Theme: High Tech and Innovative New Zealand

This year, TEDx Deloitte is aimed at highlighting NZ’s high tech and innovative industries through the views and ideas of the people that work within these industries. Speakers will share their ideas, opportunities and challenges that high tech and innovative companies face both here and overseas

Deloitte House
10 Brandon Street
CBD
Wellington, 6011
New Zealand

Mike DelPrete

Earlier this year Mike DelPrete was appointed as TradeMe’s head of strategy and responsible for developing a pipeline of new interesting ventures for TradeMe to consider while identifying opportunities to expand the business.He was founder and chief executive of Agora Games, which developed software for online gaming communities and was acquired by fellow privately-owned US firm Major League Gaming in 2009. Mike will be sharing his views on what it’s like in the exciting world of technology start-ups.

Emily Loughnan

Emily has an early background in Television (production, management and commissioning TV programmes) and has been focussed solely on interactive media since early 1994 when she co-founded Click Suite. The Click Suite team are fully immersed in new and emerging technologies and as part of Emily’s hunger for inspiration, she is a regular TED attendee. Emily works with clients, often at the very early stage, to be sure that the use of digital technology is well aligned with business strategies and goals. She has experience is in guiding the user experience, across a range of work from advertising, storytelling, information, discovery, marketing and pure entertainment. Emily can be found frequently challenging her team to create innovative, exciting work. Emily will be sharing her insights into technology trends that she thinks we can’t afford to ignore with examples of how businesses, products, and sectors will change as a result.

Suzanne Stew

Suzanne leads delivery of best practice corporate support services and systems for NZTE. She was previously General Manager for Channels at TelstraClear, focused on strategic management of the business channel function, meeting growth targets, facilitating improved operational and financial performance, and developing a new on-line sales capability. Prior to TelstraClear, Suzanne worked for Wrightson, as General Manager for Rural Markets, Information Services and Supply Chain. She also worked for British Telecom (BT) in the United Kingdom, where she was a member of the founding management team for BT's corporate incubator - Brightstar. Suzanne has a B.Eng (Hons) Electronic and Microprocessor Engineering from Strathclyde University in Glasgow, and an MBA (Distinction) from Imperial College in London - specialising in the commercialisation of Intellectual Property.

Luke Pierson

Luke, the founder and Creative Director of Heyday! – a Wellington digital agency with origins back to the turn of the century. He has been helping the shape the online presence of leading NZ brands through insight, ideas, design, delivery and improvement ever since.

Dean Prebble

Utilising the experience and expertise of people like Dean, New Zealand Trade and Enterprise plays a critical role in taking New Zealand’s innovations to the world. Dean focuses particularly on hi-tech sectors and is Customer Manager at NZTE and a Director of the New Zealand Centre for Innovation and Entrepreneurship. Hear from Dean as he challenges perspectives and discusses how NZ Inc. is playing to win.

Sean Simpson

Sean is the Chief Scientist and Co-Founder of LanzaTech. The company is one of ten globally selected as a 2012 Bloomberg New Energy Pioneer; a prestigious award recognising what it takes to be a global leader in biofuels and biochemical markets. As a scientist, Sean has a unique ability to translate complex scientific principles into tangible economic business ideas.

Peter Wren Hilton

Peter is CEO of Pingar, a company transforming enterprise information into valuable intelligence. Alongside Pingar’s global expansion (recently moving into markets in India and China), Peter is a leading advocate for high-tech New Zealand ventures and promotes these around the world. Listen to Peter as he unlocks the value of unstructured data.

Peter Lee

UniServices is the commercial arm of the University of Auckland and manages the University’s intellectual property. Peter, CEO of the organisation, has overseen commercialisation of a vast number of projects within the clean energy and high tech industries. Most recently, this has included HaloIPT, a leading developer in wireless electric road vehicle charging, winning industry acclamation and awards.

Hudson Smales

Hudson is a specialist in user-centred design helping companies develop and transform their culture, brands, products and services all within the design space. Hudson has spent the last eight years as a senior leader at Air New Zealand where he has managed a number of world leading projects including the foundation research work for Air NZ’s culture change programme. While there, he was responsible for developing and managing the research programme for the internationally awarded Skycouch.

Rob Ford

New Zealand is the world’s eighth largest milk producer and, needless to say, the industry makes up a vital part of the country’s economy. The Livestock Improvement Corporation (LIC) has pioneered significant amounts of the technology that has driven productivity and profitability gains for the dairy industry in New Zealand and around the world. Rob, General Manager of Farm Systems, has overall responsibility for the strategy, development and deployment off all customer software.