The Minister for Digital Services, Clare Curran, was sacked after failing to declare a meeting with Handley.
The Government didn’t follow through on the job offer, deciding that New Zealand didn’t need a chief technology officer after all, despite Handley having moved his whole family home from New York to take up the position.
“It was extremely difficult for the family. I would not want anyone to be under that kind of pressure and or light,” he says.
Handley describes 60 days of intense media scrutiny where he felt “like a football”.
“To me [it] was the epitome of the difference between people and politics,” he says.
“It was the kind of crystallisation of everything that’s wrong with politics and politicians and the vast difference between what they say and how they behave.”
“I wouldn’t wish it on anybody. The only thing I regret is not actually suing the Government.”
Speaking to Money Talks, Handley talks about the numerous start-ups he’s launched, including Feverpitch, HyperFactory and his most recent venture, Aera ... which is tackling the housing market.
Handley recalls the culture shock of moving from Hong Kong, where he grew up with his Scottish father and Malay/Chinese mother, at age 14.
“I was excited, but I was also leaving at a time when I had almost full autonomy in Hong Kong. It’s very safe. You’re just out any time at night ... you’re able to do a lot as a kid,” he says.
“Then I come here and you can’t go anywhere, it’s very hard to get around. That was the biggest shock.”
Handley started at Selwyn College in Auckland and immediately went into business.
He noticed that computer games were very expensive in New Zealand and, with the help of his best friend in Hong Kong, set up a parallel importing business.
“I would just start selling these things in the trade and exchange. So our phone, our house phone, would just be ringing like mentally. And my Dad was like, what is, what are all these people ringing about? And they’re coming over to buy like a pack of Sega games or something.”
Despite starting out as a tech entrepreneur with companies such as online sports betting app FeverPitch and mobile marketing company Hyperfactory (which he sold for a substantial but undisclosed sum in 2010), Handley says he’s never seen himself as a tech guru.
“No, it was more just, that’s where the opportunity was.”
He says his real passion is creating things and making things happen, so he doesn’t see his latest venture Aera – which is all about getting young Kiwis into their first homes – as a change of tack.
“I got into this because when I came home from the US, during Covid, this housing issue was so explosive,” Handley says.
“It was all over the news every day and the friends and family were like, how do I get into a house? It’s crazy. I’m never gonna be able to get one.”
“I was like, what’s going on here? Why is this so nuts? And is anyone gonna do anything differently about it?”
Handley says he spent two years looking at the issue and considering what the major roadblock for most people was.
He concludes that a lot of the problem was that the logistics were daunting.
“Number one, it was highly manual. Number two, it’s all intermediary and separated out, so it’s not like there’s one service that helps you from the beginning to the end,” he says.
“Number three, there’s no digitisation of the journey ... of education, of coaching, of finding, and getting a mortgage, of finding and getting a house.”
And there were people collecting commission every step of the way.
“So my theory was: you create one brand that helps somebody from the beginning to the end,” he says.
“You digitise as much of it as possible so they can have self-learning modules and steps that they take to get to that finish line. And as you get to the finish line, you help them get the loan, you help them get the house, and you split the commission with them.”
Listen to the full episode to hear more from Derek Handley.
Money Talks is a podcast run by the NZ Herald. It isn’t about personal finance and isn’t about economics – it’s just well-known New Zealanders talking about money and sharing some stories about the impact it’s had on their lives and how it has shaped them.
The series is hosted by Liam Dann, business editor-at-large for the Herald. He is a senior writer and columnist and also presents and produces videos and podcasts. He joined the Herald in 2003.
Money Talks is available on iHeartRadio, Spotify, Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts.
