Introducing Scale-Up NZ: the gateway to innovation ecosystem

16 April 2019

Introducing Scale-Up NZ: the gateway to New Zealand’s innovation ecosystem

A free online platform connecting New Zealand businesses with funders, incubators, multinationals and other collaborators launches today.

Scale-Up NZ, from Callaghan Innovation, shines a light on our thriving innovation ecosystem. It delivers accurate insights on ambitious, innovative New Zealand companies, removing information gaps that too often prevent our businesses from achieving their potential.

The late physicist and entrepreneur Sir Paul Callaghan urged New Zealand to build nationwide communities of innovators, entrepreneurs and businesses. Scale-Up NZ embodies that vision.

Free information you can trust Crowdsourcing information from the companies themselves and backed by a team of Callaghan Innovation data analysts who will verify data on the platform, Scale-Up NZ has the potential to foster much greater collaboration in our economy.

“We’ve worked with over 2,800 companies in the last year, but we continue to find that many of them are struggling to locate the partners or funders that could help take their business to the next level,” says Callaghan Innovation Chief Executive, Vic Crone.

“Scale-Up NZ will make a big difference,” says Crone. “We will do most of the work curating the platform as a trusted, secure and high-quality source of intelligence so our innovative businesses are more visible and the potential for collaboration is more obvious. Companies on Scale-Up NZ will be able to showcase their innovations so that potential investors and collaborators here and globally can more easily discover and connect with them.”

The platform is based on the hugely successful Start-Up Nation Finder, which provides information on over 7,000 companies that make up Israel’s innovation ecosystem. Thousands of people use Start-Up Nation Finder every day to search for Israeli start-ups, potential partners and investors.

“By having Scale-Up NZ based on the same basic platform as Start-Up Nation Finder,” says Crone, "over time we’ll be able to benchmark ourselves against, and learn from, Israel, Ireland and other small advanced economies that are on this or similar platforms.”

Easy to search and navigate Scale-Up NZ has aspects of business networking and directory tools such as LinkedIn and Crunchbase, but doesn’t seek to replace them. Instead it profiles New Zealand businesses, investors and multinationals and the relationships between them, offering more context and verified information in one place than ever before.

The platform groups together companies in similar areas of innovation based on an advanced tagging system. With My Collections, registered users can follow and analyse companies, investors, hubs, and multinationals in one easy to manage interface. Users can request mediated introductions, which also has potential to help job seekers connect with possible employers.

Erica Lloyd, General Manager Market and Sectors at Callaghan Innovation, says: “Scale-Up NZ draws on research here and overseas that shows highly-networked and collaborative innovation ecosystems produce more intellectual property, commercialise more science and attract more capital.

“We’ve launched now so the innovation ecosystem can see the power of the platform and help us build out the data faster. We expect the hundreds of profiles on the platform today will become thousands within a year or so as more New Zealand businesses realise the value of the connections and collaboration it enables.”

Scale-Up NZ will be officially launched tonight in Auckland at GridAKL, with over 200 business leaders and innovators, and alongside NZ innovation showcases.

Scale-Up NZ – where innovation lives Tūhura: Find Scale-Up NZ enables users to find the accurate information they need, when they need it, in multiple ways. You can navigate the ecosystem to explore new technology and business trends. For more in-depth analysis, browse for specific information using the platform’s comprehensive search feature. The advanced search options filter companies by business model, funding stage, geographic location, product stage and more.

Tūhono: Connect Find potential partners or complementary businesses in sectors and locations you’re interested in and ask for facilitated introductions to key people. This enables users to extend their networks and helps create connections that matter. Contact requests will be mediated to ensure their mutual value.

Turuki: Grow Similar networks overseas are growth engines for ambitious companies, innovation communities and national economies. In Aotearoa New Zealand, Scale-Up NZ will supercharge innovation and help build world-beating businesses.

Join now Visit Scale-Up NZ to begin your search for partners now. You can also check the eligibility criteria for listing your company or entity and, if eligible, upload your business details for review by our team of data analysts. Users can log-in using existing LinkedIn and Google account details.

Visit www.scaleup.nz.

ENDS

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