By SIMON COLLINS
A hightech company created to service New Zealand's Think Big industries in the 1980s has become one of the world's top four consulting firms making sure industrial installations are safe and operating efficiently.
MPT-Matcor, a joint venture between NZ state-owned Industrial Research and Singapore's Matcor, is based in a
"science park"' next to the National University of Singapore - a model for proposed science parks in New Zealand.
The joint venture earned revenue of around $1 million last year. It is one of a new breed of businesses that have become world leaders in their fields while remaining based in small countries such as New Zealand, Singapore, Israel and Ireland.
"We have grown from being an unknown engineering consultancy to a global player - we are one of four," says chief executive Dr Andy Tack.
The company's three main competitors are in the United States and Europe.
Tack, a New Zealander, has a staff of four in the joint venture. Matcor has 12 in the next office, and Materials Performance Technologies, a subsidiary of Industrial Research, has staff in Auckland, Wellington, Brisbane and Melbourne.
Tack says the company began when the former Department of Scientific and Industrial Research (DSIR) built up expertise in industrial materials to support Think Big projects such as the methanol and synthetic petrol plants in Taranaki and the Huntly power station.
"With the change in the [NZ] economy, the requirement for that expertise diminished, so we ventured offshore," he says.
"We were doing work in Asia and sourcing it in New Zealand - going to a power station or refinery and providing an assessment of their equipment."
Much of the company's work came through the Singapore company Matcor, so the joint venture was formed with it in 1998-99.
Two of its major clients are Shell and BP, which used to have in-house experts but now contract the work out.
The company is one of about 100 high-tech tenants in Singapore's Science Park, a location that allows MPT-Matcor to work with academics in several university departments and provide traineeships.
"One of the biggest issues we face as a business is 'succession planning'," says Tack. "We need 10 years' experience to get someone up to speed with a refinery job unaided, so we feel we need to get people in as early as possible."
Singapore's Economic Development Board pays part of the wages of trainees and part of the cost of bringing "talent" into the country. "They need overseas talent. The philosophy here is build the infrastructure and the business will come," says Tack.
The science park is different from the "incubators" now being established by New Zealand universities, where new high-tech companies can get business help on-site.
In Singapore, some companies have graduated from incubators into the science park, where they are merely tenants but encouraged to interact with the university.
In New Zealand, science parks are still a new idea. The first one is being developed by the software company Jade in Christchurch. Auckland University is planning a technology park next to its Tamaki campus - a project given a boost last month when the multinational switching company Allied Telesyn agreed to endow a chair in data communications to be located at Tamaki.
The Fisher Trust plans a $500 million business park called Highbrook on 293ha on the Waiouru Peninsula, between East Tamaki and Otahuhu. Peter Walker and Partners from Silicon Valley have been employed to design it, with construction due to start in September next year.
The Smale family plans to extend the office park on their 12.5ha property which already houses Clear Communications' headquarters at Smales Farm, Takapuna. A new head office for Tranz Rail is now under construction, and a hotel and buildings for high-tech businesses are planned.
Neil Developments plans a 5ha technology park near Massey University at Albany, alongside the ASB Bank's $20 million advanced technology centre now under construction. Manager Keith Maddison is talking to "a couple of parties" and hopes development will start this year.
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<i>Our turn:</i> From the ashes of Think Big
By SIMON COLLINS
A hightech company created to service New Zealand's Think Big industries in the 1980s has become one of the world's top four consulting firms making sure industrial installations are safe and operating efficiently.
MPT-Matcor, a joint venture between NZ state-owned Industrial Research and Singapore's Matcor, is based in a
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