http://UP.org.nz/media/news en Unlimited Potential Copyright 2012 2012-03-24T03:21:32+00:00 Sat, 24 Mar 2012 03:21:32 +0000 http://UP.org.nz/media/news/face_your_fears_says_tech_founder http://UP.org.nz/media/news/face_your_fears_says_tech_founder#When:03:21:32Z Some of Wellington’s leading tech company founders fronted at Unlimited Potential’s ‘Tech Founders Blast Talks’ in mid-February with some extremely frank and honest comments about the challenges facing start-ups. Dave ten Have is onto his second internet-based start-up, with Wellington-originated, globally-operating Ponoko being a bit of poster child for mass customisation/personal manufacturing. It describes itself as ‘the world’s easiest making system’. He describes the start-up (and follow through) stage as being where “fear of failure is a constant”. Those reading and observing of others’ success in the venture capital and start-up space “hear a lot of stories that are embellished,” he says. That is, people hear many of the successful bits, the how it all happened narrative. The downsides, hard times, unsuccessful moves get short shrift. Equally, hindsight provides tremendous clarity. As it currently stands for himself and Ponoko, “I can’t tell you where I am, but I can tell you how fast I’m going,” he says. “It is like being chased in a confined space with a bunch of other nutters,” explains the ten Have. For all that, he clearly relishes the excitement, the challenge, the unknowns that go with starting with a metaphoric blank piece of paper. “It allows you to look into the abyss,” he says. “But do it for the journey, for the learning, not for the dollars.” For someone who in the first two years of his original start up began his morning by throwing up the breakfast he’d just eaten, ten Have’s frankness was a tonic in an environment where kicking off a new idea is often seen and spoken of as a walk in the park. At times, it is anything but easy. “You need to turn around and conquer the fear,” says ten Have. This article was adapted with permission from Peter Kerr’s SticK Blog Fri, 09 Mar 2012 20:57:01 +0000 http://UP.org.nz/media/news/tech_focus_for_deloitte_sme_team http://UP.org.nz/media/news/tech_focus_for_deloitte_sme_team#When:20:57:01Z If you’ve ever attended an Unlimited Potential event at the marvelous venue on the 16th floor of Deloitte House in Wellington, you are probably wondering just what a global financial services and advisory firm has in common with a bunch of technology start-up folks and I.T. industry geeks. Surprisingly, they actually have quite a lot in common. Deloitte New Zealand employs around 900 specialists offering advice including taxation, finance, risk management and general accounting services. What most people don’t know is that Deloitte has a small business team based right here in Wellington that are already working with some of the coolest emerging technology start-up companies from around New Zealand. Headed by Stephen Nicholas, the SME team are keen to dispel some of the common stereotypes that persist around the industry.  Deloitte provides services to a huge range of clients from governmental agencies to large corporations right through to one person businesses and they tailor fees and service offerings accordingly, says Nicholas. “Small enterprises are the life-blood of the economy and (more than ever) we need to make sure they get sound advice to help them grow”, he says. Being a kind of global cooperative, Deloitte also reaches thousands of other professionals in their global network. So if your company has aspirations of growing offshore, odds are that someone can be found to answer any curly questions relating to specific markets. Deloitte are also involved in a number of industry initiatives aimed at showcasing our business talent. The Deloitte Fast 50 tracks the fifty fastest growing Kiwi companies each year and tech firms often feature prominently. Across the Asia-Pacific region Deloitte sponsors the Technology Fast 500. Last year local companies like Powershop, Silverstripe and Xero made the list which is great news if you are employed within the information technology sector. So, kudos to Deloitte for supporting our tech industry and for getting right behind Unlimited Potential. Contact Stephen @Deloitte Sun, 12 Feb 2012 21:57:21 +0000 http://UP.org.nz/media/news/developers_testers_needed_as_firm_expands http://UP.org.nz/media/news/developers_testers_needed_as_firm_expands#When:21:57:21Z With fresh investment on board and big goals in mind to enter more markets globally, software entrepreneur John Mitchell is feeling upbeat about the future of Petone based company Learning Source.  An alumni of Unlimited Potential’s Wellington to the World showcase, we picked Learning source as one to watch back in 2009. The company provides online software for training organisations and has grown steadily since inception in 2006. With the growth spurt happening, Mitchell is keen to add more staff including .NET or C# developers and testers. Get in touch with John Mitchell directly if you are looking for new opportunities. Mon, 26 Sep 2011 01:47:46 +0000 http://UP.org.nz/media/news/committee_nominations_2011 http://UP.org.nz/media/news/committee_nominations_2011#When:01:47:46Z October is the month for our Annual General Meeting at Unlimited Potential and that means there is an opportunity to get on board the UP committee. If you’d like to help with organising the coolest tech events in town then we’d love to hear from you. We are always on the lookout for good event ideas and are especially happy to collaborate with other groups and meetups around town. We reach over 2000 I.T. professionals in the Greater Wellington region, so it’s a great way to broaden your network.  Nominations for committee close on 21st October. Contact the UP committee and get involved. Thu, 15 Sep 2011 05:23:46 +0000 http://UP.org.nz/media/news/startup_weekend_comes_to_wellington http://UP.org.nz/media/news/startup_weekend_comes_to_wellington#When:05:23:46Z Got a crazy idea for a start-up business, but need to find a team to help pull it off? That’s where Startup Weekend comes in. Startup Weekend is a global phenomenon backed by the world famous Kaufmann Institute for Entrepreneurship. The idea is to get developers, designers and business heads in the same venue and creating new ventures over the space of a weekend. The event begins on Friday evening when budding entrepreneurs give a two minute pitch from the floor. The most popular or intriguing projects go forward and then teams form to get the ball rolling. Startup Weekend Wellington organiser and Webfund Chairman Dave Moskovitz says that Startup Weekend is not just about building a new application and selling it. It’s a great opportunity to grow your entrepreneurial networks and find friends and mentors with complementary skill sets. There will also be great food and coffee available throughout the event, included in the ticket price plus prizes, he said. The event will be held at BizDojo kicking off on the evening of Friday 4th November. For registration and more info goto the Wellington Startup Weekend website or check out what Unlimited Magazine had to say about the event. Thu, 28 Apr 2011 09:59:17 +0000 http://UP.org.nz/media/news/up_lift_how_communities_help http://UP.org.nz/media/news/up_lift_how_communities_help#When:09:59:17Z At a time when New Zealand is grappling with the twin economic challenges of a recession and a large scale natural disaster, it’s heartening to learn that Unlimited Potential made a difference to some small businesses around town. A lot of people are having hard times right now and the “recovery” might still be a long way off yet, according to some pundits. That’s why we need to help each other UP. Community building can be a thankless task at times, until you hear some anecdotes about who met who through your great event and what transpired. We had a huge event year in 2010 and are aware that a number of good introductions happened at UP events that led on to teams being built and projects created. More specifically, we heard recently that, through Wellington to the World, a local angel investor was able to facilitate a new and unexpected relationship between the university research community and some hi-tech industrial projects happening in our region. One of our entrepreneur speakers from W2W 2010 recently commented, “last year’s event came at the right time and boosted our company profile, which in turn helped us secure our funding round.” We also heard that several of our business services partners have had referrals of brand new clients in the last year, directly as a result of their involvement with Unlimited Potential. No doubt there are other stories out there. If you’ve found employment, made an investment, formed a company or had any other success as a direct result of making a contact or being inspired at an Unlimited Potential event - please get in touch or leave a comment below - we’d love to hear your story. Mon, 31 Jan 2011 07:24:29 +0000 http://UP.org.nz/media/news/openside_merges_with_deloitte http://UP.org.nz/media/news/openside_merges_with_deloitte#When:07:24:29Z Longtime Unlimited Potential supporter Openside has merged with global accountancy and business growth practice Deloitte. UP treasurer and financial advisor Stephen Nicholas will become a partner at Deloitte and is taking his staff and clients across with him. Openside specialised in assisting small and medium sized technology businesses and many of Wellington’s emerging tech companies are clients of the firm. Mr Nicholas said that under the terms of the merger clients will receive the same personal level of service from the existing team and there will be no increase in consulting fees. He said that Deloitte’s global reach could also be beneficial for smaller companies looking to head offshore with their technology products and services. Deloitte has a reputation for backing innovation with its support of the New Zealand Fast 50 and the Asia Pacific Technology Fast 500. Both competitions have given local companies higher profiles overseas. On a local level Unlimited Potential already collaborates with Deloitte and Angel HQ to host the annual Damsels Den event aimed at tech start-ups and angel investors. Stephen Nicholas says he looks forward to strengthening the relationship between Deloitte and Unlimited Potential. Deloitte New Zealand Mon, 29 Nov 2010 23:40:30 +0000 http://UP.org.nz/media/news/website_update_december_2010 http://UP.org.nz/media/news/website_update_december_2010#When:23:40:30Z By now we hope you’ve browsed the upgraded UP.org.nz and given some of the new features a test drive. Summer is on the way and we’d like to share some tips to help you get the most out of ICT networking opportunities using the UP site. Want to grab a coffee with java devs or find a few UP members to grab a summer lunch with? Log in and browse over the the member search and search for “java” in members interests, click email link next to a member, or check out their profile for other contact information and a picture. Check your own profile at UP.org.nz/user/edit Forgotten something? Pop over to http://UP.org.nz/user/forgot_password and enter the email address we’re sending this to. You can then login from the top of every page. Planning something bigger? Check out the UP.org.nz/events page. You can add your event to our site, subscribe to an RSS or ICAL feed of UPcoming events contributed by UP and members. There’s plenty on this month! We’re still currently in Beta mode, but this will soon change. We’re about to roll out some great improvements to the site, including some refinements to our member search that will make it even easier to make those important network contacts - stay tuned! Thanks to Crescendo Multimedia and WheresMyServer.co.nz for keeping us up. Mon, 29 Nov 2010 23:22:35 +0000 http://UP.org.nz/media/news/bloggers_predict_2011 http://UP.org.nz/media/news/bloggers_predict_2011#When:23:22:35Z Once again, in true UP fashion, we’ll be welcoming the New Year with Bloggers PredICT 2011. A panel of leading Wellington-based bloggers will reveal their insightful, quirky, and occasionally baffling visions for the coming year. A year ago Bloggers PredICT occurred hot on the heels of the iPad release, and accordingly our predicters had plenty to say about it. Apple aside, reining champion Brenda Wallace predicted Wellington library would start renting eBooks, the open source sector would grow (but for the wrong reasons), open government would lead to cyber-stalking, more labourer-bots would enter the market, and NZ would keep following international trends rather than leading. “Tweeter” Philip Fierlinger foresaw that the keyboard would reign, with Chrome beating the iPad in the popularity stakes. Facebook – like AOL – would crumble, wireless electricity would break on to the market finally ridding us of those unsightly tangles of cables, and marijuana would be legalised in the US. Joanna McLeod lamented her prediction that marketers would continue to try selling products to girls by making them pink. On the bright side, Wellingtonians would lead NZ in the adoption of of augmented reality games & cyber pets, the party game industry would continue to grow and government would turn to technology in a bid to save money, adopting among other things – revolutionary SMS messaging technology. She envisioned that people would get tired of sitting at home talking on social networking sites and start using them to meet up face to face, and that touch screens would increase in retail outlets. Mauricio Freitas shared his glimpse into the mobile market, predicting that Windows mobile and Symbian OS would finally fail in consumer markets, Google’s Android phone would reign supreme in the smartphone market followed closely by the iPhone (although non-geeks would call it a “Google phone”), by default, smartphones would come with built-in GPS, and social networks and location based games would intertwine – with people will forgoing their privacy for the fun of interactive entertainment. Miraz Jordan predicted that Wellington would become the hub of the 3D printer revolution, direct RSS feed readers would fade away, and that we’d finally get an iPhone app that would tell us when Wellington busses will actually arrive. So…how accurate have they been, and what visions will we be imparted with for 2011? More will be announced soon, stay tuned! In the meantime, check out videos of last year’s event here: http://www.viddler.com/explore/uptv/ Contact us if you’re interested in being involved in Bloggers PredICT 2011. Mon, 29 Nov 2010 23:14:12 +0000 http://UP.org.nz/media/news/i.t._communities_back_up_tech_entrepreneurs http://UP.org.nz/media/news/i.t._communities_back_up_tech_entrepreneurs#When:23:14:12Z This year at Unlimited Potential we’ve made a big effort to support our new tech entrepreneurs. Our Co-founder Matchmaking event was a huge success as participants in Grow Wellington’s Bright Ideas Challenge got acquainted with UP techies. We’ve already heard about several business projects that got started that night. We also ran Start-UP Saturday, a workshop for teams working on software or web start-ups and of course we showcased our best emerging tech entrepreneurs at W2W. Communities play a vital role in a vibrant and fertile entrepreneurial ecosystem because knowledge sharing and personal networks are the foundation for new ideas, project collaborations and capital flow. Apart from our own events, UP also supports and promotes other groups that have an interest in tech innovation. MLabs is a new group that is attracting interest from mobile developers and designers, for example. There are also some great Meet-Up groups around Wellington, including Lean Startups, Web Design and Hackers & Founders. Last, but not least Summer of Tech is a partner community that supports young I.T. interns to find placements. Keep an eye on UP.org.nz for tech community events and stay tuned for a very special project aimed at fast-tracking validation and investment for new tech ventures.