Shaking up the ring

There’s a common thread linking many of the stories you’ll find in our newest issue (yes, that’s 30 and counting, thank you very much). And that’s change. Daring to dare. Thinking big. Smart businesses reinvent themselves before someone else beats them to it—even when there may not seem to be anything wrong with the status quo.

Take Vaughan Rowsell, the Kiwi who’s aiming to revolutionise retail and POS systems from the ground up. Or firefighter Mike Harrison, who now makes his own equipment and is changing the way the industry views fire pumps. Or even Phillip Mills, who arguably has a good thing going with the Les Mills empire, but is determined to anticipate—and cater for—our demands. Plus the latest in cleantech and the green wave from Celsias, a showcase of the latest in design-led delights and plenty more. Don’t miss out: grab a copy from your nearest newsagent; or better yet, subscribe and get Idealog delivered to your door every other month.

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Dealing with the best

Meet Derek and Geoff. Together, the Handley brothers created The Hyperfactory, a high-tech Kiwi business that competes with the world’s best, and in July they sold it for megamillions. Literally. But they’re not finished: the pair are still on board with the mobile marketing company and want to grow it to triple its size. Mitchell Hall asks what they’ve learned about entrepreneurship—and why New Zealand needs more like them.

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Model for success

There’s plenty to learn about global business from the winners of the New Zealand International Business Awards, according to NZTE chief executive Peter Chrisp. “The winners … have done the hard yards in terms of understanding how to create value in a fast-changing and competitive global economy,” he says. “They all have successes, failures, insights and opinions about how to export – and crucially what it takes to be an international operator.”Iconic Kiwi brand Pumpkin Patch, which is celebrating its 20th year, took out the Judges’ Supreme award. We had a chat to chief executive Maurice Prendergast, which features in our latest issue, along with profiles of all the winners.

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Colours of the wind

Whether you prefer to colour inside the lines or outside, you should come along to Design Assembly’s workshop on colour management this month. In three hours, you’ll cover the basics of theory, tools, and implementation, which can be applied to either your personal workflow or a larger studio/printhouse scenario. It’s on Thursday October 28 from 2-5pm, run in conjunction with Jessica Mills of none other than NZ Colour Management. Numbers are strictly limited to 12 spots so email info@designassembly.org.nz ASAP to reserve a spot (first in first served).

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Reworking a classic

Here’s a twist on a childhood classic. Graphics and neat diagrams ensure it’s Little Red Riding Hood as you’ve never seen it before. It’ll have you feeling sorry for the wolf before you know it.

Squeaky clean

Energy technology company LanzaTech has made the prestigious Global Cleantech Top 100, the only New Zealand name to feature on the list. Created to highlight commercially exciting clean technologies, it’s compiled by a 60-strong panel drawn from investors and corporates around the world. LanzaTech, which  converts waste gases into fuels and chemicals, is attracting global interest for not only producing clean energy but using sustainable resources and thus reducing a nation’s carbon footprint.

And ever the high achievers, earlier this week, cofounder/chief scientist Dr Sean Simpson and chief executive Dr Jennifer Holmgren were named among the top 100 people in bioenergy. In total, industry executives from a dozen countries made that list, as voted by Biofuels Digest readers and editors.

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Art in the park

A 6x3m Banksy image, a car painted like a zebra, interactive installations and a scrawl wall…it’s all part of Oi You!, a street art show that’s the newest addition to the Nelson Arts Festival currently underway. Founders Heritage Park will be frantic this weekend with 20 select artists busy transposing original designs onto big fibreboards. They’ll then be auctioned off on Saturday evening by comedian Te Radar himself.

George Shaw, the man behind Oi You! has been out and about with Nelson painter Nic Foster scrounging up materials and explaining the concept to colleges for months. “Kids are right into urban art – teachers are using artists like Banksy to inspire their art classes,” he says. “We’ve tapped into this and had 70 responses to our invitation to students and adults to design their own urban art panel.”

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Many hands make light work

What makes an artist an artist? Can a sculptor who doesn’t use his or her hands really lay claim to the title? That’s the question behind Frederico Diaz’s Geometric Death Frequency-141, a sculpture of 420,000 black spheres assembled entirely by robots. He used CAD software (and data and algorithms) to create the robots’ independent working process, and the finished product will be on display in Massachussetts later this month.

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Spicing up Sesame St

Sesame Street has produced its own version of the Old Spice The Man Your Man Could Smell Like viral video, which racked up more than 24 million views not too long ago. The spoof features Grover talking to the camera from his bathroom, the beach, and, er, riding a cow. “Anything is possible when you know the word ‘on’,” he says.

Under the sea

A new artificial reef off the east coast of Mexico has been made entirely from human statues, made from a special type of cement which is 10 times harder than usual and has a neutral PH, encouraging coral growth. British artist Jason de Caires Taylor says he wanted to represent a cross-section of society, and used real locals to create the casts. “The main objective is to discharge quite a lot of the tourists who visit Cancun. Over 750,000 people come here every year to visit the marine park and that puts a huge pressure on the natural reef.” It’s hoped the sculptures will attract a range of sea creatures to the marine park.

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Quote of the week

When the ‘real’ entrepreneurs in New Zealand are property developers and finance companies, we have the wrong definition. These are people who build shitty properties, raise money from the public and then fleece them.

—Derek Handley on why NZ’s default definition of ‘success’ is broken.