TICKET ROCKET IN TAIL SPIN

He built up a global ticketing company from his adopted home in Dunedin and bought the city’s Super Rugby franchise. Now, Hamish McNeilly reports, Matt Davey’s empire appears to be crumbling.

IT had been a fairytale story of the immigrant who fell in love with rugby while studying at Otago University and ended up buying the Highlanders just as the team was winning its maiden Super Rugby title.

But this week Canadian Matt Davey was nowhere to be found at his company’s headquarters in central Dunedin. The lone remaining staff member had no idea where he is.

‘‘I haven’t got hold of him either,’’ said the man, surrounded by unmanned computer terminals.

‘‘He pops in sometimes,’’ he adds, but when asked when was the last time he saw the owner of Ticket Rocket, he says ‘‘I can’t answer that: sorry’’.

The ticketing empire Davey created, Ticket Direct (which later became Ticket Rocket), has left a trail of unsatisfied venues and disgruntled ticket holders across New Zealand.

Industry insiders fear a collapse of the company, which has struggled to refund ticket holders for events affected by the nationwide lockdown.

Those funds, they say, should have been safely kept in trusts but lengthy delays for those seeking refunds has raised doubts if customers will ever get their money back.

A close former business partner of Davey, who declined to be named, believed he would be ‘‘doing his best to find a solution and get the job done’’. ‘‘He always has in the past.’’ The former colleague noted that Davey was dedicated to the Highlanders, Dunedin and

Otago, and had kept the ticketing headquarters in the city at a time when the company expanded to other countries.

He understood Davey has been based overseas since last year, and the travel disruptions caused by Covid-19 would have made it difficult to oversee his business.

‘‘It’s an extremely tough time for everyone in the events industry, one of the first to be impacted and no doubt will be one of the last to recover.’’

Davey was passionate about the south, and in particular the Highlanders, he said.

‘‘It was great to see his passion for the area and rugby lead to his successful efforts to help keep the Highlanders in Dunedin.’’

In 2015, the year the Highlanders won their inaugural Super Rugby title, a four-member group headed by Davey secured a five-year licensing agreement for the franchise.

That opportunity came after another offer surfaced from Singapore, with Davey determined to keep the franchise

‘‘We see this as a good business opportunity, but equally we have a strong emotional attachment to the south and, for me in particular, the Highlanders,’’ Davey said.

Last week Stuff revealed Davey had sold 300 of his 462 shares in the Highlanders, and was no longer on the board.

Chairman Doug Harvie declined to comment.

But Harvie sent a statement, obtained by Sunday News, to key sponsors of the Highlanders about ‘‘media stories circulating’’.

That statement confirmed Davey resigned in April and ‘‘no longer has any involvement with the day to day governance of the Highlanders’’.

It also confirmed the Highlanders no longer used Ticket Rocket, and urged any supporters who had tickets to outstanding matches ‘‘to get in touch with us as soon as possible’’.

Ticket receipts, sighted by Sunday News, showed the Highlanders were using Ticket

Rocket at the start of the season, but were now using Ticketek.

In December 2015, Dunedin Venues Management Ltd, which operates Forsyth Barr Stadium, where Davey’s Ticket Direct once had naming rights for the northern stand, ended their relationship with his company.

Three of the four Super Rugby franchises have broken with Ticket Rocket, and the Hurricanes have contacted police to try to recover a