New research shows more than half of ASX-listed boards have no directors with STEM expertise – a gap that has barely shifted in 15 years. The research, published in the Journal of Accounting Literature, shows Australian boards are more comfortable reading balance sheets than code, despite years of digital transformation and the rapid arrive of generative AI.

“Firms with greater STEM board expertise are associated with higher levels of innovation investment and firm value.”

The study, STEM Expertise in Australian Boardrooms: Trends and Impact on Firm Outcomes,  examined the backgrounds of directors at the top ASX-listed companies in 2007 and 2022. Over that 15 year period, the share of board seats held by directors with STEM (science, technology, engineering and mathematics) expertise rose from 8.4 percent to just 12.9 percent. More than half of those boards had no STEM-qualified directors at all by 2022.

Meanwhile directors with background in accounting, banking and law filled around 42 percent of board sets, with former CEOs and other c-suite executives accounting for a further 35 percent. Even in sectors with a high level of technical and innovative activities, such as IT, the materials sector and healthcare, STEM directors were outnumbered by directors with financial and executive expertise, with 27 percent of IT and materials boards comprised of STEM directors, and 24 percent of healthcare.

It’s a trend also seen in the Australian Institute of Company Director’s 2025 Board Diversity Index, which showed Australian boards were continuing to appoint a ‘significant proportion’ of people with accounting and financial background – with just 7.7 percent having a tech background.

In short, the boardroom remains dominated by financial and governance specialists – a structure that has proven stable, consistent and not especially technical, or innovative.

Innovation and value benefits

According to the research, co-authored by Natalie Elms and Aeshesha Weerasinghe from Queensland University of Technology and John Nowland from Illinois State University the lack of STEM expertise does have an impact on business both in terms of investment and value and in limiting cyber risk exposure.

“Firms with greater STEM board expertise are associated with higher levels of innovation investment and firm value,” the research article says. “These effects are strongest in firms without STEM CEOs and in industries with lower STEM representation.”

When STEM representation exceeded 26 percent, companies were found to have invested significantly more in innovation than those where STEM expertise was below 25 percent.

The trio argue that appointing directors with STEM background may offer a competitive advantage, and recommends policies and initiatives to expand the supply of STEM directors.

The findings arrive as boards face rising accountability for technology-driven decisions, from AI investments to cyber resilience and data governance. Directors are expected to test management assumptions, evaluate technology risk and sign-off on digital strategy, even if many have never worked directly with the systems being discussed or with modern software systems.

“In Australia, the need for boards to leverage digital technologies and oversee technological risks has become a pressing issue. A national survey of corporate directors shows that 21 percent of organisations have no digital transformation strategy, while 41 percent report that fewer than one-quarter of their board members possess technology skills, and 13 percent have no technology skills.”

At the same time, cybersecurity, cyberattacks, data governance and staff technology capabilities have been identified as among the most critical risks organisations are facing, with directors in the firing line of regulators for failing to prepare and respond to cyberattacks appropriately.

“Directors with expertise in STEM are particularly well positioned to influence technology-driven innovation and, consequently, firm value.”

The study links this skills gap directly to measurable outcomes – ‘a positive and significant relationship’ between the number of STEM directors and corporate innovation investment. “This suggests that, although STEM directors comprise only a small percentage of the total director pool, their influence on innovation is significant.”

While not arguing for replacing accountants with engineers – financial, legal and governance skills remain fundamental for all businesses – the researchers note that without sufficient technical expertise, boards may struggle to interrogate major technology investments, assess risk trade-offs or challenge management assumptions, particularly in fast-moving areas like AI. (The report looked at 2022 director details, pre-dating the AI surge of the last few years.)

“Their cognitive capacities and technical expertise enable STEM directors to identify, assess, and respond to technological opportunities and risks, thereby enhancing their advisory and monitoring roles in relation to innovation and technology strategies.

“This is supported by our results, which show a positive and significant association between STEM director representation and both corporate innovation investment and firm value. Notably, these effects are strongest in firms without STEM CEOs and in industries with lower overall STEM representation, suggesting that STEM directors help fill a critical gap in firms’ innovation strategy and capabilities.

Kiwi mirror

New Zealand boardrooms appear to be grappling with a similar tension. The New Zealand Institute of Directors’ Director Sentiment Survey 2025 shows technology and AI have moved firmly into the governance mainstream, with 38.5 percent of directors identifying AI and digital acceleration as a top strategic issue and more than 60 percent of boards working with management on how technology can lift productivity.

At the same time, confidence in capability is lagging ambition. Fewer than half of New Zealand directors believe their board has the right skills to manage increasing business complexity and risk. The survey also shows easing attention to formal board evaluation and skills review, even as expectations around digital oversight accelerate.

The New Zealand IoD does not prescribe professional backgrounds for directors and the survey does not single out STEM expertise. However, a 2019 survey, cited by the New Zealand Institute of Directors, found just three percent of directors surveyed had science or technology expertise and the data highlights a widening gap between what boards recognise they need to govern and how confident they are that current capability matches that task.

The STEM Expertise authors stop short of calling for quotas or wholesale board upheaval. Instead, they argue for expanding the pipeline of board-ready directors with STEM backgrounds and recognising technical expertise as a governance asset, rather than a specialist add on.

For now, the numbers tell a simple story. Technology is shaping company performance faster than board composition is adapting.

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CPA Australia’s latest Small Business Survey of more than 4,100 businesses across APAC, shows both Australia and New Zealand are sitting near the bottom of the region for growth, innovation and technology adoption. It’s the second year New Zealand has ranked last for growth, something Rick Jones, CPA Australia regional head, dubs ‘a worrying trend’.

“Existing technology spend is not translating into profitability.”

In New Zealand just 38 percent of small businesses reported growth in 2025 – up on last year’s 36 percent but still well below the APAC average of 62 percent, and ranking New Zealand last out of the 11 markets surveyed. Just 26 percent said technology investment improved profitability, less than half the regional average and digital adoption remains weak. Australian results paint a similarly weak picture of low digital uptake and poor returns from tech investment.

Jones told iStart the problem is two-fold: Overall digital uptake in both markets remains well below Asia Pacific peers, and where businesses do spend, investment is heavily weighted toward basic IT such as computer equipment, rather than tools that change how the business operates. Online sales, digital payments and use of social media for customer insights, rather than visibility alone, remain underused, even as productivity pressures intensify.

With productivity firmly on the political agenda in both countries this election year, Jones says lifting small business technology should be a central priority.

“Our data consistently shows that businesses which invest effectively in technology grow faster, hire more people and are more likely to innovate. Countries like Singapore have demonstrated what targeted digital support programmes can achieve – there are proven approaches in our region that could work here,” he says.

Low adoption, low returns

The survey data shows that limited digital adoption remains a key issue across both markets, but the effect is most pronounced in New Zealand.

Only 32.4 percent of New Zealand’s small businesses generated more than 10 percent of their revenue from online sales in 2025, less than half the Asia Pacific average and the lowest results across all surveyed markets. Use of digital payment platforms is similarly low with just 35.4 percent receiving more than 10 percent of sales via services such as PayPal, Apple Pay or Google Pay, again ranking last in the region.

Technology use remains basic elsewhere too. Almost 31 percent of Kiwi small businesses don’t use social media for business purposes at all, compared with a regional average of 12 percent.

The pattern is mirrored in Australia, where 44 percent of businesses reported earning more than 10 percent of revenue online, still well below the Asia Pacific. The report notes however, that while New Zealand and Australian small businesses continue to be the least likely to generate online sales, Australia, at least, experienced an improvement year on year in 2025, while New Zealand’s decline continued. In Australia, 68 percent used social media for business, trailing the regional norm of 88 percent.

The gaps matter because the survey shows a strong relationship between digital adoption and performance. Businesses with higher use of online sales channels, digital payments and basic automation are most likely to report growth, hiring and innovation. “Technology continues to play a more critical role for high-growth small businesses than for other businesses,” the report notes.

Maintenance, not momentum

Where small businesses do invest in technology, the type of investment helps explain why returns remain weak locally.

In New Zealand, computer equipment was again the most heavily invested tech category last year – continuing a trend echoed repeatedly in the survey since 2020 – followed by website and accounting software. Australia was similar, favouring accounting software, followed by computer equipment and website.

In comparison, high-growth businesses across the region were most likely to invest in AI followed by cloud computing and CRM software.

CPA says this indicates A/NZ spending is often directed toward replacement or maintenance, rather than productivity-enhancing systems.

The profitability data reinforces that conclusion. Just 25.6 percent of Kiwi small businesses surveyed said tech investment improved their profitability in 2025, compared with a survey average of 56.3 percent. Australia recorded a similar outcome, with only 30 percent of businesses reporting profitability improvements from tech investments.

CPA links this to quality, rather than quantity of investment. Simply purchasing hardware – replacing devices, upgrading networks, maintaining on-premise systems – may keep the lights on, but it rarely changes cost structures, revenue flows or decision-making.

“What the survey shows is that existing technology spend is not translating into profitability,” Jones says. He says where business are investing it’s often without the sequencing or support needed to make the tools deliver operational change.

“The question is, how do we support these business owners in that capability piece, so they are not just investing in technology, but are investing in the right technology? That’s not just about using it right, it’s around making it work for the business so they are seeing returns,” he says.

Cashflow and time pressure points

Across both countries, the operational pressures facing small businesses underline why businesses are cautious – and why digital matters.

In New Zealand, 54 percent of businesses said increasing costs had a major negative impact in 2025, ranking highest among surveyed market. Hiring remains weak with only 7.4 percent increasing employee numbers, and just 14 percent expecting to hire in 2026. Innovation plans are similarly subdued with only 4.9 percent planning to introduce a new product, service or process in the coming year.

Australia’s results show similar stagnation, with CPA Australia business and investment lead Gavan Ord warning that prolonged underperformance among small businesses is feeding into a wider productivity slowdown. “When small businesses underperform year after year, it become a national economic problem, not just a sector issue,” he says.

Against that backdrop, the technologies most closely linked to measurable gains are not experimental. Jones points to practical improvements such as faster invoicing and payments, online ordering and booking systems and digital finance and reporting tools that reduce manual work across payroll, inventory and customer management.

He notes when businesses experience clear time savings and faster payments, confidence in technology investment tends to rise, easing hesitation around further adoption.

The older demographics of Australian and New Zealand businesses also has a role to play in tech adoption. New Zealand has the oldest small business ownership profile in the region, with 68 percent of owners aged 50 or over. Australia shows a similar generational divide, though less pronounced.

“It’s not an age thing in isolation, but what the survey showed is that business owners under 40 certainly reported growth,” Jones says. “They showed a lot more revenue through online sales and their digital and tech uptake is a lot higher. Younger business owners have a higher risk appetite and are more likely to invest in digital capability.”

In the wake of the survey results, Jones says business technology adoption needs to be made an essential priority for New Zealand (and Australia’s) growth and productivity agendas.

“We need to introduce some better sequence digital adoption support programmes,” he says, suggesting we look to Singapore for examples of programmes which have a proven track record in providing comprehensive support for small business.

“The government should consider designing business digital support programmes with more deliberate bundling and sequencing of measures, drawing on approaches used in Singapore,” CPA Australia says. “This would increase programme effectiveness, accelerate the diffusion of productivity enhancing technology and promote more effective use of existing digital capabilities. Over time this would support stronger productivity, greater business dynamism and a more competitive small business sector.”

In Australia the organisation is also calling for government to incentivise tech adoption and the development of stronger digital capability.

CPA is also calling for a coordinated package of measures to lift participation of younger people in small business. In New Zealand, that includes a ‘start-up apprenticeship’ or mentoring programme and improved access to finance and professional advice for younger owners, potentially through a ‘First Business Owners programme’ connecting participants with accredited advisers and possibly including a SME loan guarantee component.

Jones, who dubs the survey a ‘challenging read’ for New Zealand, says it’s not just about government investment, however. He’s calling for other organisations and consultants to step up and provide the mentoring relationships to help small businesses, and for the businesses themselves to more actively share with other small businesses their successes and learnings. CPA Australia itself is working on providing extensive professional development for its own members to help them on the journey – and ensure their small business customers can also move forward.

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Kōrero Mai: Voice of the Digital Health Community in Aotearoa New Zealand, a report from HiNZ (Health Informatics New Zealand) based on conversations with more than 200 clinicians, administrators, technologists, industry experts, students, advocates and policy stakeholders, shows respondents acknowledge genuine gains in areas such as electronic referrals, e-prescribing, telehealth and AI, with progress happening ‘but in pockets’. But those gains, respondents warn, are being undermined by fragmentation and cyclical resets that erode confidence among the workforce.

“This is not because the workforce is resistant to change, but because they are tired of change that promises transformation and fails to deliver it.”

The report follows a 2024 Voice of the Workforce special report from HiNZ, which flagged widespread sector concern about the erosion of digital capability across the sector and comes as documents released under the Official Information Act show Health NZ knew last year that cutting data and digital roles would increase risks to patient care and hospital resilience, even as the restructure – which proposed cutting $100 million from the digital services budget and slashing data and digital team from 2000 to 1460 (many of the roles were already vacant) – proceeded.

The poor state of New Zealand’s health IT has been a focus for years, with Health New Zealand grappling with an outdated infrastructure, including an estimated 6,000 applications and 100 digital networks, inherited when district health boards were disbanded, replaced with a centralised system.

Change that fails to deliver

A central finding in the report is that trust in digital transformation itself is weakening. “This is not because the workforce is resistant to change, but because they are tired of change that promises transformation and fails to deliver it.”

Participants pointed to a familiar pattern: Pilots that never move into production or scale, contracts that end before benefits are realised and initiatives framed as discrete projects rather than long-term system capability. Digital change is being repeatedly ‘reset’ with momentum lost each time organisational structures or priorities shift, the report says.

For tech leaders, it highlights a credibility issue. When systems do not endure, confidence drops, making subsequent change more difficult to implement and increasing resistance at the frontline. Each reset, respondents said, reduces confidence that future initiatives will deliver lasting value, and they warned that when systems don’t endure, clinicians and digital teams become less willing to invest time and effort in new tools.

Skills not the constraint

Contrary to long-standing assumptions, Kōrero Mai finds the health workforce does not lack technical ability. Instead, professionals report having the skills needed to engage with modern systems, but lack confidence that those systems will functional reliably and be supported over time.

“The professionals already have the skills required to engage with technology. What is lacking is the confidence that systems will work, that investment will continue and that support will be available.”

Participants in the korero mai (open conversation) reported that training is frequently undermined by system churn, with platforms retired, restructured or under-resourced before benefits can be realised. As a result, digital confidence is being eroded not by lack of competence, but by lack of continuity.

“Participants stressed that digital transformation is not a cost-saving exercise in the short term, but requires sustained investment in people: This involves training, change management and roles dedicated to making systems work in practice,” the report says. It notes reductions in digital service roles have left fewer people available to train, support and optimise systems.

Resilience warnings

Concerns about confidence and continuity are reflected in internal Health NZ documents which the PSA gained under OIA. End user Impact of Digital Change – Consequences was written around March 2025 as Health NZ refined its proposals to slash the IT workforce and flags increased risks to patient care and hospital resilience.

It found risks ‘will almost certainly elevate as technical debt becomes unsustainable and the modernisation/transformation required to meet the future needs of the sector is delayed’.

The report also noted existing weaknesses in system resilience, including limited business continuity planning and ‘minimal’ hot-failover mechanisms, leaving core systems vulnerable.

Those vulnerabilities were highlighted in a series of high-profile IT outages earlier this year. In January a major outage impacted hospitals in the lower North Island with clinicians unable to access patient information, just days after a widespread outage affected the Southern district. Auckland and Northland hospitals were also knocked offline in January, with staff resorting to paper-based systems and whiteboards during the 12-hour outage. They were also affected by an outage in February.

Kōrero Mai also notes the ongoing issue of lack of interoperability across systems, with clinicians navigating ‘dozens’ of systems, multiple log-ins and manual workarounds to deliver routine work. Patients are required to repeat stories and critical information is ‘frequently’ lost between settings.

It calls for acceleration of interoperability and shared records as a national priority, saying incremental progress is no longer sufficient. “Clear milestones, accountability mechanisms and clinical leadership are required to ensure interoperability delivers real value to  frontline care.”

A ‘fundamental shift’ away from experimentation towards sustained, system-level capability is also required. “Digital health can no longer be framed as a series of projects, pilots or technology deployments…

“Interoperability, for example, is not simply a technical problem but a systems trust issue. A ‘single source of truth’ is about more than shared records, it represents shared understanding across organisations, professions and communities.’

Showing what alignment can deliver

Among the success stories, and an example of what is possible when technology aligns with real clinical needs, is the ‘rapid normalisation’ of AI in clinical and administrative settings, the report says. AI scribes, transcription tools and assistants have moved from pilots to business as usual in many environments. Participants reported tangible productivity gains and reduced administrative burden from the tools. For some it is enabling better eye contact with patients, more thoughtful consultations and reduced cognitive load at the end of long shifts.

Interestingly, workforce attitudes towards AI have also shifted, with fear of replacement increasingly replaced by recognition that AI is a tool which if governed well, can strengthen, rather than dimmish, roles.

That issue of governance, however, comes with a warning, with the report cautioning AI’s  future success ‘depends on governance that centres people, culturally responsive design, transparency, accountability and strong human oversight’.

Incremental system unification has also seen genuine progress and received a thumbs up from participants, particularly in regions where consistent platforms are used across departments. The national rollout of electronic referrals and wider adoption of electronic prescribing were also cited as practical wins. “These initiatives demonstrated that when proven solutions are scaled thoughtfully, they can deliver immediate benefits to both clinicians and patients.”

There’s also been a ‘meaningful’ shift in how rural needs are recognised, the report says, with technologies such as satellite connectivity enabling mobile and remote care models that were previously impossible and telehealth now widely accepted as a legitimate and valuable mode of care delivery.

The report concludes that the key challenge for 2026 is not the volume of technology being deployed, but the credibility of digital transformation itself. “The opportunity for 2026 is not simply to implement more technology, but to rebuild trust in digital transformation itself.”

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The report is based on ‘insights’ from more than 4,000 eCommerce founders which Australian company Ecommerce Equation has worked with, and draws a clear line between founders who are seeing commercial impact from AI and those who feel increasingly overwhelmed by it.

“Where that understanding is missing, AI simply creates more activity, complexity and noise.”

The report highlights that AI performs best when companies already understand their business constraints. Those seeing real gains are the ones who know exactly which problem they’re trying to solve.

Or as says Jay Wright, Ecommerce Equation founder, says:  “The founders getting real results aren’t the ones doing the most with AI. They’re the ones who knew their business well enough to know exactly where to point it.”

Founders who skip this step tend to deploy AI broadly, without a clear objective or identifying a bottleneck, resulting in more output but little impact on revenue, margin or time saved, a pattern described as  ‘activity without moving the dial’.

In contrast, those who are seeing results are described as starting with a precise diagnosis: A conversion issue on one product, uncertainty in reordering decisions, a slowdown in creative testing or excessive manual operational work. In these case, AI is applied narrowly to the bottleneck and measured against a defined outcome, such as conversion rate, marketing efficiency, time saved or cash conversion speed. In essence, AI doesn’t fix unclear fundamentals; it amplifies existing systems. Where founders already know what ‘good’ looks like in their business, AI accelerates progress. Where that understanding is missing, it simply creates more activity, complexity and noise.

“The short version is this. AI is delivering real value for a small number of founders who have done the diagnostic work first. For everyone else, it’s generating activity without moving the needle.”

Where AI delivers real value: Revenue and conversion

The strongest, most immediate wins documented in the report occur on the revenue side of eCommerce operations. These include conversion rate optimisation, creative production, advertising performance and customer experience.

Lead-side work of getting products in front of the right people and converting are where most brands find their first meaningful wins, the report says, with successful brands using AI to tighten the connection between product and customer with clearer landing pages, tailored ads and a stronger read on what is resonating and the speed to act on it. “The feedback is fast, the impact is visible and the tools are mature enough to act on.”

For those who are getting it right, the report claims the wins are visible and fast, with conversion rates jumping 24 percent in a week from a single tool built around one specific customer problem.

That 24 percent figure relates to Australian apparel brand The Lullaby Club. It identified that a best-selling product fit differently from the rest of the range, rendering the standard size guide ineffective. A custom AI fit-finder was built in Claude for that single product. When it was tested with the 40,000-strong customer community, it achieved a 97 percent sizing accuracy. Within a week, conversion increased by 24 percent and returns fell. With confidence in that project, Lullaby turned its focus to other initiatives including a velocity trends tracker to show how products were selling and trends, using the same data foundation.

“We’re seeing brands go from sub-three percent to 7-11 percent conversion every day by feeding AI the right context about the customer,” the report says of some of the quick wins achieved.

The report also points to growing, if less headline-grabbing, wins on the operational side. Inventory forecasting, purchase ordering and customer service workflows are emerging as areas where AI is beginning to reduce manual effort and uncertainty.

Companies using AI to draft purchase orders, track sell-through rates and flag shifts in momentum are tightening cash conversion cycles and reducing guesswork.

Australian independent apparel brand Dr Moose is one example. The company identified that growth was being constrained its website. Rather than outsourcing work to an agency, she used Claude tools to redesign site UX, introduce bundles and adjust commercial settings herself. Changes previously scoped as a $15,000 web development project were implemented internally, lifting daily revenue from around $600 to $3,000. To get the most from the tools she used ChatGPT to work out what to ask Claude, avoiding burning tokens on trial and error.

Where AI falls flat

The report is equally direct about common failure modes. The most frequent is confusing activity with impact. Those who deploy AI before identifying a real bottleneck often rebuild systems that already work, or chase issues they don’t have.

But the report also notes there are real risks companies need to understand before they go too far down the rabbit hole. “AI will produce data it doesn’t have, confidently and without

flagging it. It too easily gives everyone asking the same question the same answer. And it will sand off the rough edges that make your brand distinct if you let it.”

Those getting the most out of it are the ones who stay in the loop, sense check the output and never let it make the call they should be making themselves, the report notes.

The report leaves little ambiguity about what separates results from noise: AI delivers value where it is applied with intent, against clearly defined constraints with humans remaining closely involved in the outcomes.

Where it is treated as a general productivity layer or a substitute for decision‑making, it tends to add complexity rather than remove it. The implication for eCommerce founders is practical rather than philosophical: AI works best not as a strategy, but as an execution tool, applied deliberately, measured against specific outcomes, and expanded only once it proves its worth.

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AppWrap April 2026

09.04 The government says it has no existing plans to use Palantir’s emerging technologies, despite meeting with the company in February. RNZ reports Defence Minister Judith Collins met with Palantir’s international president for an information discussion.

03.04 Artemis II astronauts experienced Microsoft Outlook failures shortly after launch, with Mission Control called in to remotely troubleshoot the issue. Commander Reid Wiseman reported that two instances of Outlook were running simultaneously on his Surface Pro, leaving both unresponsive, Mashable reports.

02.04 Inland Revenue says 300 myIR accounts which did not have two-step verification have been accessed following a significant increase in malicious log-on attempts. IR says two-factor authentication prevented access to another 900 accounts which are now being monitored by IR, with the 300 compromised accounts closed and IR contacting affected customers.

02.04 The government is reallocating $122m of science, innovation and tech spend to focus more investment on emerging and advanced technologies, such as robotics, quantum technology and genomics. RNZ reports the funding – about 15 percent of the total $839m available – will be allocated to support four ‘pillars’ of primary industry and bioeconomy, technology for prosperity, environmental sustainability, and healthy people and a thriving society.

01.04 Datacom has acquired T4’s Auckland data centre in a move that gives Datacom five sovereign data centres in New Zealand and a second Auckland facility. The company did not disclose how much it paid in the deal, but says the acquisition– and planned investment in the site – means it has committed more than $200m to building out local data centre capability.

01.04 SpaceX has filed confidentially for an IPO according to reports, which say the company is committed to debuting in June, with Elon Musk aiming to raise US$50b-$75b. The NYTimes reports SpaceX values itself at more than $1 trillion and would be one of the most valuable companies to reach the stock market.

01.04 NZ Police aren’t receiving promised government funding for technology needed to carry out new powers. RNZ says police need two new or improved tech systems – one to handle photos of people and other data generated by enhanced intelligence gathering and one to issue new infringements under a new Bill currently before parliament.

AppWrap March 2026

30.03 New Zealand’s Dexibit has been acquired by UK-listed Accesso Technology Group for $21m. Dexibit is a AI and analytics platform for the visitor attractions market. Accesso says the acquisition launches Accesso Intelligence, a new AI-powered cross-platform capability.

26.03 Health NZ has reminded staff not to use tools like ChatGPT, Claude or Gemini in their work after staff were caught using the free versions to write clinical notes. RNZ reports staff have been told using the tools could result in formal disciplinary action.

26.03 Meta and Google have lost a landmark US case, with a Los Angeles jury finding the two companies negligent for designing social media platforms that are harmful to young people. Reuters reports the jury found Meta liable for damages of US$4.2 million, with Google liable for $1.8m in the case of a US woman who sued Meta and YouTube over her childhood addiction to social media.

23.03 NZ Tech has launched a cybertech community, CyberTech New Zealand. The industry body says the group will bring together New Zealand’s cyber tech companies, leaders and advocates to strengthen the sector, promote its capabilities and achievements and help advance national policy and investment in cyber. It has launched with 22 founding member companies, including KPMG, Deloitte, Microsoft, Service Now, University of Auckland, CyberCX and CyberCure.

23.03 One NZ has completed its 2G and 3G network switch off, with both networks now fully retired. The company says by switching off the old tech and reusing radio spectrum on 4G and 5G, it can boost speeds and increase capacity.

20.03 Govt.nz app users will be able to see their digital wallet in the app by the end of the month, with the Government Credential Issuance Platform also going live this month allowing people to store and present accredited digital credentials in the app. Hospitality NZ is working to be the first accredited digital credential in the wallet, pending changes to the Sale and Supply of Alcohol Act, Digitising Government and Public Service Minister Judith Collins says.

19.03 Xero co-founder Rod Drury has been named 2026 New Zealander of the Year, with Halter’s Craig Piggot named Innovator of the Year at the Kiwibank New Zealanders of the Year Awards.

19.03 The X Money payments service, Elon Musk’s attempt to build a ‘everything app’ will enter early public access in April. Musk’s ambitions for the embedding payments into X are broader than most Western tech companies, notes PaymentsIndustryIntelligence, with Musk talking about a system that could eventually encompass savings, payments, securities and other financial activity, reducing reliance on traditional banking channels. At launch X Money is expected to offer core wallet and payment functions, including the ability to move funds within the platform.

19.03 Rocket Lab has won a US$190m contract with the United States’ Department of War for a series of 20 hypersonic test flights over four years. RNZ reports the deal is the single largest contract for the Kiwi-founded company and lifts its total order backlog to more than US$2 billion.

16.03 The Financial Markets Authority has ruled that Easy Crypto’s NZDD stablecoin, which is linked to the NZ dollar, isn’t a financial product and can be treated like cash, rather than an investment. Newsroom reports the finding means the coin can be operated without the strict disclosure standards overseen by the FMA.

13.03 A Health NZ report says the loss of digital services jobs within the organisation will increase risks to patient care and will hit rural hospitals hardest, eHealthNews reports. More than 600 roles were vacant and not being filled when the organisation announced last year that it was reducing digital and data roles from around 2000 to 1460. It is now actively recruiting for 200 vacancies and has contracted Datacom to support its help desk through to May.

11.03 Professional body CA ANZ says it will investigate the failure of an external exam delivery platform after more than 1,300 students were locked out of one exam and another 60 experienced delays of up to 40 minutes on a second exam. CA ANZ blamed a failure in an external exam platform operated by a third-party provider.

11.03 Datagrid has been granted resource consent for a planned 280MW, 78,000m2 data centre in Makarewa in Southland. The company says the landing of the Tasman Ring Network subsea cable at Oreti Beach has also been approved. Datagrid, founded by Hawaikii Cable founder Remi Galasso and Callplus founder Malcolm Dick, could be live by 2028 with the University of Otago as an anchor tenant, DatacentreDynamics reports.

11.03 US medtech giant Stryker has been hit by a major cyberattack, with an Iran-linked hacking group claiming responsibility, saying it is in retaliation for the killing of more than 170 people – mainly schoolgirls – in a strike on a school, and warning it marks the beginning of a new chapter in cyber warfare, Al Jazeera reports. The group says it has seized 50TB of Stryker data in the attack which it says has erased data from 200,000 devices.

10.03 Anthropic is opening a Sydney office as it expands its presence in Australia and New Zealand. The company says New Zealand ranks 8th globally in Claude.ai usage, relative to population, with strong demand from local business. Anthropic says it is also exploring opportunities to expand compute capacity in Australia ‘given our longstanding belief that democracies should lead in AI development’. The company is currently suing the US government over its claims that Anthropic is a ‘supply chain risk’. The row erupted after Anthropic refused to all US military to have unfettered use to its AI tools.

07.03 Bunnings will begin using facial recognition technology in two Hamilton stores from mid-April, with a nationwide rollout to follow. The remainder of the North Island will be covered in phase two, with the South Island rollout coming in phase three, with timings yet to be confirmed, Bunnings says. The company says the system will help protect staff and customers from increasing threatening incidents.

05.03 The GCSB has warned government that cyber security around some of New Zealand’s critical infrastructure is ‘barely meeting that foundational level we would expect’. RNZ reports that GCSB director-general Andrew Clark told a select committee that supply chains, including digital ones from private companies into public agencies, were increasingly a weak point and they had to make sure private ones are hardened up like public ones.

04.03 Recruitment company Younity is reporting an 80 percent jump in open IT roles year-on-year in January, continuing a trend seen in December. It says demand is being driven largely by business transformation roles such as business analysis, project management and delivery focused positions, however, demand is healthy across critical IT disciplines including software development, data engineering and analytics, cloud computing and cybersecurity.

02.03 Andrew Bridgman has been appointed establishment chief executive of the New Zealand Institute for Advanced Technology. MBIE says he will oversee the critical foundation phase, putting in place governance, operational capability and systems required to deliver on NZIAT’s mission of ensuring advanced tech delivers meaningful, measurable benefits for New Zealanders.

02.03 Syos Aerospace has won a contract to supply drones to the New Zealand Defence force. Air, land and sea drones will be delivered as part of the deal, Syos says.

01.03 Kiwi managed services company Securecom has been acquired by the New Zeaand subsidiary of Japan’s Sharp. Shap says there will be no structural or operational changes, for the Auckland-headquartered operations and 24/7  integrated operations centre, which will continue under the leadership of Greg Mikkelsen. The deal provides Sharp with an IT services business as it moves from being a traditional print and copier business to ‘a more unified tech partner’, Sharp says.

AppWrap February 2026

27.02 The government has released New Zealand’s Cyber Security Strategy 2026-2030 and an accompanying action plan, providing a national framework for responding to cyber threats and strengthening cyber security practices. The strategy is focused around four objectives of understand, prevent and prepare, respond and partner, while the action plan translates the objectives into specific initiatives including strengthening critical infrastructure cyber resilience and quantum readiness.

26.02 Tauranga robotics company Syos Aerospace’s uncrewed autonomous helicopter has completed a series of fully autonomous mission trials clearing the uncrewed aerial vehicle for serial production, the company says.

26.02 Nvidia has posted blockbuster quarterly results of US$68.1 billion – up 73 percent year on year and well above analysts’ forecasts. Revenue from the data centre division, which sells the chips used to train and run AI models was up 75 percent yoy to $62.3 billion, the company says.

25.02 MediMap is seeking an urgent injunction to stop any sharing of stolen data after sensitive patient data was distributed to media outlets. The injunction being sought would prohibit anyone from accessing, using, copying, sharing or publishing any MediMap data that may have been unlawfully obtained and would seek to limit further spread of the information online, Stuff reports.

24.02 Pharmacists have implemented manual systems after medication management platform MediMap was hacked on Sunday. Records for some patients have been altered, including labelling some live patients as deceased, and changing names. Patient data for over 120,000 users was put at risk by the hack, the NZ Herald reports.

23.02 New Zealand’s Privacy Commissioner has joined other countries in signing a joint statement voicing concerns about use of AI-generated imagery, and reiterating expectations for organisations developing and using AI content generation to ensure systems are developed and used in accordance with legal frameworks, including data protection and privacy rules.

20.02 Fintech Dosh’s bid to become a bank has been turned down by the Reserve Bank, which says it does not meet the legal definition of a bank. Dosh told a Parliamentary banking inquiry follow-up that the Reserve Bank says it must make loans as well as offering other banking services to be deemed a bank – something Dosh says is a restrictive and narrow interpretation of the legislation, GoodReturns reports.

18.02 Xero is restructuring with 250 jobs on the line – including in New Zealand. The company is creating around 280 roles in Canada as part of the restructure, BusinessDesk reports [paywalled].

18.02 YouTube suffered an outage from around 1.50pm NZT, with a spokesperson for Google saying an issue with the recommendations system prevented videos appearing.

18.02 Spark has reported an 83 percent rise in net profit after tax, to $64m, for the first half of FY26. Revenue was down 1.2 percent to $1.8 billion in the interim results for the six months to December. It says use of agentic AI is reducing set up time by around 60 percent on some business products with AI now identifying customers with more complex needs so they can be escalated to the care team for faster resolution.

17.02 Mastercard has completed its first Agent Pay – agentic – transactions in New Zealand, with Mastercard’s country manager using a bot to purchase cinema tickets, then booking Queenstown accommodation. Stuff reports Mastercard plans to launch the offering fully in New Zealand within six to nine months. It has currently launched in the US and is in pilot in Australia, the UAE and Latin America.

16.02 Labour says it supports the principle of long-term investment in digital health, but wants more detail before committing to supporting the Government’s 10-year Health Digital Investment Plan. Labour health spokesperson Ayesha Verrall says she wants more detail about how the plan will invest in cybersecurity, eHealthNews reports.

16.02 An American computer scientist is heading to New Zealand’s Court of Appeal next week to test whether AI really can be an inventor. In the global test case, Stephen Thaler is challenging the Patent Office’s declining of an application for a patent for a new type of food container he says was named by an AI system, RNZ reports. The Patent Office and High Court say an inventor has to be human.

16.02 The Department of Corrections has warned staff about use of AI tools outside approved use, after some staff were found using it to draft formal reports. RNZ reports Corrections’ policy for Microsoft Copilot – the only AI used by the agency – is that Chat must not be used under any circumstances for reports or assessments containing personal information, but in a ‘small number of incidents’ inappropriate use has occurred.

13.02 Kiwi Chris Liddell has been appointed to the Anthropic board of directors. CNBC reports the appointment, which comes as Anthropic announces it closed a US$30 billion funding round at a US$380 billion post-money valuation, could help the company foster some goodwill with the Trump administration which has accused Anthropic of supporting ‘woke AI’. Liddell was deputy White House chief of staff during Trump’s first term.

11.02 Christchurch start-up Contented AI, which turns meeting notes into documents, has raised $4.1m in a seed funding round. The company says it will use the funding to scale into Australia and the UK, triple its team, invest in core technology and build out new integrations and templates. The funding round was led by Altered Capital, with backing from K1W1, Icehouse Ventures, Aspire NZ Seed Fund and others.

11.02 Wellington medtech Wellumio has raised $7.28 million in a pre-Series A funding round. The company is developing a portal AI-enhanced brain scan technology designed to rapidly detect acute stroke and unlock treatment within the ‘golden hour’, Voice of Healthcare reports. The funding will be used to build the team and accelerate clinical development.

09.02 New Zealand is adopting 57 digital technology international standards as part of a trans-Tasman standards agreement. The agreement aims to align standards and adopt trusted international rules across areas including AI, data management and cybersecurity. Commerce and Consumer Affairs Minister Scott Simpson says the agreement will also strengthen digital trade, and reduce fees and red tape. The national standards bodies on both sides of the Tasman will also support 33 additional joint A/NZ standards projects to progress in fields including telecommunications, while 24 standards across areas including building and construction and consumer protection will be ‘re-aligned’.

09.02 Computer simulations, based on climate models, are being used to predict future ocean temperatures and currents – and future marine heatwaves and ocean-driven weather patterns – in an $8.9m project examining how offshore ocean changes are driving extreme weather in New Zealand and impacting coastal waters. The five-year project will see self-driven ocean gliders mapping the ‘heatscape’ along New Zealand’s coastline University of Auckland says.

09.02 Early-stage investment in start-up businesses attracted 8.6 percent more capital, with nearly twice as many new businesses receiving investment in last year, according to Angel Association. RNZ reports deal activity rebounded with a 34 percent increase in the number of deals completed, to 167, but the capital increase was a more conservative 2.7 percent, to $13.9m.

04.02 The Warehouse Group is cutting 270 head office roles and upping its ‘co-sourcing’ with Tata Consultancy Services as part of a push for a ‘leaner operating structure’. TCS will support delivery of corporate and admin functions, including parts of technology, accounting, call centres and payroll, TWG says. Last year the company announced it was using TCS to simplify its tech stack and lower costs, saying the partnership would reduce licensing and managed services costs by up to $40m over five years and free tech teams to focus on delivering more value for customers, communities and shareholders.

03.02 Kiwi software quality consultancy Assurity Consulting has been acquired by global technology services firm Aspire Systems. Assurity says the deal will provide global scale and deep technical capability, unlocking a pipeline of AI tools for New Zealand and Australian clients.

03.02 A new ‘digital medical assistant’, aka chatbot, to provide pre-and post-surgical advice is being rolled out to some New Zealand and US clinics. The AI agent, developed by Fios Health and operating via SMS, is customised to each surgeon’s protocols and proactively sends information and answers patient questions. Early trials showed some patients felt more comfortable directing certain questions to an AI assistant rather than their surgeon, Fios says.

03.02 Xero says more than two million subscribers are using its full AI features, with more than 300,000 using its newer GenAI features. In a market update today the company claimed customers are saving around 22 hours a month using bank feeds and automated actions, with more than 12 percent using AI Insights.

03.02 Kiwi AI startup Teacher’s Buddy has raised $2.3m in trans-Tasman seed funding. The offering aims to reduce teacher workloads, helping with marking and student report writing and producing customised, differentiated curriculum-aligned teaching and assessment materials  The company says the funding was led by Auckland’s Soul Capital and Australia’s Giant Leap.

03.02 2degrees has completed the shutdown of its 3G services with finals shutdown completed last night. The telco says the shutdown enables it to focus on strengthening and expanding its 4G and 5G networks which already carry the vast majority of mobile traffic, while also looking to satellite.

AppWrap January 2026

31.01 Spectral Defence has been crowned the national winner of the ActInSpace New Zealand 2026 hackathon and will represent New Zealand at the international ActInSpace finals in France in April. The event sees teams tackle space-related challenges, applying satellite data, earth observation and space-enabled technologies to problems spanning sustainability, infrastructure, resilience and ‘everyday life applications’, SpaceBase, who delivered the NZ event, says.

30.01 The NZ government has launched its Public Service AI Work Program designed to accelerate the safe and responsible adoption of AI across government agencies. The two-year ‘action plan’ is designed to connect agencies’ efforts with the resources, guidance and support needed to accelerate AI adoption, while modelling best practice, Digital.govt.nz says. The program includes an AI marketplace, an AI hub with registries and tools, a dedicated AI Innovation and Accelerator Lab and a public service AI Sandbox.

30.01 Thirty-eight percent of Kiwis received unwanted digital communication in the last 12 months, with 14 percent reporting the experience negatively impacted their life, Netsafe reports. Ten percent admitted having sent or shared at least one form of unwanted communication themselves in the past year.

29.01 A system error with the Ministry of Social Development’s IT system resulted in around 200 pensioners who get overseas pensions receiving incorrect NZ Super payments. RNZ reports the ministry is working ‘urgently’ to fix the fault in the IT system which updates overseas pension rates.

29.01 Hospital administration systems across the top half of the North Island shut down for 12 hours in a major IT failure affecting clinical and operational systems. All emergency department, laboratory and inpatient systems were affected with clinicians resorting to paper-based systems, whiteboards and phones, Stuff reports.

27.01 Nema is warning people about AI images circulating on TikTok claiming to capture the fallout of the Mt Maunganui slip. The scenes depict exaggerated scenes of destruction including a raging waterfall and emergency workers digging through wreckage. A Victoria University senior lecturer says he believes it is the first time AI images of a New Zealand disaster have circulated online, RNZ reports.

26.01 Client data has been breached in a cyberattack on Napier law firm Langley Twigg Law. The company says security monitoring software alerted to unauthorised activity on the network on 11 January, after the network was targeted by ‘a sophisticated malicious attack using a new strain of virus’ not recognised by antivirus programs at the time. Client data has been copied from the file server, the company says.

27.01 Airwallex boss Jack Zhang says the fintech is at least two years away from a public listing, despite regular references to an IPO in 2026. Zhang’s comments, reported in StartupDaily, follow news last week that Austrac has ordered an audit of the company over AML/CTF concerns.

26.01 A digital twin simulating New Zealand’s entire population, has been used to study resilience to measles. eHealthnews reports the digital twin creates ‘virtual kiwis’ built from aggregated census and government data, enabling researchers to model public health scenarios to inform public policy decision and emergency planning, without tracking real people.

23.01 Manage My Health has warned that secondary actors may be impersonating the company and sending spam or phishing emails in the wake of the high profile hack of the online patient portal. The company says it has been granted an interim injunction from the High Court to prevent access, dissemination or publication of the impacted data by any third parties and says it is monitoring data leak websites and ready to issue takedown notices.

23.01 TikTok has finalised agreements with backers including Oracle, Silver Lake and Emirati company MGX to establish a US joint venture. Each of the three backers will hold a 15 percent stake in the company. ByteDance keeps a 19.9 percent share. The BBC reports the content recommendation algorithm has been licensed to Oracle – headed by Trump ally Larry Ellison – which already oversees US user data under a previous arrangement set up over security concerns. The deal will enable TikTok to continue operating in the US, but is likely to continue to be scrutinised, with some Democrats voicing concerns about the ties between Trump and TikTok’s new investor group could limit what gets shared on the platform.

22.01 Australia’s financial intelligence unit, Austrac has ordered an external auditor be appointed to assess whether fintech – and unicorn – Airwallex is complying with anti-money laundering and counter terrorism financing. Austrac says it has ‘concerns’ about potential non-compliance including that Airwallex’s transaction monitoring program has not been ‘attuned to the full range of risks it faces’ and the company hasn’t demonstrated an acceptable understanding of who its customers are and what reporting may be required. The auditor must report findings within 180 days of appointment.

22.01 Hamilton’s Cloudland has acquired professional services tech provider CommArc for an undisclosed sum, in its fourth acquisition in as many years.

20.01 Kiwi legal tech startup Ivo has raised US$55m in a Series B funding round led by existing investor Blackbird. The company’s platform helps in-house legal teams review contracts. Ivo says customers include Uber, Shopify, Canva, Atlassian, Reddit and Pinterest, and the capital will support product development and scaling the company.

15.01 Kiwi email signature provider Crossware has bought Germany’s largest email signature provider, CI Solutions, in a multimillion-dollar deal. Crossware says the deal significantly scales its presence in the European union and establishes it as one of the leading email signature providers globally, processing more than five million emails every day.

13.01 Advertising is hitting the AI chatbots with ads starting to show up in Google’s ‘AI Mode’ in what the Washington Post says is likely to be just the beginning of more trial-and-error attempts this year. Google has been pushing a new type of ad in AI Mode to advertisers, OpenAI has also been looking at introducing advertising in ChatGPT and Perplexity attempted ads but pulled back last year – but has left the doors open to try again.

11.01 Around 70 percent of those impacted by the ManageMyHealth breach are based in Northland. Ransomware group Kazu has demanded US$60,000 after stealing hundreds of thousands of medical files. RNZ reports around 120,000 patients have had data stolen, with 80,000 of those based in Northland.

01.01 ManageMyHealth has been hacked, with ‘six to seven per cent’ of its approximately 1.8 million registered users potentially affected. The company says it has begun to identify users affected and will start notifying them within the next 48 hours.

The post Appwrap 2026: myIR access, Datacom data centre expansion, Palantir denials and Artemis Outlook issues appeared first on iStart leading the way to smarter technology investment..

Australian ASX-listed real estate assets manager Dexus, which was the project developer says it adopted an ‘end-to-end’ digital strategy for the project, including creating a full digital twin pre-construction to enable real-time decision-making, stakeholder engagement and seamless transition into facilities management, with the model now being used to manage the buildings operations.

“The scale of the model and the accuracy behind it are unlike anything we have worked with in New Zealand.”

The twin eliminated design clashes before construction began and held contingency to just five percent – half the industry norm of up to 10 percent.

The digital twin is now operating as a live facilities management system for the building, which opened last week, and Dexus says the technology has helped cut the building’s operational carbon by 80 percent.

Te Rua’s results demonstrate the impact of embedding a fully coordinated digital environment before ground is broken. Dexus says if digital twin technology is introduced from the design stage of large scale projects to identify and address flaws across the infrastructure pipeline to the levels achieved on Te Rua, New Zealand could potentially avoid millions of dollars in construction cost overruns.

The archive, which is one of the most technically demanding buildings constructed in New Zealand, required millimetre-level accuracy to meet strict environmental and seismic performance standards. Designed to remain operational after a one in 1,800-year earthquake, it must maintain temperature and humidity within one degree tolerance for at least 48 hours in a power failure to protect government records and taonga held under UNESCO Memory of the World obligations.

The digital twin created a 3D virtual environment that allowed architects, engineers and contractors to detect and resolve design conflicts before they appeared on site – a common source of costly delays and rework in complex builds. The archive’s model was ‘clash-free’ at tender stage, an accuracy level Dexus says was not previously seen in complex civic construction in New Zealand.

Contractors used on-site stations connected to the live design so they could install services with millimetre accuracy, and augmented reality was deployed for quality assurance during installation, allowing the design team to validate work in real time.

Once the building was operational, Te Rua’s digital twin transitioned into a live facilities management platform. It now monitors more than 20,000 assets, tracking temperature, humidity, energy use and structural movement in real time. The system has already contributed to an 80 percent reduction in operational carbon emissions – equivalent to around 1,330 tones – by optimising environmental systems and enabling proactive fault detection.

Risk-mitigation engines

Phill Stanley, Dexus portfolio manager, says the results have direct implications for hospitals, data centres, water infrastructure and high-density civic buildings that require strict environmental stability and uninterrupted operations.

He believes with the integration of AI, the methodology could be adapted for use in New Zealand’s planned multibillion dollar healthcare infrastructure programme to produce clinically safer environments for patients.

With major projects gearing up in New Zealand’s hospital sector, including a new Dunedin Hospital, the redevelopment of Nelson Hospital, the expansion of Wellington’s Emergency Department and major upgrades to Auckland’s hospital network, Stanley believes digital twins could be a winning formula – effectively a hospital risk-mitigation engine.

“These facilities rely on uninterrupted power, complex mechanical systems and precise climate control and even minor faults can create clinical risk,” he says. “Digital twins could help control costs, reduce construction delays and ensure clinical spaces meet strict operational and environmental requirements from the day they open.”

He says while New Zealand has previously been slower to adopt digital design, the gap now represents a chance to reset industry practice and prevent the design clashes that traditionally surface only once construction is underway.

“You cannot retrofit this level of coordination. You have to make the decision right at the start or you lose the opportunity. Once you commit early, everything else becomes more predictable.”

While no two infrastructure projects are identical, Stanley says achieving the financial results seen on a project of Te Rua’s complexity demonstrates substantial, repeatable savings potential across the broader infrastructure pipeline.

“This… shows what is possible when everything is coordinated from day one. The scale of the model and the accuracy behind it are unlike anything we have worked with in New Zealand. For us, it gave a level of design certainty you just do not get on projects of this complexity.”

Australian adoption

The benefits aren’t confined to Wellington. Australian projects—facing their own pressures from rising costs, labour shortages and a packed infrastructure pipeline—are turning to digital twins for similar reasons. According to Deloitte and Autodesk’s State of Digital Adoption in the Construction Industry 2025 report, digital tools are becoming a central too in how Australian firms manage complexity, reduce delays and improve visibility across major builds. The report highlights that digital twins are now among the key technologies transforming delivery workflows across six Asia Pacific markets, including Australia.

On construction sites, digital twin integration has moved from pilot to practice. Builders are pairing models with photogrammetry, laser scanning and IoT data to maintain continuous, real-time alignment between the physical site and its digital counterpart. Teams then use the live models to rehearse material deliveries, test staging sequences and identify planning errors early, reducing rework risk and improving the likelihood of on-programme completion.

During construction, the models act as coordination hubs. Australian projects using live digital twins report earlier detection of discrepancies, cleaner as-built validation and faster decision cycles thanks to remote walkthroughs that allow certifiers, trades and clients to review issues together. The approach helps cut reactive repair costs by flagging anomalies – such as rising transformer temperatures or spikes in water demand – before they turn into expensive failures.

Beyond immediate project control, digital twins are underpinning longer-term asset management.

In Australia’s bridge network, the University of Melbourne’s Centre for Spatial Data Infrastructures and Land Administration (CSDILA) is developing a digital twin platform for structural health monitoring. The system integrates real-time IoT data, geometric models and physics-based simulations to track structural behaviour across critical sites, including heritage rail bridges owned by the Australian Rail Track Corporation. These models support predictive maintenance and provide detailed insights into safety and performance, offering a scalable approach for infrastructure networks nationwide.

Meanwhile, digital twin project management is gaining popularity across Australia’s expanding infrastructure portfolio. Major initiatives, from Snowy Hydro 2.0 to Western Sydney International (Nancy-Bird Walton) Airport, are turning to digital twins for real-time monitoring, lifecycle analysis and predictive forecasting. As project owners balance the pressures of complexity, cost and stakeholder expectations, digital twins offer the transparency and control needed to mitigate delays and keep delivery aligned with programme targets.

For both countries, the implications are substantial. In New Zealand, where a $275 billion infrastructure pipeline is underway, the potential savings from avoiding design clashes and optimising performance could be measured in the hundreds of millions. Te Rua may be the most prominent example to date, but its methods – early coordination, real-time validation and data-driven asset management – are directly applicable to hospitals, civic facilities, water assets and data centres.

While the technology won’t prevent every challenge, it does offer something the construction industry rarely enjoys: Predictability. By exposing issues long before they hit the site – and flagging operational risks before they trigger failures – digital twins give builders and asset owners the chance to act early instead of react late.

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The long-awaited strategy and accompanying Cyber Security Action Plan 2026-2030, released earlier this month, signal that cyber resilience must now be treated as a core governance, risk-management and strategic decision-making responsibility. It also flags that regulatory change is likely on its way.

“The Strategy clearly signals that regulatory reform is being considered.”

Alongside the Strategy and the Action Plan, the Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet also released a discussion document seeking industry feedback on a new approach to the cybersecurity of critical infrastructure.

In it together

The Strategy adopts a whole of society model, outlining shared responsibility on government, industry and individuals. Businesses sit at the centre, with the Strategy’s four national objectives – Understand, Prevent and Prepare, Respond, and Partner, defining practical expectations.

Understand is around improving cyber awareness and literacy across organisations and New Zealanders, providing improved reporting of cybersecurity and sharing of information between government and industry to better understand the threat environment. NCSC will establish a single cyber security reporting service, with processes established for other types of online harm and cyber-enabled crime and redirected to other agencies. Critical infrastructure providers garner special mention, with the strategy noting there will be tailored guidance, including assessments, strategies for risk management and guidance to implement technical controls to protect IT and OT networks, for them (more on that later).

Prevent and Prepare is about strengthening cyber risk management, resilience and preparedness across government and industry. That includes strengthening the existing mandate for the Government Chief Digital Officer to entrench a culture of security from procurement to systems operations, with the Government Chief Information Security Officer establishing and enforcing minimum cybersecurity standards and working with digital supply chain vendors to apply more consistent security controls across agencies. Industry and public consultation on core elements of the regulatory framework is also proposed, including additional non-regulatory actions the government can take to better partner and support critical infrastructure owners and operators to manage cyber risk.

The Respond section says resilience and preparedness must be strengthened across government and industry, ensuring effective, coordinated responses to cyber incidents. Victims of cybersecurity incidents will be ‘supported to remediate and recover’. Legislative frameworks will be modernised to account for the complexity and global nature of cyber threats, with work to address jurisdictional barriers to Kiwi enforcement agencies can access cyber evidence to investigate cybercrime.

Partner highlights the need for ‘strategic and targeted cooperation’, both locally and internationally, with industry and international partners.

The Action Plan, meanwhile, provides the actions required over the next two years to put the Strategy into action, detailing lead agencies for each action.

Notably, the Critical Infrastructure discussion document highlights that if accepted, critical infrastructure entities would be required to develop, implement and maintain a risk management programme aligned with an internationally recognised cybersecurity framework – either endorsed by the NCSC or recognised internationally, such as the US National Institute of Standards and Technology Cybersecurity Framework.

The discussion document also outlines requirements to allow government to collect specific information, such as (initially) a description of their operations including critical components, information on the owners and controllers of the entity, and mapping of key dependencies and interdependencies.

The establishment of a voluntary information exchanges connecting organisations across the critical infrastructure system with each other and the government to coordinate cyber security efforts, a requirement for sharing of certain information with other critical infrastructure organisations – for example information on projected restoration times – and a requirement for cyber incidents to be reported are also proposed.

Regulatory change

The Strategy clearly signals that regulatory reform is being considered across several areas including strengthened requirements for the cybersecurity of critical infrastructure, which encompasses everything from the electricity grid to telco networks, health and transport services and financial systems.

The Strategy document notes that around 120 countries have some form of critical infrastructure regulation. “As a first step, the government will consult industry and the public on the core elements of a regulatory framework, including additional non-regulatory actions the government can take to better partner and support critical infrastructure owners and operators to manage cyber risk.”

The critical infrastructure discussion document highlights that cyber risks are ‘not well understood or collectively managed to a consistent level’ across the system, and that effective protection requires understanding ‘critical components, ownership and control structures, and mapping of dependencies’.

The document suggests the reach of proposed obligations could extend beyond the core operator to include third-party service providers with operational control of critical components.

Another potential area for regulatory change is the potential introduction of a civil pecuniary penalty regime to the Privacy Act aimed at incentivising protection of personal information. The Ministry of Justice will provide advice on options to incentivise protection as part of the two-year action plan.

Thomas Anderson, MinterEllison solicitor says if implemented it would mark ‘a notable shift in New Zealand’s privacy landscape’ which currently has no civil penalties for breaches of the Privacy Act.

“At present, the Act relies on a complaints-based enforcement model administered by the Privacy Commissioner, which can result in recommendations or, in serious cases, referral to the Human Rights Review Tribunal. However, there is no power to impose civil fines for contraventions of the Act (such as a failure to comply with the data security requirements in information privacy principle 5), unlike comparable regimes in Australia, the European Union and the United Kingdom,” he says.

Also on the table is the creation of a potential new offence for handling – including disseminating – illegally obtained personal information. That’s an area the Ministry of Justice has been charged with providing potential advice on the new offence.

The proposal would extend liability beyond the breached organisation to anyone knowingly handling unlawfully obtained personal information. While the intention is to deter malicious actors from circulating stolen data, Anderson notes the wording also captures organisations or third-party recipients who are aware that the information they are accessing or using was acquired through unauthorised means.

“Together, these two actions seem to signal a clear intent: The Government plans to use both stronger Privacy Act enforcement tools and new criminal offences to create meaningful financial and legal consequences for the mishandling or exploitation of personal information after a cyber incident.”

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This year’s awards received a record 300 entries, with a line-up that ranges from deep-tech ventures rewiring entire industries to nimble start-ups punching above their weight, from sustainability trailblazers to software innovators, creative technologists, manufacturers and standout individuals.

Nearly 70 companies are vying for glory across 14 categories. So who are they and what exactly do they do? Read on for the full lineup…

PwC Hi-Tech Company of the Year finalists:

Aroa Biosurgery develops advanced regenerative healing technologies designed to support complex wound and soft-tissue repair. The Auckland-headquartered and ASX-listed company, formerly called Mesynthes, was started in 2008 by a former vet, around a low-value byproduct from the meat industry, and is experiencing strong growth.

Auror provides an intelligence platform to help retailers and police reduce crime through real-time insights and connected data. The company has scaled rapidly, becoming a leading player in crime prevention technology for retail. The company has expanded into Australia, North America, the UK and Europe.

Dawn Aerospace is building a space transportation network using non-toxic refuellable satellite propulsion and rapidly reusable spaceplanes. Dawn’s propulsion systems are already operating on 42 satellites and the company’s next step is Loop, an on-orbit refuelling network. The company has 130 staff across New Zealand, the US, the Netherlands and France.

Gallagher Group is a long-established global security and animal management tech company known for innovative, high-reliability systems. Operating in 140 countries, the 85-year-old business reinvests 15 percent of all revenue in research, design and product innovation.

Halter delivers remote-control, GPS-enabled smart collars for cattle, enabling farmers to virtually fence, guide and monitor livestock – and paddock health. It has just completed a US$200m raise, which sees the company valued at US$2 billion – and you can read about that here.

Tait Communications specialises in critical open standard communications systems for industries such as emergency services, utilities and transportation. In business for more than 50 years, Tait provides rugged, high-reliability mobile radio solutions and is increasingly linking that with a range of broadband and video technologies and services. It’s also the sponsor for the Hi-Tech Award’s Flying Kiwi award, recognising an individual who has played a leading role in the success of the sector, with founder Sir Angus Tait the first recipient back in 2003.

ASX Hi-Tech Emerging Company of the Year finalists:

BioOra develops cell-based and regenerative medicine technologies, automating the manufacture of CAR T cells for personalised immunotherapy, and ‘building the future of cancer treatment’. The company has an internationally recognised GMP license to manufacture CAR T cell therapies and is preparing to bring its products to market.

Calocurb produces a natural appetite-management supplement derived from New Zealand hops, targeting healthy lifestyle and wellness markets. The company has New Zealand and US operations and has reported 300 percent growth last year.

Hectre builds orchard-intelligence software and computer vision tools that help fruit growers improve yield, quality and labour efficiency. The company and recently completed a $12m Series A raise and their Spectre AI platform is gaining strong global traction.

Starboard Maritime Intelligence provides an AI-powered maritime intelligence platform that detects, analyses and monitors vessel activity for environmental protection and security. Their technology, which uses satellite, sensor and contextual data to provide real-time visibility of activity at sea, is used by governments and critical infrastructure operators to combat illegal fishing and safeguard oceans.

Starshipit offers an automated shipping and fulfilment platform for ecommerce businesses, integrating with major couriers and storefronts. Its tools help retailers streamline operations, reduce delivery friction and scale their online logistics.

2040 Ventures Hi-Tech Startup Company of the Year finalists:

Goodair Nosebuds is an Auckland startup which has developed a breath-powered nasal device designed to clear congestion naturally. It has raised more than $1.6 million and its first launch in 2025 sold out in less than a day.

Kara Technologies builds digital signing avatars to improve accessibility for deaf communities, using motion capture and AI to deliver sign language content at scale. Their Kat AI engine, currently in public preview, rapidly converts English text into high-quality sign language animations, aiming to make critical information more inclusive across media, education and public sectors.

Sea-flux provides mobile-friendly cloud-based integrated fleet management software for commercial vessels. The maritime compliance software provides real-time vessel monitoring, crew management, preventative maintenance and data driven decision making. The company secured nearly $3 million in seed funding and has more than 1,300 vessels and nearly 9,000 users.

Datacom Hi-Tech Inspiring Individual finalists:

Ankita Dhakar is the founder and CEO of Hamilton’s Capture the Bug a cybersecurity focused company helping organisations strengthen their digital resilience with penetration testing-as a-service.

Dan Walker is senior partner development manager, global partner solutions at Microsoft.

Irina Miller is co-founder and CEO of Daisy Lab a biotech startup developing dairy-identical proteins through precision fermentation.

Tim Young is founder and CEO of Smart Access, a company which has collected data based on 40 accessibility features in the built environment. The information is then provided to councils to see what changes they need to make, providing a form of asset management for decision making and spend.

Trent Fulcher is CEO of Starboard Maritime Intelligence – finalist in the Company of the Year category.

Poutama Trust/GreenMount Capital Hi-Tech Kamupene Māori o te Tau – Māori Company of the Year finalists:

Alps2Ocean Food is creating sustainable, high-protein beef snacks, notably the Mīti beef bar, made from young dairy beef. The company won a 2025 Early-Stage Innovation Award at Fieldays for Mīti.

Bio Innovations

Hectre – a second outing in these awards, with the company also a finalist in the Emerging Company of the Year finalists above.

PAM is an AI-driven personal assistant app to help families stay on top of tasks, calendars and everyday life.

Duncan Cotterill Most Innovative Hi-Tech Software Solution

CloudHound is an advanced infrastructure discovery platform providing deep insights and best-in-class recommendations to accurately plan and maximise AWS cloud success.

PAM – another showing for the AI-driven family personal assistant, which is also a finalist in the Māori Company of the Year category.

Partly is building ‘the first foundational AI model for the auto parts industry’ with AI native applications ranging from Parts Procurement which analyses business rules, availability, pricing and more to automatically build the most efficient parts basket, to order management and estimation.

RossOps helps manufacturers unlock the knowledge living in the heads of their most experienced people and make it available to others on the team so each shift can perform their best. It’s solutions include AI-powered shift handovers and engineering trouble shooting and knowledge management and CI project tracking.

UneeQ Digital Humans develops AI-driven ‘digital humans’ for sectors including tourism, financial services, healthcare, education, and aviation. It’s newly launched Immersive Training Platform provides ‘next generation learning’ enabling organisations to create lifelike, emotionally intelligent training simulations at scale across learning domains including sales, customer service and leadership. The company has strong momentum in the Middle East with customers include Qatar Airways, the Saudi Tourism Authority and Ajman Bank and is now looking at North American expansion.

VXT connects law firms calls to their legal software, logging time, transcribing conversations and filing notes, removing admin work.

Kiwibank Most Innovative Hi-Tech Solution for a More Sustainable Future

AoFrio provides intelligent hardware and a SaaS platform for beverage and food customers. It’s cloud-based platform connects millions of refrigeration assets, providing realtime data and actionable insights on cooler location, operation, sales and sustainability. The company, which counts Coca-Cola, Pepsi and Heineken among its customers, logged revenue of $83.2 million for the financial year ending 31 December 2025.

Captivate Technology is a Massey Ventures spin-out, and has developed a recyclable sponge-like adsorbent material to selectively capture carbon dioxide from industrial emissions. The patented material can be deployed across sectors including cement, steel, natural gas, biomass combustion and biogas. It recently completed a $3 million seed round.

Helical is a SaaS based genetics operating system for genomic data management, registry operations and genetic evaluation. The company, founded in 2021, now operates in more than 40 countries powering breeding systems across beef, dairy, sheep and others.

NZAutoTraps provides automatic, self-resetting possum and rat traps, manufactured in Whakatane. More than 20,000 traps are in use and the company is looking into further automation and data collection – as well as a project to exclude the tenacious kea.

Partly – another showing for the auto parts industry player, which is a finalist in the Most Innovative Hi-Tech Software Solution category, above.

TCS is a Waikato-based micro-processor engineering company whose Milkcollect system was created in 2014 and is now installed in more than 550 milk tankers collecting 84 million litres of milk a day. Its tanker fluid management includes pumping algorithms to maximise collection speed, RFID vial tags to electronically track the load, composite and quality samples to ensure full traceability and cellular data collection to factory scheduling systems.

Braemac Most Innovative Hi-Tech Manufacture finalists:

Alimetry has developed a non-invasive gastric diagnostic tool for diagnosing and managing gastrointestinal disorders. Their products combine wearable sensors with cloud-based analytics to deliver non-invasive insights into gut function. The company recently secured FDA clearance for an AI-powered update to the wearable device.

Architectural Glass Products is a Cambridge double-glazing manufacturing business. The insulated glass units are p;roduced with minimal human contact using precise automated equipment.

Aroa Biosecurity – the company is also a finalist in the Hi-Tech Company of the Year category, above.

Astute Access provides smartphone-centric keyless locking technology for utilities and critical infrastructure complete with a cloud-based audit trail and over the air access enabling remote administrators to instantly grant and revoke user access.

Cleanery develops eco-friendly, low-waste cleaning, dish wash and hand soap products using patented formulations that enable naturally occurring plant and mineral materials to easily mix with water. The concentrated mixes are sold in sachets with customers adding the water, reducing plastic waste and transport emissions.

Fisher & Paykel Technologies designs and manufactures advanced direct drive motors, motor control systems and electronics. Their technology powers home appliances from global brands and are used in a variety of industries to help businesses customise solutions for their customers. They’ve also stepped into health and fitness with drive systems, sensors, digital twin technology, flow builder software and a user interface to help companies design customised solutions for end users.

Consult Recruitment Best Contribution to the NZ Tech Sector finalists:

GridAKL is an Auckland innovation precinct, designed to support tech startups and scale-ups through shared workspaces, community programmes and ecosystem-building initiatives. It’s role focuses on accelerating collaboration, capability and growth within the wider NZ tech sector.

Ministry of Awesome is a Christchurch-headquartered, nationwide entrepreneurship hub providing founders with programmes, mentoring and pathways to investment. They play a central role in nurturing early-stage ventures and strengthening Aotearoa’s startup pipeline.

Mission Ready delivers training and upskilling programmes that help people transition into tech careers more quickly. Their industry aligned courses support workforce development and contribute to filling critical skills gaps in the NZ tech ecosystem.

Oxygen Advisors provides specialist guidance to startups, acting as an ‘outsourced CFO and hands-on finance team’. It has raised $650m in capital and secured $240m in grant funding, backing more than 330 founders over 10 years.

NZTE Most Innovative Hi-Tech Agritech Solution finalists:

BDX is a Whangarei-based company, originally providing engineering services specialising in industrial, mechanical and structural projects. It has since expanded into fabrication and maintenance services and civil contracting and mechanical services.

Bovonic develops agritech designed to support animal health monitoring and disease detection. Its QuadSense automatic mastitis detector has been installed on more than 160 farms across New Zealand and Ireland, saving farmers on average 3.7 hours a week, increasing milk quality and leading to reduced antibiotic use.

Hectre makes its third showing in these awards with the orchard intelligence provider also a finalist for Emerging Company of the Year and Māori Company of the Year.

TCS adds to another category to its lineup, alongside Most Innovative Hi-Tech Solution for a More Sustainable Future, above.

Trackit provides fleet tracking and management, including agricultural fleet management that handles seasonal scaling, off-road operations, mixed vehicle types and the unique complexity of farm logistics. It’s used in more than 150 kiwi farming operations, including with LIC’s 390 vehicle agricultural fleet and claims an average 40 percent increase in off-road RUC refund recovery.

Xero Hi-Tech Young Achiever finalists:

Jean-Luc Ellis is co-founder and CEO at WasteX which is developing AI-powered software to revolutionise waste, material, logistics and embodied carbon tracking to reduce waste, optimise costs and drive decarbonisation.

Lucy Turner is the CTO and co-founder of communication automation company VXT, a finalist in the Most Innovative Hi-Tech Software Solution category.

Nathan Konigkramer is an AIX engineer at Spectrum Consulting.

Sam Broadhead is co-founder of Sence which tries to make sense of unseen conversations to improve engagement strategy.

Fujitsu Most Innovative Deep Tech Solution finalists:

Masco Technologies provides sensory AI integration for hardware companies, offering solutions from data collection and engineering to model development and deployment. Alongside using AI to enable solutions to detect air quality issues and identify contaminants, the company has a focus on animal health and smarter, data-driven livestock care.

Starboard Maritime Intelligence – another appearance for the AI-powered maritime intelligence platform which is also an Emerging Company of the Year finalist, above.

ZealaFoam is creating plant-based technologies to enable businesses and consumers to make smarter, greener choices. Its ZealaFoam is 100 percent bio-based and designed to meet the need for sustainable alternatives to traditional materials.

NZX Most Innovative Hi-Tech Creative Technology Solution finalists:

Access Quest by Smart Access is mapping the world in an effort to make it more accessible. Users book a free access ‘cart’ then walk their usual routes and the cart tracks accessibility features and obstacles using the mobile phone. Data is then uploaded and information is provided to councils to encourage more inclusive access for all. Smart Access founder and CEO Tim Young is also a finalist in the Hi-Tech Inspiring Individual category.

Kara Technologies – the digital signing avatar company is a finalist in the Startup Company of the Year, as above.

Kitten Space Agency by Rocket Werkz is a mission to create a spaceflight game that inspires the next generation of space explorers – and yes, there are kittens. Currently in ‘pre-alpha’, players can sign up and test and share ideas on it. And did we mention that there are kittens?

Staples VR creates AR/VR training through SaaS solutions and bespoke software development across aviation, defence, health and safety, medical, first responders and entertainment. The immersive tech company closed a $5.25m funding round last year.

UneeQ Digital Humans – the AI-driven ‘digital humans’ company is also a Most Innovative Hi-Tech Software Solution finalist.

Christchurch Airport Hi-Tech Solution for the Public Good finalists:

Access Quest by Smart Access – a second outing for the project aiming to make the world more accessible using people power. It’s also a finalist in the Most Innovative Hi-Tech Creative Technology Solution category, above.

Canterbury Seismic provides advanced earthquake monitoring solutions including Sentinel Seismic Monitoring, using on-site sensors and cloud-based analytics to provide reliable insight into how a building is performing during and after an earthquake.

Evolocity is an EV programme aiming to inspire school age students into sustainable engineering. The year 7 to 13 students design, build and compete with their electric vehicles, with workshops provided to guide them in welding, CAD design and Arduino programming.

0800 Trust (Hark) is dubbed the world’s first acoustic wildlife monitor with true edge AI. Hark runs google’s Perch v2 bioacoustic model, directly on device, on solar power, to detect and classify more than 100 species in real time painting a picture of New Zealand’s forest – and the impact of predators.

oVRcome is a platform combining VR exposure therapy, using home technology, and generative AI to improve mental wellbeing. Its goal is to make treatment for anxiety disorders easy and accessible to everyone.

Wildlife.ai is a charitable organisation dedicated to accelerating wildlife conservation through AI, developing user-friendly, non-invasive and open-source technologies. Its projects so far include an AI-powered open-source smart camera trap with embedded machine learning for real time species identification and modular sensors capable of monitoring diverse taxa, and Spyfish Aotearoa, a citizen science and machine learning approach to identify fish in baited underwater videos.

Winners of the awards will be announced at a gala dinner in Auckland in May.

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That’s the issue Monash University faced and is now looking to solve.

“That will lower the hurdle for industry to use these models.”

Yunlong Tang, assistant director of the Monash Centre for Additive Manufacturing and senior lecturer in mechanical and aerospace engineering and materials science and engineering, told iStart that despite a surge in robotics adoption, most Australian and New Zealand factories continue to separate humans and robots with physical cages. That’s something he says isn’t the best option as workflows demand greater speed, flexibility and human involvement.

Tang is the co-author of a new international review on human robot collaboration, exploring how manufacturers can make human-robot collaboration safer, more adaptive and efficient by improving the way robots predict human behaviour in shared industrial environments. It also identifies major system level changes, including the absence of standardised behavioural datasets and the need for models that can interpret human movement, intent and cognitive state.

As manufacturing moves toward Industry 5.0, production systems are becoming more human-centred, combining human creativity, judgement and dexterity with robotic precision, strength and speed. But that’s creating new safety and coordination challenges – if robots can’t accurately anticipate what a worker will do next, the risk of collisions, delays and inefficient collaboration increases.

For Monash, which is building a digital twin system enabling human and robot collaboration, the issue is more than theoretical. The university faced real safety concerns around ensuring people and robots operate together without risk.

It was that concern that prompted the review, published in the International Journal of Production Research. It outlines three key approaches – mechanism-based models built around physical motion and interaction rules, data-driven models that learn from sensors and AI and hybrid combinations – for predicting human behaviour during human-robot collaboration. It concludes that integrated models, combining physical world understanding with AI-driven data insights, will be necessary for the safety, efficiency and generalisation required in modern manufacturing systems.

Tang says the real barrier to Industry 5.0 is that robots still can’t reliably anticipate what humans will do next, and industry won’t change how it deploys robots until that prediction gap – not issues around power or speed – is closed.

Traditional solutions use rule-based boundaries to keep robots and humans separated. “We separate the robot and human in different spaces, and of course the human is much safer and feels more confident working with the robot,” Tang says.

But that approach limits the efficiency because in a lot of tasks having robot and human in the same space makes things easier and more efficient.

Removing those boundaries requires robots to handle unpredictable human behaviour, and Tang says industry demands absolute reliability before attempting this shift. The report says Industry 5.0 environments introduce new safety risks if robots cannot accurately anticipate the next human action.

“The conclusion we got from this research is we didn’t see any existing method or model that can solve all the problems. Every approach has its own shortcomings.”

The review suggests future progress will depend on combining physical models, sensor data and AI in ways that allow robots to respond more intelligently to human movement, intent and changing working conditions.

Key challenges, however, include the absence of standardised multimodal datasets, the limited scope of physical world models, the variability of human behaviour and the need to more effectively consider human trust, workload and cognitive state during collaboration.”

Closing the gap between research and deployment

Tang and his team at Monash have now embarked on a multi-year project to address the issue with the ultimate aim of releasing open-source base models and frameworks for industry to use.

“Our plan is that in the first one or two years, we get enough data. Then we’ll be training the model and validating the models and seeing whether it can help humans and robots have the better collaboration,” he says.

In Monash’s Living Lab, robot 3D printers and humans are working together. “We have a lot of sensors to detect the human actions and we want to build a data set to understand, for example that a human is now picking up items from the 3D printers, and then link to the next potential behaviour that the operator will do.”

The lab captures natural human motion, decision sequences and task patterns, giving researchers the multimodal data required to train predictive models.

Open-source base models and frameworks would be made available for industry to adopt – taking the algorithms and framework, but adding their own industry specific data.

“I hope in future, if this approach has been proved valid and we can build an open database, the more data we have, the more accurate, and much smarter robots can work with humans. That will lower the hurdle for industry to use these models.”

He says collecting data will be one headache for industries, because they will need to spend one or two years – “sometimes even longer” – to get enough data to train the models.

“I hope that in the future, like our large language model nowadays, we can train some foundation model and based on the foundation model, fine tune for the different industries. Maybe that will be the next step.”

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The $3.5 billion data centre – set to be the first hyperscale facility in the South Island – has secured multiple resource consents for the 78,000m² facility in Makarewa, north of Invercargill, but while some are cheering, others have expressed concern that the project could quietly transform the region into an energy exporter to offshore companies, with little payoff at home.

“The key issue is  not just whether the project brings investment, but how the benefits of that investment are structured and distributed.”

Landing of the Tasman Ring Network – a 6,000km trans-Tasman subsea cable linking Invercargill with Sydney and Melbourne – at Oreti Beach has also been fully approved, providing the first international subsea cable connection to the South Island and a crucial link for Datagrid and global cloud and AI operators requiring stable, low-latency international data routes.

Datagrid, which is headed up by founder and CEO Rémi Galasso who was also the founder of the Hawaiki Cable (Callplus founder Malcolm Dick is Datagrid’s other co-founder), has received full resource consent from by Southland District Council, Environment Southland and Invercargill City Council, nearly six years after the project was first announced in 2020. It includes six large data halls and a dedicated grid exit point substation on 49 hectares of land.

Galasso has said the centre will deliver a ‘transformative impact’ for Southland and the country, turning Invercargill into a vital digital destination.

New Zealand already has 56 operational data centres with another 20 more planned or under construction, according to a report last year from NZ Tech (now Tech New Zealand).

Empowering Aotearoa New Zealand’s Digital Future – Our National Data Centre Infrastructure says the sector directly employs ‘over 1,000 people’ while supporting 6,800 additional roles. “The workforce is forecast to double by 2030 with up to 15,000 construction jobs expected as new centres are built.”

The report paints a glowing picture of data centres for New Zealand, saying the sector underpins $93 billion in economic activity, with  $16.5 billion in ICT GDP and $76.5 billion in knowledge-intensive services.

Kiwi data centres are among the most energy efficient globally, with an average PUE of 1.3 – below the global average of 1.54.

“For every unit of energy used to power computing, almost none is wasted on overhead like cooling and backup systems.”

Powering up

But while local leaders and business advocates have promoted the development as a major economic win, there are concerns over what the data centre means for energy supply, local infrastructure and the long-term economic value to the region.

The facility’s need for uninterrupted baseload electricity, in particular, has become a focal point. The facility will draw up to 280MW – around six percent of New Zealand’s annual consumption – making it New Zealand’s second-largest electricity users behind Tiwai Point aluminium smelter. But unlike industrial users such as Tiwai, data centres can’t power down during periods of tight supply.

Dr Ulrich Speidel, Auckland University of senior lecturer in computer science, notes that between Datagrid and Tiwai ‘there mightn’t be so much power available to send north anymore’. However, he notes that likewise, threats to close the smelter might also have less bite from now on.

Speidel warns too, that while the facility itself will be powered by hydro, if the data centre displaces power that would have headed north, power may then need to be generated elsewhere using fossil fuels.

Datagrid, for its part, emphasises that the data centre will use renewable energy and take advantage of Southland’s cool climate to support energy-efficient operations. Internationally, renewable-powered data centres are increasingly in demand by large cloud and AI customers seeking to reduce the emissions footprint of their operations. The company has positioned the Makarewa site as a strategic gateway to Asia Pacific markets

The data centre will rely heavily on electricity drawn from the lower South Island grid, where Manapōuri already powers Tiwai. It signed a 15-year 140MW/year long-term power purchase option agreement with electricity generator Mercury earlier this month.

Draft fast track approval has also recently been given to Contact Energy’s Slopedown wind farm, which is expected to power the equivalent of 150,000 households. It is in close proximity to the Datagrid facility – just 50km away.

The ‘green’ credentials are a big selling point for Datagrid’s future international clients and have been heavily touted.

But energy experts have noted that hyperscale data centres require not only enormous amounts of electricity, but also substantial cooling capacity. Even in Southland’s cool climate, large-scale AI systems generate heat loads requiring continuous thermal management, contributing to pressure on both power and water systems. Datagrid will use groundwater and on-site stormwater for cooling.

Experts also note data centres can dispose of large amounts of wastewater, which may be heated above ambient temperatures, but say there is little clear information on that front when it comes to Datagrid’s plans. The original fast track application includes mention of possibly ‘coolant laden’ wastewater.

Despite this, Datagrid’s proponents argue that Southland is one of the most favourable places in the country for a development of this type, citing its cool temperatures, low seismic risk, proximity to renewable electricity generation and now direct international connectivity via the Tasman Ring Network. These conditions are seen as vital for hosting AI‑focused facilities, which require low‑latency connections and reliable, stable energy supplies.

University of Auckland electrical engineering expert Professor (Ahorangi) Nirmal Nair, has previously noted that New Zealand’s relatively clean and cheap renewable electricity could be a business opportunity, making New Zealand a ‘go-to’ place to invest in AI servers. In 2024, amid concerns about ChatGPT’s impact on power grids and electricity markets, he said if scaled correctly, New Zealand could increase electricity generation to meet the demand of data centres.

“My sentiment remains still the same,” he says in the wake of Datagrid’s approvals.

“We are in 2026 and now countries and regions are really going after building core-capability of AI and data centes, and New Zealand is still an attractive place to build AI loads supported by our current and growing electricity generation in the immediate coming years.”

Albert Bifet, director of the AI Institute at the Unversity of Waikato, is also positive, saying the approval is an important step for the country’s digital infrastructure. “AI systems require very large computing power, and facilities like this provide the data centres and connectivity needed to train and run modern AI models.”

Similar initiatives are being seen elsewhere, he says, citing Europe’s investment in networks of AI factories connected to high-performance computing centres to support research and industry innovation. “If New Zealand wants to stay competitive in AI, we will need more infrastructure like this.

““The opportunity will be to ensure this capacity benefits the local ecosystem, including universities, startups, and businesses, so that AI innovation can grow within New Zealand.”

Jobs and sovereignty

Another concern raised has been the uneven distribution of benefits. Angus Dowell, a PhD candidate in economic geography at the University of Auckland, says data centre projects like Datagrid often function as nodes in large international cloud networks, whose main value and revenue flow offshore, not to the surrounding region where they are physically located.

“My research on the expansion of big-tech cloud infrastructure suggests facilities like these are often integrated into transnational computing systems whose main markets, customers and commercial returns lie elsewhere,” Dowell says.

“The key issue is therefore not just whether the project brings investment, but how the benefits of that investment are structured and distributed. Infrastructure like this can be physically located in a region while being economically and operationally integrated into wider global cloud and AI systems. Under those conditions, local communities may provide the land, energy and enabling infrastructure, while much of the strategic control and commercial value remains concentrated elsewhere.

“These kinds of tensions increasingly sit at the centre of international debates over data sovereignty and digital infrastructure.”

There’s also the warning that while data centres are frequently promoted by operators – particularly hyperscalers – as job creators, the long-term workforce tends to be small.

While construction tends to create some jobs – Datagrid is claiming 1200 skilled and technical jobs will be created in the construction phase – there are very few new jobs afterwards because most of the operation is automated and remote controlled from places with a pool of IT staff.

Warns Speidel: “Local communities need to think a bit about whether the extra connectivity that comes with the cable is enough payback for them or whether other ways of monetising the data centre’s presence are needed too, such as special rates.”

Construction of the Datagrid facility is expected to start in June, and it is due to be fully operational by 2028.

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The round was led by Peter Thiel’s Founders Fund, which has been a long-time investor in the company, backing it in its Series A round in 2017. Existing investors Blackbird, Icehouse Ventures, DCVC, Bond, Bessemer, Ubiquity, NewView and Promus also participated.

“Halter is beginning its largest ever hiring effort, seeking more than 200 people across product, engineering and customer operations.”

The US$220 million raise is one of the largest-ever in agtech globally and smashes Halter’s own record for the largest VC raise by a Kiwi-founded company. It follows earlier reporting that the round was heavily oversubscribed with some of the biggest names in VC keen to get involved.

Halter’s GPS-enabled collars use audio cues and vibrations to contain and herd both dairy and beef cattle within virtual boundaries, enabling farmers and ranchers to move herds from a smartphone, redrawing fence lines from their smartphone. Animal health can also be monitored through the smartphone, along with pasture management, with live data on animal locations, health and feed availability providing a digital twin of farms and ranches, and providing users with access to complex data points in simple and easy to interpret ways. Versions are available for both dairy and beef cattle, with Halter saying beef farming needs its own technology, not a dairy product repurposed for beef cattle as everything about beef systems varies massively. The company has positioned the systems as full herd management, from a smartphone, at US$5 to US$8 per animal per month.

Since launching in the US in 2024, Halter says American ranchers using Halter have built 60,000 miles of virtual fencing. Globally it claims 645,000 kilometres of fencelines have been drawn since 2024.

Founder and CEO, Craig Piggot, who was recently named Innovator of the Year at the 2026 Kiwibank New Zealander of the Year Awards, says Halter was started because of the belief technology could fundamentally change what it means to run a farm, and enable farmers to use innovation to build long-term futures on their land.

“Our farmers need tools that work and the fact they’re using Halter tells us our technology has earned their trust. This raise lets us bring it to far more of them, and faster.”

Scaling up

As part of the Series E expansion stage, Halter says it is beginning a recruitment drive, seeking more than 200 people – its largest-ever hiring effort. Positions will cover product, engineering and customer operations with many based at its Auckland headquarters. Additional staff will also be hired in Australia and the United States in the coming weeks as well. The company employs more than 300 staff, including a team of more than 100 engineers and designers.

Founded in New Zealand and maintaining an Auckland headquarters, Halter also has Australian operations, based in Melbourne, and a US office, which it opened in Colorado in 2024 following its US$100m Series D funding round.

The company, which topped the 2024 Deloitte Fast 50 Index with 1,539 percent revenue growth and secured $165 million in 2025 to accelerate its global expansion, has rapidly scaled across New Zealand, Australia and the United States, with more than 2,000 farmers and ranchers as customers, and a million of the solar-powered smart collars sold.

The Series E funding round will support several initiatives for the company, which says it will enable it to accelerate its commercial expansion across the United States and fund the roll-out of a range of new products in the coming months.

“Investment will continue across product development, including animal health monitoring and pasture management, shaped by how customers are using the system in the field,” Halter says. “The focus remains on supporting farmers building their operations with Halter.”

The company says it will also enter the United Kingdom and Ireland later this year, along with key South American markets.

Piggot says farmers in the UK and Ireland have long expressed interest in Halter.

“The UK and Ireland are very similar to New Zealand in terms of landscape and climate – we know we can have impact there,” he says.

Halter’s growth sits within a wider movement toward virtual fencing and precision livestock management. Research and Markets has put the precision agriculture market at US$9.5 billion in 2025, with projections to reach US$17.3 billion by 2031.

Across New Zealand and Australia, Halter’s uptake aligns with increasing adoption of agricultural automation.

Founders partner Amin Mirzadegan says while agriculture is a “multi-trillion dollar industry that feeds the world”, it remains one of the least digitised sectors on earth.

“Halter is changing that by bringing software, sensors and AI directly into livetock operations in a way that farmers actually adopt.”

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Despite widespread experimentation, Massey University applied AI researcher Athar Imtiaz says research suggests businesses are hesitant to move beyond basic use cases, with no centralised framework outlining what safe, compliant or responsible adoption looks like.

“We don’t have a centralised framework or legislation. Everything is scattered.”

Imtiaz says the absence of national guardrails is directly shaping how – and how little – companies are willing to use AI today. “The depth of usage is pretty low here, it’s very shallow adoption,” he says.

Despite strong ‘adoption’ of AI, much of the current activity is focused on basic productivity use cases – summarisation, paraphrasing, grammar checking – rather than core process automation, customer operations or high-value workflows. Imtiaz says the absence of national guardrails is directly contributing to that hesitation. Without clear guidance, businesses handling PII or other sensitive datasets are choosing to limit their exposure rather than expand it.

“Organisations want to comply, but … they are apprehensive.”

Imtiaz says New Zealand’s current approach leaves businesses exposed, while a centralised framework would give organisations confidence to progress from list experimentation to deeper operational deployment – without constant having to reinvent the wheel creating guidelines for themselves.

“I see a lot of repetition. If we had a centralised act, companies could just refer to it and be confident. Right now, everyone is spending a lot of time thinking ‘should we use it, should we not use it, what are the effects?’”

While most government agencies have signed up to the Algorithm Charter for Aotearoa New Zealand – an initiative for the government’s data system which can also be used by business – and the Privacy Act and general human rights protections apply to some degree, those tools were never designed to regulate AI systems. “We have a good set of recommendations, but it’s recommendations, not an Act or a framework,” he says, noting they Charter is not binding.

“The Privacy Act remains important, but it does not define technical standards for model validation, dataset integrity or audit requirements. Without tailored legislation, accountability become fragmented.”

Importing models, importing assumptions

New Zealand companies adopting offshore AI tools face another challenge: The risk that models trained overseas may not understand local demographics, health indicators, patterns or cultural context.

Imtiaz highlights emerging use cases in the health sector, where AI tools are being trialled to categorise patient urgency. Relying on purely international models in such settings may be risky.

He says for important decisions, such as medical triage or identifying high-risk patients ‘it absolutely matters what assumptions the model was trained on”, with those trained outside New Zealand not having the social and demographic understanding of New Zealand.  “Wrongful assumptions could lead to serious issues.” Kiwi demographic and health profiles differ significantly from those of larger countries whose data dominates model training. “We have concrete data from Stats New Zealand and from Te Whatu Ora/Health New Zealand that certain demographics are more prone to certain illnesses,” he says. “You can’t guarantee an overseas-trained model understands that.”

Model providers also don’t disclose full training sets, which is IP.

The mitigation is model tuning – adapting base models so they reflect New Zealand-specific data. “It’s a very common thing and it is not actually even very expensive in terms of computation. We tune it to our context, put some grounding information so that it is aware of our socioeconomic and health conditions that are more common in New Zealand, then we can be sure it is categorising patients according to whatever Stats NZ or Te Whatu Ora has released.

But tuning also brings up its own challenges, with New Zealand lacking any body responsible for certifying, auditing or standardising AI models, leaving organisations without a way to independently verify whether systems are safe, accurate or appropriate for local use.

He compares the situation to hardware and networking, where bodies such as the IEEE provide universally recognised technical standards. World standards for AI do exist, but with tuning, countries need their own local standards.

“If a company develops a model, who will assure everyone that it is up to standard?”

Without such an authority, organisations are left to determine their own validations requirements, risking inconsistency and duplication across industries. Imtiaz says such a body would play a critical role in establishing trust in AI systems and supporting broader adoption.

EU AI Act provides guidance

With the government signalling a light-touch approach, and not national regime in development, Imtiaz says New Zealand businesses looking for guidance can align with the European Union’s AI Act. The AI Act sets detailed requirements for transparency, human oversight, documentation, testing and risk management for high-risk AI systems, including those used in healthcare, employment, public services and customer-facing decision processes.

In writing AI policies for organisations, Imtiaz has used the Act as a point of referral. “It’s one of the best ones out there so you can use it as a guide. It’s a big document, but they have it online so you can search it. Then modify it and adapt it to your situation.”

Australia is also doing work in this area, though it doesn’t have a central Act.

International regulatory settings shape global product design. Even without local legislation, AI tools used in New Zealand are likely to inherit EU-drive compliance features as vendors adjust to the European market.

Building sovereignty

There’s another leg to Imtiaz’s push: Sovereignty. While many people equate ‘sovereign AI’ with keeping data onshore, that’s just the foundation, with true sovereignty requiring control over the entire AI lifecycle: Data collection, storage, training, tuning, deployment and oversight.

“It’s a chain. At each step you ask, do we have sovereignty?”

Today the answer is no. Even with local data centres from Microsoft and AWS coming online (and let’s be clear, they are owned by offshore companies), Imtiaz says government agencies still rely heavily on offshore infrastructure, with data stored or processed in Australia and training models usually happening overseas as New Zealand doesn’t have enough high-performance compute.

He estimates building sovereign capability would require several hundred million dollars over the next five years, especially to establish secure compute environments and skilled workforce pipelines.

“Australia has already committed more than AU$100 million in federal funding toward AI capability and regulatory reform, alongside broader digital infrastructure investment. Singapore has invested billions across successive national AI strategies. The United Kingdom continues to fund AI research and governance capacity through its central technology portfolio.

“In contrast, New Zealand has no dedicated AI budget line and no central authority equivalent to the Department for Science, Innovation and Technology in the UK, the Ministry of Digital Development and Information in Singapore, or Japan’s Digital Agency,” he says.

While Imtiaz is realistic that sovereign control is ‘a very long-term plan’ requiring a government with ‘very distant vision’, he argues that the priority for government is straightforward: Start developing a national AI framework. “At least think about establishing a centralised AI framework, an Act.” That step alone would provide consistent expectations, reduce duplicated work and give businesses certainty.

“To give organisations confidence, we need this centralised framework… guardrails that are specific to NZ conditions. Then later on the [sovereign] chain can be implemented and improved. But first, we need the rules and regulations and the guardrails.”

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Derry Finkeldey, Sydney-based Gartner VP analyst, told iStart the shift away from traditional planning cycles is clear. “We’ve seen this shift from the number one reason driving technology purchases being formal planning activities, through to it being directed from top management to align with new strategic priorities. It’s really a top-down pivot.”

“Company culture … is by far the thing that is the greatest indicator of when they’re going to adopt technology, how they adopt it and how they make decisions.”

She notes AI adoption has turned over a lot of behaviours and plans, and increased leadership attention on technology.

“More organisations are starting to realise how strategically important technology is to their organisations.”

Finkeldey says organisations are changing quickly to adjust to changing markets, with companies with faster planning cycles more closely aligned to growth.

Shorter strategic cycles were identified as a characteristic of high-growth technology companies in earlier research. These organisations operate with more agile planning rhythms and respond more rapidly to external changes.

In this context, many CIOs are being required to adapt to sudden shifts in strategic direction, triggered by top-down AI expectations and to increasingly anticipate and respond to those sudden pivots.

Finkeldey says CIOs need to understand the ‘psychographic profile’ of their organisation, as it determines how readily the rest of the organisation will get onboard with more flexible planning processes. She says CIOs need to identify and address any rules, policies or processes that obstruct more agile shifts and clearly articulate why changes to planning approaches are necessary.

Culturing success

Finkeldey says there are clear demarcations of organisations which are successful buyers or technology. “We’re seeing this company culture in relation to technology investment is by far the thing that is the greatest indicator of when they’re going to adopt technology, how they adopt it and how they make decisions.”

The cultural factor determines how strategically important an organisation believes technology is to its mission, the speed at which it moves on new initiatives, the level of governance applied and how effectively stakeholders align during decision processes. “Organisations that see technology as critical to achieving their mission behave differently from those that do not, and these differences are visible from the earliest stages of the buying journey.”

The defining question is: how strategically important is technology recognised as being to the organisation. “It doesn’t matter what industry you’re in, it’s ‘does technology have that status in your organisation and what is your appetite for risk and change?’”

In organisations where technology is recognised as mission-critical, the CIOs are listened to, with their expertise valued by the executive team. “They’re often directing those strategic decisions and they have implemented governance around the decisions about the technology because they’ve effectively invested not only in the technology, but in all the considerations and processes that go along with it to make it work.”

In contrast, organisations which have not made this recognition often treat IT as an ‘order taker’ to the business, lack governance structures and experience weaker outcomes, including higher levels of buyer regret.

“You’ve got roughly just over half of organisations going into these decisions and they don’t know what they don’t know and they don’t know what to ask for.”

In good news for Australian companies, Finkeldey says Australian respondents typically have a higher proportion of the savvy, strategic tech-buying organisations – leading to better outcomes and less buyer-regret.

Twenty percent of Australian organisations did custom builds in response to customer experience and growth initiatives, compared with 17 percent globally.

“It’s not statistically significant, but it is in line with other findings in other surveys where Australian organisations have reported being driven by outward facing customer experience and growth objectives rather than just internal efficiency or operational ones.

Culture further influences the level of stakeholder alignment achieved during technology decisions. Those with strong technology cultures experience more consensus, while organisations lacking this foundation experience ‘unhealthy conflict’ characterised by disagreements on objectives or decision criteria. This directly affects decision speed and confidence.

Decision processes under pressure

The changes driven by top-down AI directives are producing practical consequences for organisations’ tech decision processes, including longer, more fragmented decisions and late discovery of essential requirements. “There’s a lot of repetition of milestones in decisions, stakeholders coming in and out of the decision who might overrule or overturn parts of the decision and recognition that ‘oh, we haven’t done a security review – yes, that happens a lot.”

Underestimating internal resource requirements with initiatives consuming a lot more resources and having a greater impact on teams than anticipated, and high levels of internal conflict are also immediate implications.

CIO priorities under the new model

Finkeldey says there are several practical actions CIOs should prioritise in this accelerated environment, including using independent sources early in the journey. Organisations relying on vendors for early learning receive ‘false signals’ which can draw them prematurely into sales-led processes.

Starting with organisational objectives – including what the organisation is trying to achieve, how technology supports the organisational goals and how success will be measured – unsurprisingly, also reduces conflict later.

Ensuring security reviews, stakeholder engagement and resource assessments are schedule early can help avoid last-minute delays, while identifying which rules or policies hinder flexible planning, and explaining the need for more adaptive approaches is also important.

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A survey by US work management platform Slingshot shows that while nearly half of employers embrace AI as a ‘team member’, employees are much less inclined to see it as a co-worker, with 54 percent say of employees saying AI is helpful but not critical to their work. Just 19 percent say they rely on it in a meaningful day-to-day way.

Use of AI tools at work isn’t as mandatory as the C-suite thinks…

Interestingly, only 15 percent of those surveyed felt like AI was a potential replacement for parts of their job, and 20 percent said it was like a teammate, supporting and enhancing their work.

Generational data reinforces the divide, with 28 percent of Gen Z and 24 percent of millennials seeing AI as a ‘teammate’, versus just nine percent of Gen X and Y respondents. But even the younger employees express caution. Their concerns over being replaced by AI are also higher, at 19 percent and 17 percent respectively versus 14 percent for Gen X and Y.

The survey, which polled 500 full-time US employees across a range of age groups, also highlights that use of AI tools at work isn’t as mandatory as the C-suite thinks – another example of the widening gap between leadership assumptions and employee reality. The research says 86 percent of executives believe AI usage is required in their business’ operations, but just 49 percent of mid-level management agree – and are passing on to employees – that AI is a requirement.

At the employee level, confidence is even more subdued. Only eight percent of workers say they are fully trained on AI tools, with younger staff showing higher confidence (43 percent of Gen Z) compared with just 15 percent of Boomers. That training gap is likely contributing to the inconsistent adoption patterns reported across workplaces.

In yet another example of the disconnect between the C-suite and the actual company approach 70 percent of executives said their employees are ‘constantly’ relying on data. The employee take on things? Only 31 percent agree, saying they use data to drive decisions regularly. The top reasons for the lower data usage among employees were reliance on their own personal experience (29 percent) and dependence on a data analyst or team (27 percent).

“Companies are being told that if they are still looking at AI as just another tool, they’re already behind – and are adjusting strategies accordingly,” Dean Guida, founder of Slingshot and CEO of parent company Infragistics, says. “However, while the top office may be putting AI at the centre of business processes and decision making, this ‘teammate mentality’ doesn’t automatically trickle down to the entire organisation.”

For a company to harness AI’s full potential, he says a bottom-up approach, focused on employee education, clear AI policies and AI transparency, needs to be instituted.

The Slingshot report doesn’t break out results by industry, however, which is notable, given the wide variation of AI adoption across sectors, and it’s likely those in some sectors would beg to differ on the results.

In Australia, the Department of Industry, Science and Resources’ AI Adoption Tracker shows among SMEs, retail trade is leading the charge with adoption, followed by health and education, services and hospitality – all in the low to mid-40 percent for adoption.  Agriculture, forestry and fishing lagged at just 19 percent adoption.

AU legal sector data reveals cost of outdated tech

Separate Australian market data underscores how far the gap between technological promise and operational reality can stretch, particularly in professions where documentation, billable time and administrative load are crucial.

Clio’s State of Legal Tech 2026 report shows that 60 percent of Australian lawyers lose over six hours a week – or 44 days, or nearly nine working weeks, a year – to inefficient systems. That’s significant time lost in an industry built on billable hours.

These productivity losses aren’t isolated. The research, which was conducted by YouGov and surveyed 1,001 practising lawyers and attorneys across Australia, also reveals a sector-wide pattern of data access issues and vendor lock-in. Nearly 71 percent of lawyers report facing withheld or delayed access to their own practice data when attempting to switch technology providers with delays often stretching into weeks and accompanied by hefty data retrieval fees averaging AU$24,861.

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Olive Huang, Gartner VP analyst, says with AI products and functionalities in CRM still very new, the majority of local businesses are in the early stage of experimentation and limited pilots.

“Large CRM vendors have sold a lot more AI capabilities than organisations are able to use.”

She estimates only 100 to 150 organisations across Australia and New Zealand have moved beyond pilots, with just 10 to 20 expanding into production use with more than five CRM agents.

She told iStart the region’s slower uptake reflects practical constraints and a market still grappling with legacy systems, rising costs and immature AI tooling.

While AI dominates global discourse around CRM transformation, it accounts for only a minority of issues raised in Huang’s day-to-day client conversations. “In reality, maybe 30 percent of client enquiries have something to do with AI, but the rest, not at all.”

Her comments follow recent research highlighting a challenging path to adoption, with organisations globally struggling to balance business goals, technical readiness and fast-moving AI innovation. Gartner’s 2026 Strategic Roadmap for CRM warns that AI is reshaping customer engagement, workforce structures and CRM processes, but also introducing new operational, data and sovereignty requirements.

Huang says many local organisations are preoccupied with long-standing CRM issues, rather than AI experimentation – issues like merging multiple CRM technologies after M&A activity, how to move off a 15 year old system, whether a CRM is even needed, what to do in the face of rising CRM costs, and how to get sales and service people to adopt systems they hate. European clients, meanwhile, are facing an additional challenge, searching for non-American systems. Then there’s the issue of having vendors pushing AI on them and uncertainty about the value of the offering.

The Strategic Roadmap reflects the same tension, noting that business leaders are struggling ‘to stay focused on on their business goals and customer experience as AI dominates the top trends impacting CRM and strategy discussions’.

It also warns that leaders underestimate the organisational changes AI could bring.

Capability questions

Vendors have been evolving their AI and agentic capabilities at breakneck speed, further complicating the situation.

Huang points to Salesforce’s Agentforce as an example of rapid iteration that complicates implementation planning.

“They announced Agentforce five quarters ago at 2024 Dreamforce, and they have had three releases. If you started using it from the first quarter, what you’re looking at today – the whole development environment would have changed twice.”

Gartner’s Predicts 2026: Will AI in CRM Finally Prove its Worth? Report similarly notes that current agentic capabilities are often ‘significantly oversold’ with many promoted features ‘not enterprise-ready for several years’.

“Large CRM vendors have sold a lot more AI capabilities than organisations are able to use,” Huang says.

The Strategic Roadmap adds that the pace of change in LLMs means ‘assessment and baselines become quickly out of date’ creating further planning challenges.

Huang says current economic conditions across Australia and New Zealand mean AI investment is not the immediate priority vendors might expect.

“They all come with quite a hefty price tag,” she notes. “And the cost is going up to the roof for everything,” she says. “Just to control how you run your business sensibly is a very big deal for every business.”

There are also concerns that the speed of AI innovation may render long-term plans obsolete.

For regulated sectors, technical constraints around data handling limit the applicability of agentic AI. Huang notes some CRM-embedded agentic capabilities require customer data to be passed to external models in unmasked form, something that is incompatible with many regulatory settings.

“Lots and lots of regulated industries absolutely can’t use it because it violates privacy and security in so many fronts.”

Optimistic outlook

Despite current constraints, adoption is steadily increasing. Huang cites Saleforce’s latest financial figures, from last month, showing the company recorded US$800 million in Agentforce bookings globally, with 29,000 deals signed and an estimated 2,500 in production. (The company has 150,000 plus customers globally.)

Across Australia and New Zealand, the company has claimed 125 customers live on Agentforce, including big names like Australia Post, One NZ, Xero, Fisher & Paykel and student accommodation operator Scape.

The vast majority – 75 to 80 percent by Huang’s reckoning – of use cases currently are customer service.

“I’m expecting the number to go up quite quickly in the next 12 months just because Salesforce has sold a lot more than they have delivered. That US$800m AR means a lot of companies have picked up some sort of Agentforce in their subscription to use in the next year.”

Huang says the selling by other CRM vendors as well, of AI capabilities beyond what most companies are currently able to use will also result in a ramp up in adoption this year.

Meanwhile Gartner’s Predicts 2026 report forecasts that by 2030, changing customer preferences will become the number one driver for CRM investment, as more interactions shift to AI-powered channels.

Where to from here?

Huang is urging local organisations to look beyond the initial success from pilots and emphasis vendors’ abilities to support scalable operations, including appropriate tooling to design, build, test, secure and continuously iterate AI agents.

IT teams in A/NZ should also use the next 12 months to focus on transforming internal technology skills required for managing AI-powered CRM systems, she says. “No matter how small your budget is, scrape the bottom of the pan and get a few dollars out to train your admins and developers in the latest stack so that you will be prepared, otherwise the IT department becomes the first obstacle for the whole company.”

And her final piece of advice for local businesses? “Keep pace with customer preferences of using AI through inputs from regular customer research, voice of customer programs and industry thought leaders.”

Voice AI is one area she believes will see big moves before long. While it’s currently dubious at best for the most part – who hasn’t been told ‘sorry I don’t understand you’ – she believes new iterations will see consumer hatred of the systems dissolve.

“In the next 12-24 months people will have a very positive surprise that those technologies get better and as a result the voice channel, which has traditionally been a channel companies want to shrink because it’s very expensive… why would you shrink it when people still use it well.”

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Offering up $475,000 a year over three years it’s being framed as a productivity booster for manufacturers, with plans for ‘at least 180 manufacturers’ to benefit – to the tune of an average annual $2,638.89 each (to give some perspective, Stats NZ says there’s only around 830 manufacturers with >50 staff).

“The program is premised on a shoestring-but-smart approach: Smaller tech, lower cost, fewer barriers.”

The University of Auckland-led program, which aims to get SME manufacturers adopting ‘practical’ digital tools to improve productivity, build workforce capability and support long-term business resilience, was first piloted in 2022 in partnership with Auckland Council.

Appropriately enough, it builds on the Digital Manufacturing on a Shoestring framework developed by a team from the University of Cambridge’s Institute for Manufacturing.

With its less than $1.5 million in funding for the entire three years, it may feel less like a bold national push and more like a polite gesture made from the loose change of the significant economic benefits the sector delivers – particularly when compared with Australian initiatives, which include a AU$28.7 million Industry Growth Program aimed at strengthening local manufacturing and supporting SMEs.

However, the program is premised on a shoestring-but-smart approach: Smaller tech, lower cost, fewer barriers, faster wins. It uses low-cost, off-the-shelf technologies and open-source software to help manufacturers integrate digital tools into existing operations without major capital investment or complex infrastructure changes. Participants in the program, which is co-funded by participating manufacturers, receive a customised assessment of their operations, guidance on selecting appropriate digital solutions and hands-on installation assistance. Training is also included to ensure factory staff can operate the new technologies effectively.

Small business and manufacturing minister Chris Penk says the program addresses a long-running barrier for manufactures who need the tools international competitors are harnessing, including automation, AI, robotics and cloud computing, to sharpen their competitive edge, but are often held back by cost or concerns about disrupting operations, especially where in-house technical expertise is limited.

A Digital Manufacturing Light Insights paper says while New Zealand has a host of inventive and energetic manufacturing companies creating top-notch products and exporting globally, they produce just over half the output of similar firms in other advanced economies of comparable size.

“Overall, productivity in New Zealand’s manufacturing sector is significantly lower than in many peer countries. In 2022, the industry’s productivity (measured as value added per hour worked) was US$102.40, compared with US$136.29 in Denmark and US$167.04 in Ireland.

“Digital transformation can help turn this around.”

Many businesses continue to operate 20-year-old – and older – machines that are mechanically functioning and, mostly, still producing high quality output but which lack the capability and business benefits offered by modern data collection, connectivity and automation.

A survey of Employers and Manufacturers Association members carried out as part of the development phase of the pilot confirmed key barriers to implementing new digital solutions were cost (identified by 61 percent of respondents), lack of time and resources (54 percent) and challenges associated with existing or legacy systems (52 percent). Those are all areas the program says it addresses with low cost, low risk, solutions that are easy to implement.

“The Digital Manufacturing Light initiative has been designed to help companies ‘dip their toe in the water’, build confidence and enhance both technology and workforce capabilities, while also addressing key barriers to adoption.

Beyond Auckland

MBIE says the new funding, which kicks in from April, will allow the program to support at least 180 manufacturers across Auckland, parts of the Waikato, Northland and the Bay of Plenty, where around 55 percent of New Zealand’s manufacturers are located.

The pilot saw the University of Auckland’s Faculty of Engineering and Design’s Laboratory for Industry 4.0 Smart Manufacturing Systems working with Auckland Council to test and adapt the Shoestring program for the Kiwi market, launching a 12-month Digital Manufacturing Light pilot in July 2025. Twelve Auckland companies took part in the pilot.

Information on the program’s pilot work says to maintain affordability Digital Manufacturing Light provides a pre-developed library of digital solutions sourced from the Shoestring program and developed locally in New Zealand. The solution kits include a detailed list of ‘affordable’ electronic components, all of which can be purchased online from major retailers, along with necessary open-source software to connect the components and create easy-to-understand dashboards. The program also offers a distributed and repeatable method for developing specific solutions, Auckland Unlimited says, and peer-to-peer assistance is promoted.

A survey of EMA members showed top digital manufacturing priorities were real-time digital tracking of internal jobs, capacity and utilisation monitoring and process monitoring (temperature and power). Digital starter solutions for those areas are already available via the Shoestring program, with each of the starter kits costing less than $2000.

Practical improvements expected from the program include more consistent machine monitoring, better visibility of bottlenecks, improved quality control and reduced reliance on manual processes. The Auckland Unlimited documentation on the pilot, is however, somewhat light on the actual benefits seen.

The document is based on two Digital Manufacturing Light pilot projects carried out with Auckland companies Spiraweld Stainless and ABB New Zealand. In Spiraweld’s case legacy machines were retrofitted to provide automation in the pipe welding process, using computer vision to measure a welding gap, a stepper motor to rotate the welding rig knob, a Raspberry Pi microcomputer as a controller and a touch screen. The hardware costs were below $1000, while development costs were around $5000. For Spiraweld, the primary benefit was the ability to weld pipes automatically, freeing the operator to perform other tasks and improving productivity.

University of Auckland Faculty of Engineering and Design Laboratory for Industry 4.0 Smart Manufacturing Systems (LISMS) professor Xan Xu says the pilot demonstrated how the university’s engineering expertise could translate international best practice into practical solutions for Kiwi SMEs.

“Most manufacturing firms are small, operating with limited capital and older machinery. Our Auckland pilot showed that accessible, low-cost digital tools can quickly improve productivity, operational visibility and product quality,” Xu says.

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The State of FinOps 2026 report, from the FinOps Foundation, shows practitioners are now applying FinOps practices across multiple technology categories, with 90 percent managing or planning to manage SaaS, 64 percent handling software licensing, 57 percent managing private cloud and 48 percent overseeing data centre costs. SaaS, licensing and AI are now normalised parts of the FinOps remit.

“FinOps has become a technology value practice moving at the speed of cloud.”

It’s a broadening the FinOps Foundation says is now the norm as organisations chase consistent, value-oriented governance across their entire IT estate. (So great is the change, that the Foundation has updated its mission from ‘Advancing the people who manage the value of the cloud’ to advancing the people who manage the value of technology.)

At the centre is AI – both managing it and using it. The sixth annual report identifies FinOps for AI as the top forward-looking priority and AI cost management as the number one skillset teams must now build. Almost all respondents – 98 percent – now manage AI spend, up from 63 percent in 2025 and 31 percent two years ago, with AI investment spreading across public cloud, SaaS platforms, data centres and private cloud deployments as organisations scale generative AI and machine learning workloads.

“The agenda is dual: Manage AI spend and apply AI to improve FinOps team productivity and the value of AI initiatives,” the Foundation notes. Smaller organisations are balancing AI alongside foundational FinOps work. For larger organisations, however, AI is increasingly treated as a dedicated domain. Either way, teams are preparing for AI-related value management.

The shift reflects the practical complexity of AI economics. AI consumption can vary wildly depending on usage while metrics such as cost-per-token, cost-per-inference and cost-per-training-epoch can complicate forecasting, allocation and showback or chargeback models.

With spend rising and accountability increasing, many organisations report being told to self-fund AI investments through optimisation savings, tying traditional FinOps work directly to strategic technology enablement. However, 53.4 percent also acknowledge they have difficulty understanding the full scope of AI spending, and 40.1 percent say identifying the value derived from spending on AI is a challenge.

Those broader pressures were also highlighted in Flexera’s 2026 IT Priorities Report which showed the operational and financial strain AI is placing on IT budgets globally. The report, which included a survey of 834 IT decision makers in companies with 100+ employees across the Australia, the US, UK and Germany, shows 80 percent of IT leaders say spend on AI applications has increased and 36 percent believe they’re overspending on AI. It noted the ‘critical challenge’ IT leaders now face of preventing cloud overspending in an AI-driven world and the growing importance of FinOps practices.

At the same time, Flexera’s report shows 73 percent of IT leaders reported SaaS and cloud infrastructure costs were up, and 67 percent said cloud costs weigh heavily on their budgets – a trend strengthening the case for disciplined, cross-scope FinOps practices.

Flexera also highlights widespread visibility and governance challenges, noting that IT visibility gaps pose organisational risk, and 58 percent have encountered issue due to unsanctioned SaaS usage.

Rising influence

The State of FinOps report, which is drawn from a survey of nearly 1,200 shows FinOps’ organisational footprint has also expanded. Seventy-eight percent of FinOps teams now report to the CTO or CIO, up 18 percentage points since 2023, signalling FinOps’ transition from a finance-aligned function to a technology-embedded discipline.

Those engaging with executives were much more likely to influence technology selection, with those with C-suite engagement, rather than just ‘director level’ showing 2-4x more influence over technology selection.

FinOps leaders are increasingly participating in strategic provider negotiations, multi-year investment decisions and M&A technology due diligence, with some influencing decisions about labour versus AI technology investment.

There’s also a shift left happening, with financial requirements are being embedded into financial requirements earlier in the engineering and product lifecycles, allowing teams to make informed decisions pre-deployment, rather than remediating after the bill arrives. Pre-deployment architecture costing has emerged as a top desired tool capability and FinOps teams are engaging with platform engineering and enterprise architecture teams, building pricing calculators and offering pre-deployment guidance. However, the Foundation warns, incentives haven’t caught up and there’s a need to identify how to give developers credit for ‘shift-left’ activities.

The report also shows FinOps practitioners are growing outside of the traditional stronghold of North America, including in Asia Pacific.

While no specific reference is made to Australia and New Zealand findings, the broad themes map closely to local developments, where cloud dependence, AI experimentation and governance mandates are reshaping financial oversight.

And one final takeaway from the report: It shows more respondents are now prioritising governance, forecasting, organisational alignment and managing expanding technology areas then optimisation and efficiency alone. “Mature practices increasingly focus on unit economics, AI value quantification and influencing technology selection, reflecting FinOps evolution from tactical function to strategic discipline,” it says.

“The technology area data speaks for itself: SaaS, licensing, private cloud, data centre, AI, and even labour are now normalised parts of the FinOps remit, managed with the same discipline once reserved for public cloud infrastructure,” the Foundation says. “FinOps has become a technology value practice moving at the speed of cloud.”

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“Once these foundations are established, the lessons learned – both technical and institutional – can be applied to other sectors.”

Koronios, founding CEO and managing director of the Australasian Space Innovation Institute (ASII), says the digital twin, launched last month and a flagship initiative for ASII, isn’t just another farm app or dashboard, it’s a chance to rewrite how a climate-exposed, globally competitive sector makes decisions, replacing delayed, fragmented information with AI-enabled ‘what if’ scenario modelling across climate resilience, biosecurity, water management and productivity, enabling decision-makers to test options, anticipate risks and optimise actions before implantation.

And the benefits won’t just be reaped by the agricultural sector with Koronios telling iStart the initiative will establish a national capability in digital twin infrastructure and space-enabled intelligence, which can progressively support multiple sectors of the economy.

“Agriculture provides an ideal first application because it allows us to develop the core architecture, governance frameworks and data integration methods that are necessary for large-scale digital twins. Once these foundations are established, the lessons learned – both technical and institutional – can be applied to other sectors.”

He says the same principles used to integrate satellite observations, environmental data and modelling tools for agriculture could also support digital twins for water systems, natural ecosystems, coastal environments or disaster management.

Real-time national picture

The elevator pitch is simple – but bold: Bring satellite earth observation data, sensors, climate records, soils, agronomic models and the wealth of other data already available into a single sovereign, AI-enabled system that mirrors conditions on the ground and updates continuously. The digital twin aims to end the fragmentation that has existed in agriculture and turn the abundance of data into decision-ready intelligence that can be used with confidence.

For Meat and Livestock Australia, who along with Elders and Charles Sturt University are backing the initiative, the prize is speed and certainty. Michael Lee, Meat and Livestock Australia’s group manager for science and innovation, told iStart the twin could ultimately reduce risk and potentially cut years from research cycles.

By putting hypotheses through a virtual R&D engine first, teams can refine and narrow failure modes, deploying only what looks likely to work. Producers, in turn, could see more accurate grazing plans, better timed interventions and lower operating risk, with the potential to also unlock provisions for stronger evidence for sustainability and traceability requirements – something brand owners could be rewarded for in a margin-tight industry, where proof that travels cleanly through the value chain is money.

“We are expecting that the digital twin will support evidence-based scenario testing by combining satellite imagery, climate data and agri models in one system. Industry can use this to then compare stocking plans, pasture strategies or herd timing against various climate outlooks and assess expected changes in productivity, groundcover and emissions intensity.”

This supports the kind of repeatable and transparent assessments needed by producers, researchers and other supply chain partners, which could even include banks and other policy advisors who are looking for analytical intel on how agriculture is performing and where it is heading, he says.

Lee has a long list of use cases that most excite him. Top of the list is forecasting pasture growth and testing grazing strategies under different seasons. Climate and drought scenario planning supporting early and confident decisions; landscape pest, weeds and biosecurity modelling for coordinated responses; testing water and infrastructure options for improved productivity and animal welfare and emissions and natural capital modelling using satellite data and agronomic models also feature.

Koronios has a similar list, with the addition of carbon and sustainability monitoring. “As global markets increasingly demand proof of sustainable farming practices, the digital twin could help measure land condition, vegetation cover and carbon outcomes across farms, giving Australian producers a credible way to demonstrate environmental stewardship,” he says.

“What excites me most is that these applications are not futuristic concepts. The underlying technologies already exist. The digital twin simply brings them together into a single intelligence platform that helps farmers make better decisions every day.”

Phased, with challenges…

The program will be delivered in a phased development approach, with Koronios stressing that practical benefits will be realised progressively, rather than only at the end of the program.

First up is the formal establishment of the program’s governance structure, including a steering committee and key delivery partnerships. Koronios says initial workstreams will focus on designing and building the core digital twin platform while working with industry and research partners to validate the first practical use cases.

“During this phase the emphasis will be on developing and testing the foundational capabilities: Integrating key data layers, building analytical tools, and demonstrating how the system can support real-world agricultural decision-making,” he says.

Importantly, early pilot deployments will allow farmers, agronomists, industry partners and government agencies to begin using and benefiting from the platform as it evolves, rather than waiting for a fully completed system. Koronois says these early deployments will provide immediate value while also helping refine the models through real-world feedback.

As the platform matures, the program will expand from pilot deployments to nationally scalable operational services, incorporating additional datasets, analytical models and regional applications. With each phase, new capabilities and insights will become available to users, expanding the value.

“Ultimately, the National Digital Twin for Australian Agriculture is conceived as a long-term national capability – a digital infrastructure designed to support Australia’s agricultural sector for decades to come. Much like national mapping systems or weather forecasting networks, it will act as a shared digital backbone for agricultural intelligence, supporting productivity, climate resilience, biosecurity and evidence-based policy.”

There are, of course, technical challenges, the biggest of which will be bringing together all the agricultural, environmental and satellite data sets into a single, consistent system that can operate across an entire continent.

Koronios notes currently data, models and insights remain fragmented across jurisdictions, research programs, Research and Development Corporations and proprietary platforms. “This fragmentation has resulted in duplication, inconsistent standards, slow translation of research into practice and rising costs for levy payers and taxpayers alike.”

Each of the datasets, which come from a wide range of sources including satellites, weather systems, soil databases, farm sensors and government programs – has different formats, resolutions and update cycles. Harmonising those datasets so they can be combined into a coherent, real-time model will be no mean feat.

One of the most important layers is the satellite earth observation data, which provides frequent updates on vegetation health, crop growth, pasture condition and land use across the entire country, every few days and in a few cases as frequently as daily. “This gives us a consistent, continent-wide view that simply isn’t possible from ground observations alone,” Koronios says.

Soil and moisture data will be another critical layer, helping farmers and advisors understand water availability and plant stress. When combined with weather and climate data it becomes possible to anticipate drought conditions, irrigation needs and crop development patterns.

Farm-level and environmental data, such as sensor measurements, land management information and water systems will also be integrated, providing the local detail needed to translate satellite observations into meaningful insights for individual farms.

Biosecurity and environmental monitoring datasets will also be included, helping detect changes in vegetation patterns that could signal pests, disease outbreaks or land degradation.

“The real value comes from combining these layers, because when they are analysed together they reveal patterns and trends that would not be visible in any single dataset,” Koronios says. “This is a current gap in the ecosystem.”

Scale is another challenge, Koronois is preparing for, with Australia’s agricultural regions spanning millions of square kilometres. “The system must process very large volumes of data continuously, while still delivering useful insights at the level of individual farms or paddocks.”

He says modern cloud computing, AI and advanced observations will address those issues to integrate and interpret data streams. “Rather than trying to centralise everything in one system, the digital twin works as an intelligent platform that connects existing systems and continuously updates the model as new data arrives.”

The final challenge is ensuring information is practical and usable for farmers and advisors, not just technically sophisticated, he says. That means designing tools and dashboards that translate complex data into clear insights that support real-world decisions.

“We are embarking on a journey where the priority is not the volume of data, but the acceleration of technology adoption. We want to ensure that the data we ingest translates into high-value insights and practical tools that the industry can trust and use with ease. The Digital Twin will work by integrating multiple layers of data that together describe what is happening across Australia’s agricultural landscape.”

Over time other information sources will be integrated, particularly as Australia’s sovereign earth observation capabilities advance and tech such as IoT networks with intelligent sensors are increasingly deployed across agriculture and related sectors.

“Ultimately, the Digital Twin is not a destination with a fixed finish line. It is a living R&D engine designed for continuous progress and evolution. There is no ideal amount of data, as the system is designed to learn and improve as we move forward.”

There’s a broader national dividend here, too. A sovereign digital capability for agriculture is a food‑security asset as much as it is a productivity play. It reduces reliance on offshore analytics to interpret Australia’s land and climate signals, while creating a platform for local companies and researchers to build exportable services on top. In Koronios’s framing, the twin strengthens food systems and regional economies today while laying tracks for tomorrow’s cross‑sector twins – water systems, disaster resilience, coastal environments – a reusing the architecture and governance patterns forged in agriculture.

Koronios says in practical terms the twin is designed as an open, modular platform that different users will interact with in ways that suit their needs. For agronomists and advisors, the most common interface will likely be intuitive dashboards and decision-support tools that translate complex datasets, such as satellite observations, soil moisture and weather data, into clear insights about crop health, risk conditions and management options. For agtech companies and software developers, the platform will provide APIs that allow them to integrate digital twin data directly into their own applications and farm management systems. “This means companies can build specialised tools, such as irrigation optimisation models, yield forecasting systems or sustainability monitoring platforms, using the digital twin as the underlying intelligence layer.”

Researchers and advanced users will also be able to access modelling environments and analytical tools to develop new algorithms, predictive models and agronomic insights.

“The platform is not intended to be a closed system controlled by a single organisation. Instead, it is conceived as a national innovation platform that allows multiple organisations – agtech companies, research groups, industry bodies and government agencies – to build services and applications on top of the core infrastructure.

“In that sense, the digital twin acts as a shared intelligence layer for agriculture, enabling an ecosystem of tools and innovations to emerge around it, while ensuring that the underlying data and analytical capabilities remain consistent, trusted and nationally coordinated,” Koronios says.

“If we get this right, the Ddigital twin will become something that future generations of farmers simply take for granted – much like weather forecasting or satellite navigation today – because it supports better decisions across the entire agricultural sector.”

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Currently in beta, the new suite of AI agents and features will progressively roll out across MYOB’s product portfolio including MYOB Business Lite, Pro and AccountRight, and aim to tackle one of the most persistent challenges facing SMEs: Time.

“Small improvements quickly add up to big results.”

Paul Robson, MYOB chief executive, says MYOB is targeting business pain points ‘ready for reinvention and transforming how customers and partners operate, unlocking a step-change in productivity through efficiency and insight’.

The new SME-focused AI features land against a wider backdrop of MYOB’s ongoing AI work across its wider platform ecosystem and a push to encourage local businesses towards becoming an ‘autonomous business’. Late last year Valantis Vais, MYOB general manager for product, product marketing and design told iStart that ‘practical’ was a key aspect of that push. While midsize businesses are curious about AI, they’re also wary of hype and sunk costs, wanting tools that provide practical benefits in the here and now, rather than promises of a sci-fi future.

He detailed to iStart a range of AI features going into Acumatica ERP solution, including accounts payable bill entry powered by OCR and semantic interpretation, expense management with AI-driven receipt capture, AI advisor anomaly detection and Auto Complete.

The new rollout extends the AI features to smaller businesses, including sole traders using Lite, as well as the more complex mid-market companies using AccountRight.

According to MYOB’s latest Business Monitor, 24 percent of employing SMEs say late payments exert significant pressure on their operations. The company believes embedding AI directly into existing workflows, with the likes of smart invoice reminders, automated reconciliation and AI-driven business insights, is key to unlocking productivity boosts without disruption.

Making sense of numbers and smart reconciliation

At the heart of the latest wave of promised updates is an AI Business Insights feature which will provide interactive charts and commentary to allow businesses to identify patterns and establish areas which need attention. MYOB says it will ‘plainly’ tell the story behind the numbers, providing easy-to-digest explanations for businesses, and a quicker avenue to surface trends and identify performance drivers in preparation for advisory-focused conversations for accountants and bookkeepers.

Another major addition will be Smart Reconciliation, which uses machine learning to categorise and auto-reconcile transactions based on user behaviour and pre-set schedules. Bank feeds are matched automatically, reducing hours typically spend on repetitive admin.

For small businesses, this means real-time visibility of expenditure and cashflow – an essential advantage in volatile trading conditions. For advisors MYOB says the feature means fewer errors and cleaner files when compliance deadlines loom, reducing the time spent tidying data before submission.

The focus on practical time savings echoes themes raised in MYOB’s earlier mid-market Acumatica rollout, where early adopters reported savings of upwards of 20 hours a month thanks to automation in accounts payable. While the new release doesn’t replicate those features, it shares the same underlying goal of removing manual volume so human effort can be redirected to higher-value decisions.

Behavioural cues to tackle late payments

The Business Monitor data shows late payments remain a stubborn issue for small businesses. MYOB’s Smart Invoice Reminders aims to address that, analysing late payer behaviour to recommend actions and tone, with customisable scheduling of automatic reminders.

For owners, MYOB says the offering will reduce administrative load, while providing clearer visibility of expected cashflow to reduce uncertainty in planning conversations for advisors.

Robson says the approach reflects the company’s belief that small improvements quickly add up to big results for local SMEs.

“AI can completely change the game for small businesses and their advisors, powering up productivity and accelerating innovation beyond anything we’ve seen before,” he says.

The company says it has guardrails and evaluation measures in place to ensure the accuracy and safety of its AI outputs, but does admit AI can still get things wrong. Users can view the context and data source of suggestions to review them.

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Lachimea, chief corporate officer for the Australian manufacturer and distributor of steel products, is clear that technology is a fundamental requirement for his industry – not only to enable operational efficiencies, but to remain competitive.

“Over the next three to five years, the biggest differentiator will be deeper system integration with key customers and suppliers.”

“In the steel industry, differentiation comes from service, not the product,” he says.

“Over the next three to five years, the biggest differentiator will be deeper system integration with key customers and suppliers,” he told iStart. “Seamless data sharing will reduce friction, minimise errors and improve speed to market.”

Reduced manual keying errors and processing delays will also be key.

“Businesses that eliminate those inefficiencies will have a clear service and cost advantage,” Lachimea says.

The focus on eliminating friction has shaped a broad digital roadmap for Apex, which has adopted a progressive modular approach, upgrading its warehouse management systems (WMS), integrating with SAP Business One, introducing analytics to guide planning and deploying Zebra technologies to modernise frontline workflows.

While a deployment of Zebra ultra-rugged mobile computers, printers and barcode scanners might be a highly visible step which has garnered the company attention, Lachimea says the foundations sit much deeper.

“Our ERP and WMS platforms form the backbone of our operations, supported by analytics and planning tools that drive informed decision making across procurement, production and customer service.”

The objective is not simply to capture more data, but to ensure operational performance is visible. “This allows us to respond faster to customers and maintain tight control over stock, production scheduling and delivery performance.”

The company previously relied on a legacy paper-based system, which led to inaccurate stock counts and fulfilment delays and hampered the company’s long-standing stated goal of setting itself apart through customer service.

The modernisation has included a combination of mobile computing, barcode scanning and industrial printing, alongside the Warehouse Management System upgrade designed to connect seamlessly to Apex’s SAP Business One system.

Lachimea says the new workflow has dramatically reduced order-receiving time.

“Receiving orders could take up to an hour. With Zebra’s MC9 series mobile computers, it now takes 10 minutes, making our team six times faster.”

Orders are now received digitally, entered directly into Apex’s systems, and automatically nested with similar jobs to improve production efficiency.

The new workflow provides a single source of truth for inventory. On the shop floor, barcode scanners validate every steel coil’s colour and gauge before cutting, preventing material waste and expensive rework. Industrial printers automate the final labelling stage, ensuring every finished pack is correctly identified to prevent shipping errors.

The improvement in inventory visibility has produced a measurable service impact. “We can tell a customer immediately if we have an item in stock and commit to next-day delivery with 99 percent confidence.”

The digitisation effort has also changed how operational information flows through the business with Zebra’s solutions working with the WMS to enable real-time visibility of stock, improved accuracy and instant data sharing across the business.

“This has empowered planning and purchasing decisions by moving from historic forecast-reliant processes to data driven decisions. It also enables more frequent stock validation and faster investigation of unusual variances.”

From a customer perspective, the biggest opportunity is confidence. “We can confirm availability more readily and provide more accurate delivery timelines, enhancing overall customer experience.”

Tech as a workforce strategy

The technology is also a workforce strategy. Lachimea emphasises automation is a support for Apex’s team, rather than a replacement. Reducing administration and paperwork enables team members to focus on activities such as customer engagement, supplier collaboration and problem solving, all areas he identifies as critical to service outcomes. “We see digitalisation as enabling our expertise to be applied where it matters most, in delivering service.”

Every transformation project comes with cultural and procedural challenges, and Apex’s has been no exception. “Any system rollout requires buy-in from everyone,” Lachimea says. Not all benefits are immediately visible at the frontline and adjusting established habits takes time. However, once improvements become clear ‘adoption accelerated quickly’.

The lesson, he says, is that process discipline and training are just as important as the technology itself.

Beyond the frontline digitisation, Apex is taking a pragmatic approach to the architecture supporting its operations. “We operate within a hybrid architecture,” Lachimea explains. Legacy systems remain in place that continue to perform well, but they are being progressively upgraded and integrated into a more connected, cloud-enabled environment.

“Our focus is on modular and scalable systems that can evolve with the business rather than wholesale replacement for its own sake.”

Looking ahead

Lachimea says the next wave of automation will focus on accounts payable and accounts receivable automation, including digitising supplier invoice processing, matching delivery dockets to invoices, automating reconciliations and streamlining collections and payments.

Looking further ahead the company is exploring real-time sensors, along with expanded reporting capability and further automation opportunities.

“A major focus is equipping our customer service team with enhanced visibility tools so they can proactively support customers,” he says, adding that technology investments will continue to be guided by improving service outcomes.

“Our commitment to service and reliability has not changed, but the way we deliver it continues to evolve. By integrating modern software and hardware platforms, we reduce manual touchpoints, improve data accuracy and ensure we meet and exceed our customers’ expectations for quality and reliability.”

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