Kiwis Team up at World Fair

www.stuff.co.nz
21 March 2005

By Reuben Schwarz

New Zealand ICT companies at last week's CeBIT conference in Hannover say they scored big off the country's stand, with visitors lining up to try out Kiwi technology at Europe's biggest computer fair.

"People were queuing up for it," says New Zealand Trade and Enterprise ICT sector director Hans Frauenlob, who helped organise the stand.

"Every company there got at least something positive from the experience."

Funded from a $560,000 grant, the stand featured a large plasma screen television displaying a presentation by Dunedin's Animation Research, the company which developed the technology to animate the America's Cup.

The screen was linked to a system from Auckland firm NextWindow that let visitors manipulate images using their hands.

The two companies hadn't worked together before CeBIT.

NextWindow chief executive Al Monro says the company signed up two European resellers at CeBIT.

AdvertisementAdvertisement"We got quite a lot of leads. The measure is still whether that converts into sales, but the level of enthusiasm was fantastic," he says.

"We got a huge number of people through our stand. We were just flat out from day one."

Mr Monro used the conference to show off the prototype of NextWindow's latest touchscreen technology, its first product to target the large point-of-sale market in restaurants and for ticketing and ATMs.

He says the technology on show at the stand helped change Europeans' perception of New Zealand.

"People were genuinely very surprised. People's perception of New Zealand is very much lamb and Lord of the Rings. We're not known for our ICT."

The NZTE grant helped 16 New Zealand companies attend the event, which ran from March 10-16. The Immigration Service also had a booth to field questions from prospective migrants.

"A lot of people at the show were interested in migrating to New Zealand," Mr Frauenlob says.

The stand was branded "New Zealand New Thinking" to boost the nation's image of ICT creativity.

To promote the stand, postcards were given out to all attendees that displayed "augmented reality" animation of kiwis, silver ferns and rugby balls when imaged by technology from Christchurch's Human Interface Technology (Hit) Lab.

Hit Lab general manager Richard Bishop says the organisation scored "a dozen or so" good leads with European companies and research institutions.

NZTE asked Hit Lab to supply technology to show off the country's talent and attract people to the stand.

The centrepiece of the stand was a 2.5 by 2.5 metre 3D projection by California-based but majority Kiwi-owned firm Right Hemisphere.

Newly-formed industry group Outsource2NewZealand, which hopes to attract outsourcing work from Britain, also attended CeBIT, but mainly to scope out the competition. Spokesman Garth Hamilton says there is an opportunity for New Zealand to brand itself as a "hotbed of innovation", a place to design software instead of cutting code, as Indian outsourcers do.

The group says it scored one solid lead from the event.

Mr Hamilton says the costs of attending CeBIT would have run to about $30,000 for the group's two-man crew without the subsidy from NZTE.

Other companies at CeBIT included Wellington's AfterMail, Terralink and Auckland GPS firm Navman.

Mr Frauenlob says there were many positive comments on the collaboration between companies at the New Zealand stand, who would cross-sell each other's products.

"By the end of the week there was a real `team New Zealand' feeling about it. It's very unusual to see companies acting that way at any event like CeBIT."

The NZTE grant covered public relations, NZTE staff travel, a "networking" event, and the construction of the stand. It also partially covered space hire and companies' travel costs.

There were 6270 companies from 69 countries at the event.