NZTE gives $560,000 for technology exhibition

New Zealand was represented at the CeBIT computer expo in Germany by 16 companies.

New Zealand Trade and Enterprise is spending $560,000 to give the country's ICT industry a strong presence at the CeBIT computer expo in Germany.

NZTE's acting director of ICT, Hans Frauenlob, said a professional and cutting-edge pavilion had been built to show off 16 leading Kiwi companies.

"A combination of ARL's America's Cup technology and NextWindow's giant touch screen is stopping people in their tracks in the aisles and blowing them away," said Frauenlob from Hanover, where the expo finishes tomorrow.

Frauenlob said NZTE's outlay on the expo was evidence of a huge ramping up of commitment to the industry.

"Almost every company here has reported serious and solid leads and they are all positive about the experience so far."

CeBIT 2005 marked the launch of the "New Zealand New Thinking" campaign, aimed at helping New Zealand businesses compete globally.

"One of NZTE's key objectives is to help high-growth, export-orientated companies establish strong commercial positions in targeted offshore markets and CeBIT fits extremely well with this," Frauenlob said.

Rod Drury, chief executive of email archiving and management developer and exhibitor AfterMail, said Kiwi exhibitors worked together to make sure New Zealand stood out.

The trade show has 6270 exhibitors on 309,000sq m of floor space in 36 halls and pavilions.

Drury said the NZTE stand had been actively searched out by distributors and resellers interested in Kiwi innovation.

He had about 30 "great leads" to follow up when he returned. But he won't have just new business contacts to chase up. Many visitors to the stand came armed with CVs looking for work in New Zealand.

Drury said CeBIT had been a vital education in the differences in international business culture, regulation and requirements.

"It's really influenced the way we're going to go to the market around the world from here on," Drury said.

Jamie Macdonald, head of Auckland-based Navman's wireless data division, said the level of activity on the company's stand had left him almost hoarse from talking.

"On a New Zealand scale it's enormous. The category we're working in, which is a combination of navigation, telematics and fleet tracking, has grown significantly."

Macdonald said at the same event a year ago there were a handful of exhibitors in each of those product groups, whereas now a hall was dedicated to the category.

"We've been growing in this category in the past three or four years and our reputation has been growing as well. But there's no doubt about it - the competition is increasing. The key emphasis [for attendees] here is to take a look at this year's and next year's products which are on display - both ours and other companies.

"There are a lot of buyers from around the world - manufacturing companies, distribution companies and other people who are getting into the market and are interested in buying components from companies like Navman and building their own solutions." Macdonald expected to leave the event with new "partners, opportunities and orders".

Navman is also promoting a new GPS range - Sport Tool - for consumer buyers. It's designed for wearing on the arm or shoulder so the display can be seen in the course of whatever activity it's intended for.

Macdonald said the company was open to finding European distributors for the range.

"That's part of the focus here - looking for distributors."

Exhibiting at CeBIT was not cheap, he said.

"It is a substantial investment. It's a sum of money that a small company would find it difficult to do alone.

"But that's where New Zealand Trade and Enterprise has been useful to some of the small companies coming here. They're able to take advantage of that bigger New Zealand picture and piggy-back on it.

"We're partnering with NZTE - so we're present on their stand and also have our own Navman stand."

Small companies might also find a larger company to partner with. Companies of the scale of Vodafone and Intel might take an entire hall, whereas Navman's stand, with about 35 staff, is 100 sq m.

Kiwi representatives at CeBIT 2005:

* Animation Research: Computer graphics production facility.

* AfterMail: Email archiving and management developer.

* EMS-Cortex: Produces a secure application provisioning platform for managed services.

* Endace: Developer of network interface technology.

* The Human Interface Technology Laboratory New Zealand: Human-computer interaction research centre.

* i-lign: Project, portfolio, workload, decision and risk-management integration specialist.

* Navman: Manufacturer of consumer and commercial electronics using the global positioning system.

* NextWindow: Specialist in high-quality touch screen technology.

* Information Edge: Developer of enterprise performance management software.

* Investment New Zealand: New Zealand Government's national investment promotion agency.

* New Zealand Supercomputing Centre: Telecom New Zealand and Weta Digital joint venture.

* Outsource2NewZealand: Outsourcing organisation for software development projects.

* Prolificx: Electronics designer and manufacturer for telematics and mobile data applications.

* Right Hemisphere: Provider of enterprise software for visual communication.

* Talkingtech: Computer telephony and interactive voice response solutions developer.

* Terralink International: Geographic information system and mapping solutions provider.