established norms. You should specify what level of security your organisation needs - there are systems that specialise in email filtering, threat hunting, detecting bots and bot activity. Invest in the right AI system.

4. Spending - When concluding a budget for cyber security, 10% of your IT budget is considered standard, but for high-risk industries this can go up to 25%. High-risk industries include: 

Business/corporate 
Healthcare/medical 
Banking/credit/financial 
Government/military 
Education 
Energy/utilities

5. Consult & Research -Attack vectors (pathways for attackers to illegally access your environments) and technology change fast. You should do your research and seek the best advice and solutions that are relevant to the current security situation. 

Tony Teesdale doesn’t think too many people in the B:HIVE need to worry about something that has put New Zealand on the International Labour Organisation’s “bad country” list.

But the founder of Level One’s Teesdale and Associates says the NZ Government’s Fair Pay Agreements (FPAs) policy has ruffled a few of his clients’ feathers.

The consummate professional, who hung out the company’s shingle in 2008, says he sits firmly on the fence when it comes to the rights and wrongs being bandied about by different sides of the political spectrum. He’s just trying to educate people about what happens if FPAs becomes law.

For now the policy is only at Bill stage, with the first reading in Parliament having been completed. The Bill now goes to Select Committee where interest groups’ lobbying becomes super charged.

However, Teesdale says even after some changes after the Parliamentary process the Minister in charge doesn’t expect to see anything come out in terms of a FPA before late 2023 or even 2024.

The technical process for even getting a FPA to the table is arduous under the current law and the Government has written that it retains control into its policy. But Teesdale say unions ( the CTU) have indicated they have a priority list that has people like cleaners at its top.

Meanwhile the FPAs have attracted the attention of the International Labour Organisation (ILO). Along with 21 other countries accused of labour breaches including discrimination, forced labour and child labour, New Zealand is deemed to have a case to answer regarding its intention to breach a fundamental labour convention which protects freedom of association.

BusinessNZ says New Zealand’s Fair Pay Agreements policy contravenes ILO Convention 98 by constituting an ‘act of interference’ in the affairs of workers and employers. It says businesses believe the compulsory nature of the Fair Pay Agreements policy constitutes interference and are also concerned at other sections of the policy which would limit the freedoms of workers and employers.

Asked for his opinion on that, Tony just laughs and says: “well it is not the first time the ILO has taken New Zealand to task.”  And, he adds, there is a General Election before the end of 2023 that may change things too.

New Zealand has long been a testing ground for international companies. Our workforce is seen as agile and early adopters of technology.

That’s partly why multinational software solutions company Bravura chose its Level 3 B:HIVE team to pilot a new way of working.

ASX-listed Bravura, which has a market capitalisation of around A$389 million, employs around  1,500 people in 17 offices across Australia, New Zealand, United Kingdom, Europe, Africa, and India.

Another part of the pilot decision was the attitude of the team led by NZ country manager Kylie Bryant. After the challenges around COVID and remote working, her people were up to conversations about how to make working together better.

Bravura partnered with New Zealand hybrid working specialists Anywhere Culture for the pilot. Together with Bravura’s Eilis Devlin, learning experience and culture partner, and Elissa Fletcher, acting chief people officer, Anywhere Culture led a co-design that put employees at its heart.

Kylie says with the physical office move from a traditional office to the B:HIVE, it was an opportunity to think differently not only about where, but how the team worked.

“Through the Anywhere Culture project the team adopted new mindsets, tools, norms and habits that were fit for a hybrid world,” she says. “These mindsets focused on community, empowerment, growth, and wellbeing.

“Through our conversations around empowerment, we watched employees start to think differently about the opportunities brought by hotdesking – including the ability to choose a focus or collaborative zone dependent on the type of work, and to form new connections with colleagues they don’t usually work alongside.

“With on-site yoga, weekly socials and networking events, the B:HIVE embodies our mindsets and provides endless opportunities to connect to community, prioritise wellbeing and experiment with new ways of working.”

Kylie says one thing that stood out was rituals matter: “It was crucial that we maintained the ‘moments that matter’ to make the B:HIVE feel like home, and no culture revolution was going to get in the way of Biscuit Wednesdays!"

Kylie will be talking about the Anywhere Culture pilot to interested B:HIVE residents later this month. Contact events@bhive.co.nz for more information!

The ocean has always been at the heart of Syrene skincare’s story.

Syrene uses marine ingredients in all its skincare formulations. The hero ingredient Ephemer™ is a macro algae, an antioxidant powerhouse that actively works to repair and protect skin at a cellular level.

Syrene is ingredient efficacy focused, which means it has thoroughly tested and researched the ingredients. It also harvests marine ingredients from sustainable farming methods such as marine collagen collected from the by-product (wastage of the fish food industry) of tuna fish skin.

Now in a twist of fate, Syrene has added another ocean ingredient to its range and it has become an important part of its sustainability story.

That ingredient is plastic – ocean waste plastic.

Mari Taylor, marketing executive for Syrene on the B:HIVE’s Level Three, says as custodians of the environment, the company has partnered with Ocean Waste Plastic™ for its packaging.

It’s currently estimated that every year, around eight million tons of plastic waste escapes into the oceans from coastal nations.

Mari says Syrene is constantly aware of its commitment to sustainable business practises. As well as using recycled plastic for packaging, it is working with retailer Mecca and TerraCycle.

“Rather than throwing away your already-loved bottles, pots and tubes, drop them off to your local Mecca store. TeraCycle’s program sends back your beauty waste, ready to be sorted, processed, and transformed into something new (and just as beautiful),” Mari says.

“We also put our online orders into 100% recyclable boxes and use a paper-based alternative to plastic bubble wrap to ensure your order gets to you safely.”

Walking into Compendium’s Level Three office is like walking into a cave of licorice all sorts. A riot of colour assaults the eye.

But the colour has meaning – they’re carefully chosen and woven together by fingers of sustainability.

Caitlin, one of the cave’s keepers, starts by putting her hand on a Hydro Flask, rubbing it like a Genie’s lamp: “Like all the products we represent, it is focused on sustainability. High quality, reusable, and long lasting with a lifetime guarantee.”

If you ride the “throw away, plastic wave” then Compendium will make you think again. The single use plastic bottles you now (hopefully) throw in the “recycle” bin are repurposed into Rumpl blankets - each blanket repurposes 60 bottles out of landfill.

And Compendium’s riotous Cotopaxi clothing brand recycles polyester – as well as repurposes off-cut material from bigger production runs giving perfectly functional material new life – ensuring that all materials used are responsibly sourced.

“These bags,” says Caitlin holding up a good-looking hiking pack, “are ethically made by workers who are given creative autonym to pick whatever coloured material they’d like from remnant material. They are unique and one-of-a-kind.”

Compendium is a family-owned business and it proudly distributes these brands across New Zealand, Australia and the Pacific Islands.

“The brands all have sustainability at their core.”

Sustainability is at the core of what Huski does says Simon Huesser, one half of the B:HIVE company that has brought the world its award-winning tumblers for coffee, water, beer and wine, and wine coolers.

To emphasise the point he hands over a ‘short tumbler’ in a box. While the stylish tumbler promises to keep hot drinks hot and cold drinks cold for hours, like a child I am more fascinated in the box.

The box is as stylish as the tumbler and looks to unfold ready for recycling. “We worked with a cardboard engineer at Think Packaging and yes, our packaging was a finalist in the best design awards,” Simon laughs.

But back to the tumbler and its sister products including a wine cooler that fascinated so many at the B:HIVE drinks. The point is, says Simon, that we live in a ‘throw away’ culture and Huski is helping people change their mindset.

Google tells us that it is estimated more than 50 billion coffee cups get thrown away around the world annually.

“Ours are made with stainless steel and the minimal use of plastic,” Simon says. “It’s all recyclable is a key, but we also focus on the durability and longevity of so hopefully it will be a long while before your Huski is ready to be replaced.”

Ever wondered how the Level One company came to be called Huski? Apart from the fact it’s the name of a breed of dog that knows how to work hard in the cold, it is a combo of Simon and wife Meika’s last names.

Building a sustainability plan has been a work in progress at The LEGO Group for years.

Cedric Roose, Country Manager for LEGO New Zealand, says the maker of the iconic children’s plastic construction toys says it hopes to have all its plastic bricks made from sustainable material by 2030.

“We have a little way to go, but there has been some promising progress,” Cedric says from his Level Four B:HIVE office.

A 2018 pilot project first produced some LEGO elements out of sugar cane. But they were non-structural elements like trees and leaves that appear in some LEGO sets.

“They looked good and felt good, but they didn’t have the strength for our construction pieces.” Then just over a year ago, The LEGO Group unveiled a prototype brick using PET plastic from discarded bottles -  the first brick made from a recycled material to meet the company’s strict quality and safety requirements.

Materials scientists and engineers spent three years testing more than 250 variations of PET materials and hundreds of other plastic formulations. The result is a prototype that meets several of their quality, safety and play requirements – including clutch power.

“Clutch power refers to the strength of the bricks when joined together and how easy they are to click together and pull apart,” Cedric says.

On average, a one-litre plastic PET bottle provides enough raw material for ten 2 x 4 LEGO bricks.  However, the bricks are still at an opaque colour stage and Cedric says the team is now figuring out how to make them the iconic LEGO colours.

Meanwhile The LEGO Group has also focused on getting rid of single plastic bags – from carrier bags to those found in LEGO boxes – and replacing them with paper. It has also set a target to reduce the company’s carbon emissions by 37% by 2032.

“We can have an impact for the future,” Cedric says. “The LEGO Group has a vision and a sustainability mission.”

The Real Learning team replaced its training room microphones with winners’ medals recently, after a win at the New Zealand Association of Training and Development awards.

The learning development company, based on Level 1 of the B:HIVE, took home Best Leadership Development Programme at the national awards night.

Heidi Lance, Real Learning’s founder, developed a safety leadership development program for Fletcher Building after the construction company reached out following on-site incidents.

“The purpose of the leadership safety programme is to help instigate a safety culture shift that starts with the leaders and results in improved safety outcomes,” Heidi says. “It's an acknowledgement that people come first, and all injuries can be avoided.”

Since Real Learning implemented its programme there has been a “significant” positive change in processes within Fletcher Building Heidi says. The company has recorded 32% reduction in injuries, 75% reduction in serious injuries, 90% of sites being injury free and two more business units remain injury free.

“We worked with Fletcher Building for six months to design this programme,” Heidi says. “It has gone from me facilitating it, to the executive leadership team, to then filtering down through the whole company.

“The business has trained more than two and a half thousand leaders across Australia and New Zealand since we started.”

The same leadership development programme was also named as a finalist in the Australia and New Zealand Safeguard Safety Awards.

“It’s great to get recognition for all the hard work the team has put in and it also shows the strength of the relationship between us and Fletcher Building,” Heidi says.

Dietary health has come out on top with B:HIVE-based Feel Fresh Nutrition scoring an exciting contract with Southern Cross Health Insurance.

Members of Southern Cross are eligible to receive major discounts on consultant and nutritionist fees with Feel Fresh Nutrition until December 10.

Feel Fresh Nutrition owner Abbie O’Rourke says this applies to the 900,000 Southern Cross members nationwide.

“This is the first time ever that we have had access to so many people, it’s exciting.  We know the role nutrition plays in our health and now, more than ever, people are seeking additional help. Having an unhealthy diet is the leading preventable risk for poor health in New Zealand, not mention how it makes us feel and perform,” she says.

Abbie says Southern Cross’ commitment shows that nutritional health is being further recognised as important for overall good health.

“People used to see us as just weight loss consultants, but it’s now understood that it impacts every part of our lives. We provide nutritional solutions for anxiety, high performance, sports performance, gut health, hormonal balance and everything else,” she says.

“For a lot of people [nutrition] used to be secondary to financial planning or physical health and now we’re seeing it become a really important part of being a healthy person.”

This current offering is a saving of $95 when booking in for the ‘Southern Cross Members Package’. This package includes a 60 minute initial consultation and two 30 minute follow-up consults. The standard fee for this package is $385, but only costs $290. Also, Southern Cross Health Insurance members who have Ultra Care are 100% covered, and members that have Wellbeing Two plus Body Care Module have an allocation of $250/year for nutritionists under the Feel Fresh deal.

The focus at Feel Fresh Nutrition, is not only on individual wellbeing but workplace wellbeing, Abbie says.

“A lot of the work that we do is in the workplace and many of our corporate clients are also Southern Cross members. It’s incredible how many people have access to this, but they are not aware of it. Nutritional is now top of mind when workplace wellbeing is considered.

“This partnership with Southern Cross has made nutritional help incredibly accessible to so many people."

Binance, one of the world’s largest digital asset platforms, has created a cell in the B:HIVE.

But if you go to Level Four to take a peek, you would be excused for doing a double-take. Ben Rose, Binance’s first general manager for New Zealand, used to be in the hive at CodeHQ as CCO.

A Londoner by birth, Ben came to New Zealand 19 years ago to shoot a TVC for Tourism New Zealand. He loved it so much he stayed converting from advertising to sales and marketing and into the digital world.

Now he’s setting up the local entity for Binance, wading through registration as a financial service provider, rules for external disputes resolution, reporting to Police on anything suspicious and becoming an anti-money laundering reporting entity (AML).

There are people, including journalists, who are dark on cryptocurrency ( look at all the losses they wail…) and other digital transactions like NFTs, staking (crypto savings accounts) and wallets.

But Ben says 10% of New Zealanders have already had their first foray into the crypto world. And with the global average at 15% per capita, there is plenty of room for growth here.

Binance’ global platform has grown from launch in 2017 to, as of mid-October, handling US$100 billion trading a day and 1.8 billion transactions per second.

In New Zealand, Binance’s BNB coin is already on the list of crypto in TV money reports here.

How can B:HIVERS convert to “Binancians”? Ben says it is important to educate yourself – to do your homework. An online Binance Academy covers 101 in crypto lessons through to the complex. And he might be talked into doing a session if enough people want to bring their lunch and have a listen.

But will he get Binance’s billionaire co-founder CZ (Changpeng Zhao) to visit from Singapore? He’s working on it… Now that would create a real buzz.

NZIE’s digital marketing students are celebrating a fantastic new collaboration between their education provider and Google. 

NZIE’s Digital Marketing School have developed a course with Google for its graduates that will put a cherry on top of their Diploma of Digital Marketing: a post-grad 10-week course in Google’s Digital Academy. 

The Google Digital Academy will be held at the end of each NZIE Digital Marketing Diploma and provide NZIE graduates with the chance to gain Google industry certifications. 

The certificates offered will focus on display and video, campaign management, and Google Search Ads 360. It will be run by Google and delivered with agency partners. 

“It builds on the Diploma in Digital Marketing,” says NZIE managing director Rob Marks. “Getting these certificates means that they are even more qualified when they enter the industry. A lot of agencies look for Google-certified digital marketers, so this initiative will help the industry and our graduates.

“The students are very excited. It’s a great way of getting certified and engaging with the Google team and agencies."

NZIE’s Digital Marketing school offers programmes ranging from NZQA-accredited short courses to a Level 7 Diploma. All courses are co-created with industry and their classes are delivered 100% live and online so students can study from anywhere in New Zealand.

The institute’s “big network” of alumni can benefit from the recent partnership with Google too.

“Once they've got the Diploma, both graduating students and alumni can join the Google course,” Rob says. 

B:HIVE business Mycare has got its ice hockey sticks and maple syrup ready following its recent launch into Canada.

It is the digital care organisation’s first bridge over international waters, and comes after years of building to nationwide success. Mycare, located on Level 2 of the B:HIVE, is New Zealand's largest online community of people seeking or offering various types of help at home.

“The premise behind it is reimagining what homecare looks like for people with disabilities, older aged care needs or wider needs, enabling people in the home to thrive. What we discovered was homecare had a very ‘push’ approach, where carers would be sent out without the person in the home understanding who was coming into their home,” CEO Matt Owen says.

“So we redesigned what homecare could look like; centred around the person at home having a choice as to who comes into their home.”

Mycare is one of the first in the world to bring this concept to life, Matt says, and the platform has since grown to have more than 14,000 qualified and vetted carers registered throughout New Zealand.

The B:HIVE- based organisation’s launch into Canada came after not-for-profit organisation Manitoba Possible in Winnipeg reached out to collaborate with Mycare, after they discovered the kiwi organisation had achieved what they were trying to do themselves.

“They believed in the same model as us, that the person in the home should have the right to choose who comes into their home,” Matt says.

Mycare has provided the software and platform for the Winnipeg-based organisation to connect the disabled community with local support workers.

Since launching in October, Care Possible - has bloomed on Canadian soil, already providing support to people with care needs and connecting the care in the home ecosystem.

For example, a dad in Toronto is now able to be a part of the care journey for his disabled son and daughter-in-law, who are in Winnipeg, Matt says.

“Because of the nature of the platform, it enables family, friends and carers, all to be able to connect to the platform and the care system. So, for this dad, even though he lives thousands of kilometers away, he is able to be a part of the care journey for his son and his son’s wife,” Matt says.

This is only the beginning of Mycare’s international outreach, Matt says.

Mycare also delivers the technology behind Gumboot Friday, providing a platform for young kiwis to connect directly with counsellors nationwide.

They also launched Te Heke Mai in 2019, a coaching platform supporting New Zealander’s into the work or on a pathway of their choosing.

Stop by and say hi anytime to Matt and the Mycare team on Level 2.

Image: Some of the Mycare team based in the B:Hive, from left: Mackenzie Amer, Nikki Harris, Matt Owen and Emilie Nebulot.

One of the B:HIVE’s own has scored bigtime in the delivery of the FIFA World Cup in Qatar.

Leading Design Professionals (LDP), a lighting and electrical engineering company based on Level 4 of the B:HIVE, designed the lighting around the Hamad International Airport in Doha, Qatar.

This project included a lighting master plan and detailed design of all exterior lighting, including 200km of roads and carparks around the airport, three major intersections, and the Emir’s private terminal area with custom designed equipment to provide the airport site with a “unique identity”, senior lighting and illumination engineer Ben Cullen says.

LDP is a lighting design company which focuses mostly on designing for the built environment and infrastructure, while considering and reducing the impact of bad lighting on the natural environment and wildlife, Ben says.

“LDP is really about limiting the impacts of bad lighting, by designing good, well-controlled lighting,” he says.

LDP’s work in Qatar is not the only major international project its team of expert designers and engineers have undertaken.

They also designed the relighting of the 100,000-seater Olympic stadium in Sydney, Australia, alongside various other sport stadiums including the Avantidome Velodrome in Cambridge, including full electrical and backup power integration design, and North Harbour Hockey Stadium.

LDP’s success has been recognised this year with five awards for three different projects.

The company designed the relighting of the streets of Dunedin City, a project for which it won three awards: the IESANZ Award of Excellence: Energy Efficiency and a Commendation, and the Royal Astronomical Society of NZ Award of Excellence.

Senior Engineer Ben Cullen said they worked on the Dunedin City Council (DCC) project for eight months, which included the design and placement of 14,000 lights.

Not only did they reduce the energy usage of the DCC by over 60%, they significantly reduced “sky glow”, Ben says.

“We reduced the sky glow by using warm white streetlights, making sure they focused downwards and didn’t throw light into the sky. This helped the local ecology including birdlife, and reduced light pollution, which the DCC was really focused on,” he says.

LDP were also awarded IESANZ Awards of Commendation for a new cycleway linking Glen Innes and Tamaki Drive, and the Viaduct Harbour precinct.

The lighting project in Viaduct Harbour saw LDP retrofit and redesign the original lighting along the promenade with LED while keeping the original bespoke feel.

LDP worked with the original design which focuses upwards into a dome which reflects it to the ground, creating a “soft, ambient” effect, Ben says.

Mel Carroll often goes missing in action from her B:HIVE Level One desk. She takes off on luxury retreats around New Zealand and soon to return to Bali and Niue. But before you get all envious and pin her tan and healthy looks on a chilled life, it’s because she’s working.

Mel is the founder of Wellness Retreats New Zealand – as well as the resident Smales Farm yoga teacher (on Tuesdays from 12.30-1.15pm). Her story is familiar – top performer in the wild world of advertising and graphic design, until she burned out.

Mel says her mid-20s diet and lifestyle as well as her work added up to be diagnosed with chronic fatigue syndrome. After taking some time out to focus on her wellbeing, Mel ventured overseas to work on super yachts for three years. Then it was on to Bali where she managed a women’s premium wellness retreat. Along the way she became a certified yoga instructor, completing her 200-hour Vinyasa training in Seville, Spain.

Her grownup self then returned to New Zealand and 2014 started up her business. “Yes it started as predominantly women who were keen to get away, often with friends, for a premium luxury holiday with yoga, fitness, good eating, massages wellness workshops and all the good stuff,” Mel  says. “But I have noticed more and more men are joining our retreats either solo or with their partners now. And since the pandemic a wider range of people are investing in their holistic health."

“Corporates too are investing in their people to not only retain but keep their good talent healthy. They are including it in personal development plans, with half a day planning and the other half learning about nutrition, mindfulness, resilience and how to keep yourself fit in your body and mind.”

Wellness Retreats New Zealand has a collective of around 40 health practitioners it calls on to cover its retreats here and overseas and its corporate days.

“I call it adventure meets wellbeing,” Mel says. “Yes, you can have an alcoholic beverage with dinner on our Franz Josef and overseas retreats (wellness is all about balance) and sometimes get on your cell phone or laptop. But I encourage people to leave their devices behind, or only use them for an hour a day.  I think a lot of modern-day stress and mental health issues, especially with young people, can be sheeted back to electronic devices. It’s good to turn them off – disconnect to reconnect.”

Over the past six years Mel’s rolled out wellness programs for prominent companies such as HSBC, PwC, PwC Foundation, 2degrees, ANZ, BNZ, Deloitte, Deloitte Fast 50, Hyundai, World Masters Games, AIA, Caci Clinic, Stride Property and Yellow.

Hook into the B:HIVE yoga or talk to Mel about her retreats …if you can catch her at her desk!

You’ve just taken delivery of your beautiful new couch or state-of-the-art fridge. If you are very lucky your old favourites will be taken away at the same time, but where do they end up?

B:HIVE-based, online furniture and appliance company Andoo has partly built its rapidly growing internet-based furniture and appliance reputation on answering that question.

It is all about sustainability and recycling. It’s absolutely committed to raising the bar and thousands of tonnes of no longer usable household items are being repurposed as a result. There’s no greenwashing here!

The team works with multiple recycling partners for cardboard, whiteware, polystyrene waste, and more. Wherever possible the process of recycling starts right at its warehouse.

Anna Faber, content producer from Andoo, explains: “We have two machines in our warehouse that we use to process waste. The cardboard bundling machine packs cardboard and sends it to a partner in New Zealand and the EPS compactor compresses polystyrene into blocks, which then goes to a partner in NZ and is sent overseas to be remanufactured into things like skirting boards and picture frames."

Everything that can be diverted from landfill is, Anna says.

As well as recycling,  Andoo is committed to the process that creates the products it sells, including its own brands alongside the big names like Beko, KitchenAid, and Sealy.

“Our parent company Winning, which is based in Australia, has a dedicated team that conducts due diligence on supply chain across the key areas of modern slavery, packaging, carbon emissions and timber sourcing,” Anna says.

Modern slavery is still a real thing.

“Our team engages with our suppliers to understand what practices and processes they have in place to manage and mitigate the risks of modern slavery within their organisations and supply chains,” Anna says. “A key part of our approach to responsible sourcing at Andoo is to educate suppliers and provide practical advice to further understand the risks of modern slavery in their supply chain, while improving transparency and due diligence measures.”

Torrential downpours have a big effect on New Zealand’s civil engineers.

For a start, they get nervous about just how much rain will go into soak hole, stormwater pipes and downstream receiving catchments says Kane Willcox, team leader at Maven on Level One.

Then he says they get curious and want to see how their designs have coped.

“The big flood on January 27 and the subsequent cyclone was devastating for people, and our sincere sympathies are with them and their families,” Kane says. “The event, however, gave a us a real-life opportunity to evaluate some work Maven has been doing to protect against flooding.

“That includes designing new soak holes, pipe capacity checks and a variety of other engineering solutions. I got out and about as soon as the water allowed me to and had a look at a few of our sites. I was very happy with what I found.

The Maven team at the B:HIVE is involved in general civil engineering and land development, with current work flow being focused on delivering various large scale subdivision projects.

Kane predicts the flood event will have an effect on freeboard levels – the level at which houses needs to be built on a site. These levels could be increased to make buildings more resilient.

“We need to future proof not only Auckland, but across New Zealand,” he says.

The Maven team has been growing quickly, with the help of its B:HVE colleagues 84 Recruitment finding it top talent. The 10-strong B:HIVE staff complements a larger team of engineers and surveyors based in nine offices across the country.

In the mop up now taking place Kane says the challenge for many will be getting sign off to be allowed to do work to solve issues that the weather events caused. As well as consent for engineering work to take place, there are also considerations around insurance claims and Toka Tū Ake EQC (Earthquake Commission).

“We are all going to have to be a bit patient,” he says. “The influx of work has suddenly got so much longer.”

The fine weather in the past couple of weeks and a chance to get to the beach for a swim is helping with the wait.

Artificial intelligence (AI) systems like ChatGPT have surprised a lot of companies with their efficiency and, well, intelligence.

Many employees are quietly nervous that their jobs are threatened by the rise of these new tools.

But ‘tool’ is the crucial word here. AI systems are just tools like the hammer or the wheel, and it’s important to keep them in perspective. Will they be disruptive? Definitely. Yet will this disruption result in pain and suffering for the average company and employee? They don’t have to.

Here’s how EverEdge, the intangible asset specialists based on the B:HIVE Level 2, thinks about AI systems.

About 30 years ago, when AI first crawled out of its cradle, the early machines began to defeat some of the world’s best chess players. Breathless news of these victories flowed across global media just like the stories of ChatGPT over the last few months.

The human chess players figured out ways to adapt. The smart human chess players started allying with AI systems, using them as tools to win. Rather than stubbornly competing against the machines using only their brains, the human/AI teams ended up consistently beating the AI systems that were operating alone.

EverEdge knows that companies which deploy AI tools to enhance the productivity of their human employees, rather than using them to replace their staff, will achieve incredible advantages over their competition. Obviously, humans alone can’t beat smart machines, but human/AI teams will soon be like having a hundred little superheroes dotted around your office.

EverEdge knows this because it specialises in seeing the intangible assets behind even the most “obvious” business dynamics. Those companies that are leveraging – rather than fearing – AI are adding value to their organisations by generating better returns on investment through the enhanced use of assets such as data, systems and processes, software, network effects and content.

As with most things, technology can be worrying, but learning how to leverage it effectively and drive value can take the edge off the shock.

When Ariel Metekingi called his friend Marsden Hulme in Australia a few years back and asked him if he would come home and help his people, he said yes. The result was Hapū Ora.

Marsden, who is of Ngapuhi and Waikato-Tainui descent had been working with global organisations in the UK, US and Australia and the timing was right. He was ready to bring his commercial background back home and use it to advantage.

The friends founded Kaupapa Māori organisation Hapū Ora, based on level 1 of the B:HIVE.

Their approach is both caring and practical.  “On one hand we are very much socially driven, but we are also a mix of social and commercial,” says Marsden. “It’s a logical handshake.”

Hapū Ora provides 12 home care sites throughout NZ, with the B:HIVE as their head office, focusing on returning mainly but not exclusively Māori tamariki and rangatahi to their whanau. These young people had previously been removed from their families by various organisations. This  home care is supported by a recruitment arm which has relationships with the likes of Fulton Hogan, Downer, G.J Gardener Homes and some telcos, as well as mining companies in Australia. Getting rangitahi into employment is a crucial part of the process.

The skill sets Marsden and Ariel bring to Hapū Ora are immense. Marsden’s experience encompasses Operations, BPO (Business Process Outsourcing), Workforce Management and Contact Centre Operations. His entrepreneurial ventures include consumer electronics, telecommunications, and renewable energy.

Ariel, (Ngati Toa Rangatira,Ngai Tahu, Ngati Koata, Ngati Tahu Ngati Whau, Ngati Pikiao Te Ata haunui a Paparangi, Ngati Tuwharetoa, Ngati Ngat Ata) has served on the Tainui Māori Trust Board. More recently he worked as a management consultant in New Zealand, Australia, and the USA, advising businesses on entering new markets and building international networks.

Hapū Ora works differently to other organisations. “Our point of difference is that we are caring at a broader level, by reaching into homes to try to help whanau have a better life through employment opportunities,” Marsden says.

“One of things we have learned, is that many whanau are returning kids on a benefit, so it’s a real struggle to feed another mouth. While the aspiration of sending kids back is noble, from a practical point of view it is difficult. When we talk to Iwi we are able to talk about employment for rangatahi to help the whanau.”

The organisation is government funded and has partnerships with Oranga Tamariki, DHBs, Mental Health Services and other specialists.

There are currently 25 kids in Hapū Ora's care across the country from Invercargill to Auckland. Some of their centres, which are mainly family homes, are owned by Oranga Tamariki or Hapū Ora. Seventy percent of all kids in care are of Māori descent. And Hapu Ora is seeing kids younger and younger and with more complex trauma.

“Our job is to reset that trauma working closely with other services, no one group has all the answers,” he says.

The stereotype of scientists walking around labs with notebooks and fastidiously taking hand notes, is amazingly, not far from the truth.

Antipodes Scientific’s Managing Director, Daniel Fitzpatrick, who has a doctorate from the University of Cambridge, has been through the ropes himself.

Which is why he and Antipodes Scientific are building tools to help address challenges they faced as researchers themselves. All members of the team have a background in lab-based research.

Now, Antipodes Scientific is about to launch a product that has the ability to completely transform research. Catapulting researchers from pen and paper and mountains of unsearchable binders, to a fully searchable, pre-populating electronic lab notebook, that meets the chemical industry's stringent health and safety requirements.

“It means that researchers can spend less time on day-to-day monotony of routine tasks and have more time to do productive work,” says Daniel.

A big component of the transformation is that scientists will have access to research records electronically, including chemical transformations, which will accelerate discovery processes, especially in the pharmaceutical sector.

So why have researchers been stuck in the dark ages?

Partly, Daniel says, the industry is slow to adopt new technology because of the regulatory environment in which they operate. If they do things as they always have, regulators like the FDA are familiar with their procedures. But, if something new is introduced it might trigger a long review process, impacting time to market. It’s always been seen as easier just to carry a book around.

“I do find it mind boggling,” says Daniel. “I’ve got a great photo of the storage area at the university where I did post grad. We would write our results in thick books of 200 pages, and there’s basement full of thousands of these books, that need to be kept for 40 years by law.

“When someone moves on, their books go into the basement and no-one knows where they are. You lose past knowledge – no-one's going to spend hours searching through them.”

The electronic lab notebook will be released publicly next month to time with the post summer holidays of the US and Europe, where Antipodes Scientific does a lot of business.

“We’ve got existing customers trialling, and word has spread to other companies, so there's growing interest to get it up and running,” Daniel says.

Transformational indeed. If you recognise Daniel working from his desk on level one, it’s highly unlikely you will see much paper!

When Māori-founded company AskNicely moved into the B:HIVE last August they were intentional about celebrating the support of the mana whenua, with a pōwhiri and a blessing.

Now less than a year later the company is celebrating winning Hi-Tech Kamupene Māori o te Tau – Māori Company of the Year.

AskNicely is guided by Kaupapa Māori (the Māori way of doing things) and is proud to shine a light on Māori success in the technology sector.

CEO Aaron Ward, (Ngāti Maru) is hoping more Māori and Pasifika will see there is a genuine pathway in technology. “The rate of participation in the technology sector by Māori is woefully low. Māori kids need Māori heroes,” he says.

AskNicely helps businesses make every customer experience a success and has teams in the US and Europe serving millions of customers across the world. The company collects feedback from the customer after they have an experience with a frontline worker. This is forwarded to the worker directly through an app on their phone.

“There’s plenty of ways to collect feedback from customers, we’ve all seen those silly long surveys that lots of companies inflict upon their customers. What we do is we make sure that feedback doesn’t go to an analyst or some sort of report for managers to look at - we make sure it goes directly to the person that serves them. So that they know what they do matters, they are caught in the act of doing things right.”

AskNicely’s executive team from the U.S flew in to celebrate the awards last month at a glitzy ceremony in Christchurch. Ask Nicely has 25 staff at the B:HIVE, and other 25 in the United States and several in Amsterdam.

“This is where the discovery work was done, the design work was done. This is where the building is done. And then we have the rest of our business, our teams in the US and in Europe that go out and market our product around the world.”

Everyone loves a Kiwi success story and leading software developer CodeHQ is most certainly that.

Beginning life as Augen back in 1993, over the past three decades CodeHQ has brought the power of 15-hour in and out-sourced working days and a relentless appetite for innovation to their clients.

With a base here at the B:HIVE and a second office in Vietnam, CodeHQ has delivered world-class software design and implementation at a considerable cost saving.

Why Vietnam?
The start of the new millennium saw Vietnam invest massively in STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Mathematics). It was for this reason that, 18 years ago, CodeHQ chose to set up a wholly-owned subsidiary in Ho Chi Minh City.

Ho Chi Minh City has a population of around 9 million people, and with the vast grouping of available talent on offer, CodeHQ’s clients can save as much as 30% compared to local employment costs and better than 50% on local contract rates.

CodeHQ CEO and Co-Founder Peter Vile believes the company’s offering, with 100 staff spread across both offices, gives them and their direct clients a significant competitive edge. “Drawing on highly talented software development teams, has allowed us to add scale to our very experienced New Zealand-based workforce in a way that wouldn’t usually have been possible,” says Peter. “We employ all members of our Vietnam team directly and have built a trusted reputation. This means we have skilled workers waiting to join our ranks when we need them and we can onboard them quickly and deliver scale even faster.”

A ‘One Team’ culture
Developing an operating model organically over the course of two decades in Vietnam and three in New Zealand has produced a perfectly synchronised ‘one team’ culture.

The Vietnam working day usually starts around 1.30 pm New Zealand time.

CodeHQ’s clients and local developers can work all morning, do a quick virtual stand-up with their Vietnamese colleagues, who then carry on working into the evening and the night NZ time.

Operating across two time zones provides a considerable extension to the Kiwi business day and a major boost to productivity.

The next stage of the journey
So, what’s next for CodeHQ as the company’s enters its thirties?

In a word, growth. Growth built on the back of an agile business model that has evolved over time to be perfect for today’s always-on commercial environment.

Product Development company IQ Hive have found a unique niche within the massive mobile services sector which has transformed the nature of their business.

IQ Hive modernises and automates IT systems and processes and now find themselves dedicated largely to One New Zealand, one of the key network providers in the country.

“We started managing projects with them, small to medium size ones, but then started to pick up larger ones and now all of our business is predominantly with them in the wholesale sector,” says Alex Vaz, Product Manager at IQ Hive.

It’s all about what could be called white labelling when a company purchases a generic product and rebrands it as their own to sell.

“What One New Zealand has noticed is a growing desire for other “non telco” companies to get into the mobile service space, which is very expensive to set up, as you can imagine,” he says. “There’s a lot of infrastructure, like cell towers, huge servers, a lot of overseas contacts to enable international capabilities"

“One New Zealand already has all the right infrastructure so they work with us and we created a layer that provides a seamless integration into their infrastructure so OneNZ customers can utilise the One New Zealand network and they can sell their own branded version of OneNZ’s mobile services,” he says.

“Our platform sits on top of those services, so when their wholesale customers come to them with just a brand such as images, some website copy and colour guide, we give them an entire platform that allows their customers to purchase sim cards, buy plans and manage the services - all branded under a customers brand which ultimately uses the OneNZ network.”

“A lot of people have amazing customer bases and would like to expand to mobile services. Anyone can do that now.”

Overseas, in countries like India, there are thousands of mobile services providers.  Essentially New Zealand is getting into the game happening overseas where the market is adopting more and more players, which OneNZ and IQ Hive hope to work together to champion.

Business is growing with the successful launch of both MightyMobile - Mighty Ape’s new mobile brand as well as Contact Mobile, the mobile service belonging to one of NZs biggest power providers - Contact Energy.

Watch this space!

Awesome charity Save the Kiwi is a longtime B:HIVE community member, and many of you will already be aware of the great work they do. This month they have an exciting new month-long campaign, called the Kiwi Art Trail, bringing a collection of uniquely designed and painted kiwi sculptures to Commercial Bay, the Viaduct, Wynyard Quarter, and Silo Park.

The Kiwi Art Trail will run from 9 October until 3 November 2023 and features 20 kiwi sculptures that have been turned into bespoke pieces of art by well-known and emerging New Zealand artists including Otis Frizzell, Flox, Amanda Billing, Sarah Oostendorp and Jonathan Organ. The Kiwi Art Trail is supported by insurance broker Gallagher (who recently rebranded from Crombie Lockwood).

“The Kiwi Art Trail is a great way for people to get up close and personal with a kiwi in a very different way,” says Save the Kiwi Executive Director Michelle Impey.

When the trail ends, the sculptures will be auctioned. Proceeds will go towards raising the next generation of kiwi at the Gallagher Kiwi Burrow, a facility managed by Save the Kiwi that incubates and hatches kiwi chicks and releases them into the wild.

Michelle is excited about the fundraising and awareness opportunities of the Kiwi Art Trail. “New Zealand used to be home to millions of kiwi, but in just a few hundred years, widespread clearing of forest and introduced predators have seen numbers crash,” she says. “Stoats, ferrets, dogs, and other predators pose a great danger to kiwi. Approximately 68,000 remain, a number which declines nationally by 2% every year. Of the kiwi chicks that hatch in areas where there is no predator control, 95% are killed before they reach adulthood. It’s very sobering, and we hope the Kiwi Art Trail will raise awareness about the threats kiwi face and raise much-needed funds to help the next generation of kiwi.”

But there are also many success stories. Michelle says in some areas like Northland and Coromandel, there is actually growth in kiwi numbers, which is testament to the great work of community groups. Earlier in 2023, Save the Kiwi released 50 kiwi to Wellington, and another 50 to Tongariro. Now’s the time to step up and support kiwi conservation.

Check out the trail if you can! For more information, visit www.kiwiarttrail.nz
For info on Gallagher Kiwi Burrow, visit  www.savethekiwi.nz/about-us/what-we-do/crombie-lockwood-kiwi-burrow/

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Did you know that more than a quarter of New Zealanders have poor mental health. Our hyper-paced, digital world has left us more lonely, more depressed and more anxious than ever before.

The trend is particularly alarming among young people, with 23.5% aged 15-24 experiencing high or very high levels of psychological distress in 2021/22 compared to just 5.1% 10 years earlier. Dr Louise Schofield, the co-founder and CEO of PREKURE, located on the 1st floor of the B:HIVE, has seen the fallout firsthand.

“Two years ago, I stood next to a mum who was beside herself with worry for her 24-year-old daughter. Her daughter was suicidal. Together we called the mental health crisis team for help, yet no help came. They told us that if we thought she was going to do something that night then we should call the police,” she says.

“Later that night when I was at home thinking about what I had just witnessed, I got sad and then I got really mad. Mad at the system, mad at the lack of support, mad at the lack of well-trained mental health professionals, mad at the lack of quality education on what you can do to keep yourself mentally well.”

The result was PREKURE, a social enterprise committed to revolutionising healthcare by training Professional Health Coaches, Nutrition Coaches, and Mental Health Coaches.

PREKURE is committed to making a difference and this month is stepping up with a new complimentary offering. Their  21-Day Mental Fitness online programme developed with the latest scientific knowledge will be available free to help participants build their mental fitness and provide tools to manage everyday stress and anxiety. (The programme is normally priced at $99.)

Created by the PREKURE Faculty, the programme integrates scientific-backed learning of the seven lifestyle levers to achieve optimal mental fitness: Eat, Move, Sleep, Breathe, Cold Water, Joy, and Self-Talk. The daily online learning provides actionable tools for immediate positive change.    

Dr Schofield says the programme’s aim is to inspire people to be the best they can be.

“To eat more whole real food that is not ultra-processed. To move more and gradually do harder exercise like lifting heavy things and getting their exercise intensity up,” she says. “To give themselves an 8-hour sleep opportunity every night. To do hard things. Things that at first glance they may not think they cannot do, like getting into very cold water.”

Interested? Sign up for free here!

Successful businesses care about their employees’ wellbeing. But how do they contribute to it or measure it?

HealthNow, based on the second floor of the B:HIVE, was founded three years ago by Steve Zinsli with the vision of making it easier for employers to provide their employees access to healthcare. They have found many employers are on board with a socially capitalistic approach to health and wellbeing, but they are still a business and it is natural they want to know about ROI. 

In response, they engaged researchers to build a comprehensive report called the “ROI of Employee Wellbeing” which is being offered for free to B:HIVE members.

It’s just been released and with some interesting findings. For example, over a 10 year period, Port of Brisbane gained a $1.58 return for every $1 spent on its employee wellness initiatives.  The pillars behind the dollars are productivity, staff retention and staff morale. On the flipside, today 34-39% of the New Zealand and Australian population aren’t able to access care due to financial barriers. 

Since launch, Steve Zinsli has grown to 13 staff at the B:HIVE with more in Australia. Investors include Anna Mowbry and John Joyce. Zinlsi grew up in a home where there wasn’t always enough money for healthcare, which set some early thoughts in place. Ones that would years later make a difference.

“Our mission is to make healthcare more accessible and equitable and part of that is to show employers it is worthwhile,” he says.

HealthNow offers organisations a platform to deliver a wellness benefit to their people by way of funds available on a HealthNow mastercard.

“The card removes barriers and provides a modern, dignifying purchasing experience  at the every doctor, dentist, physiotherapist, served by the global Mastercard network,” Zinsli says.

Employees can manage their allowance by viewing their balance of funds and transaction history. Employers choose a contribution amount and health sectors.

“Delaying health needs can very quickly affect an individual’s wellbeing, spilling over into work life, creating a culture of disengaged staff. Considering that people spend an average of 30% of their waking life at work, employers stand to benefit the most from their employees’ improved health and wellness,” Zinsli says.

“We can reduce the need for more expensive and complex treatments down the road, helping to create healthier, happier, more productive workforce, with fewer sick days and improved overall wellbeing.”

Download the “ROI of Employee Wellbeing” Report here!