BILL REICHERT’S NEW ZEALAND I NNOVATION REPORT: I MPRESSIVE EFFORT, BUT MUST TRY HARDER

Garage Technology Ventures' managing director Bill Reichert spent four weeks in New Zealand as entrepreneur in residence at AUT University and travelled the country meeting some of our most promising and passionate startups, innovators, educators and regulators. In a two-part feature, he gave his educated view on the state of our country's innovation ecosystem and what we need to do to develop it and then told us all about the New Zealand companies that impressed him most. Awww, shucks Bill.

His seven top tips:

1 Engage the corporate community 2 Celebrate innovation heroes 3 Increase support for sales training 4 Create an open professional network of startup companies 5 Support scale-ups, not just startups 6 Focus on innovation, not “commercialisation”

7 Make New Zealand attractive to global innovators