Published on the 20/09/2013 | Written by Newsdesk

The CEO of Animation Research Limited says the America’s Cup is more than just a boat race – it is also a tech showcase…

The head of the company behind the excellent on-screen graphics and app for the America’s Cup has spoken out against the flippant and facetious treatment of the race by some members of the media and the government.

In response to an interview on Radio New Zealand’s The Panel, Ian Taylor, chief executive of Animation Research Limited, has written a strongly worded email that sets out why the America’s Cup is more than just a boat race – rather it is a tech showcase and he says Emirates Team New Zealand is a “technology company” and a “technological marvel”. Win or lose, he believes it’s more about showcasing New Zealand as a technological centre of excellence.

“We aren’t winning this race solely because of our sailors. We are winning it because of innovation on board the boat that not even Oracle had thought of,” he wrote in his missive, which reads as follows:

Hi everyone from San Francisco

As everyone starts to get excited about the potential for ETNZ to bring the Cup home (and I know it is still early days) I believe most in the country, including our ministry charged with Innovation, Design and, dare I say it, Science has missed the whole point of what is happening here. This is not a story about a boat race. This is a story of world class, world leading technology, innovation, engineering and design. This is the story that should be being told – win or lose on the water this team has been a shining example, an eye opener, on what we are capable of. And as Lord Ernest Rutherford said: “We haven’t got the money so we have to think.” That should be our mantra. In a place like this, next door to Silicon Valley, he should have been our talisman.

We aren’t winning this race solely because of our sailors. We are winning it because of innovation on board the boat that not even Oracle had thought of. A leading edge to the wing that can be twisted to optimise wind flow across the sail. A self-setting gyb that gains the crew critical seconds in tacks and gybes and a fibre optic network on board that fires updated data to screens around the boat all built in a container on Pier 32 by 3 guys. One of them an American genius attracted to live in New Zealand because of the culture of this team and the beauty of our country. Check out the engineers setting this boat up every morning – not a spanner in sight – all hand held tablets. And we bemoan the $36 million investment made in this technology company called ETNZ!

As proponents of a Ministry charged with promoting our country as a leader in innovation, technology and smart thinking we should be shouting this from the roof tops. Instead our PM says we haven’t achieved anything unless we win this thing. We shouldn’t even be here but we are. And yesterday you saw the panic that this technology has put into Oracle Team US.

What has brought me to this is an interview I did last night with two ignorant, dismissive commentators on a fully tax payer funded radio station.

You can hear that interview here at 15:55. […]There are times I feel ashamed at the way we treat our real innovators. This is one of them.

Taylor also highlighted an animated film that his company produced to put the America’s Cup in context for New Zealand as a Nation of Sailors using design, technology and innovation, and which has been extremely well received in San Francisco and now around the world:

You might also like to check out something else special about this event. It can be found here.

Some background on this. We sought funding to produce because we thought it was an important story to tell in the context of the Cup and our history as a Nation of Sailors. No one would fund it so we made it anyway.

Two guys from Google saw it at the waka two days ago and suggested we put it on You tube. We did. As at this stage it has had over 16,000 views, it has been picked up by Louis Vuitton for their guests, Emirates has requested a copy to show on their planes, it has been Face Booked linked all around the globe and the Warehouse and Noel Leeming chains are now screening it in their store around the country. It is being used to open hosted evenings in the Waka and the official AC Park big screen has requested a copy and, what is most heartening, everyone has identified the fact that no other country or billionaire involved in the America Cup could tell a story as powerful as this. An unbroken line of design, engineering, technology, seamanship and navigation from our maori ancestors who sailed the Pacific to Aotearoa to this hi tech flying machine called Aotearoa, representing us so superbly on the waters off San Francisco Bay.

Peter Townsend, CEO of the Canterbury Employers’ Chamber of Commerce, read the missive and replied with the following:

I have listened to the Radio link and cringed.
I have watched the YouTube link and felt inspired.
I have read your words and feel humbled and somewhat ashamed.
Your story needs to find a far wider audience and I hope it does.

The commentators on the Radio New Zealand programme have since called to apologise.