NZi3 (New Zealand’s ICT Innovation Institute) was created in 2007 to be the national ICT (Information and Communication Technology) research and innovation centre for New Zealand (NZ). The institute’s goal was to be the “hothouse” of strategic ICT research. It aimed to be a globally-recognised innovation centre that transforms ideas from the lab, across the innovation gap, into industry. It was to provide leadership in an entrepreneurially-focused, applied research approach, attracting world-class researchers and students, as well as creating partnerships with industry to drive ideas to the marketplace.
NZi3 is based in Christchurch (in the middle of the South Island) on the campus of the University of Canterbury (UC). It was created with a total investment of NZ$30M, with a third coming from each of UC, the NZ government, and the founding industry sponsors (Jade Software, Tait Electronics, IBM NZ, and Hewlett Packard NZ). From the NZ government perspective, placing NZi3 in Christchurch was important because of its ICT industry and the technology capabilities of UC.
Dr. Darin Graham was selected from a pool of global innovation leaders to be the inaugural Executive Director of NZi3 and moved his innovation endeavours from Canada to New Zealand (NZ) for three years. He literally helped construct the institute from the ground up, arriving before the building designs were finalised and ground yet to be broken. In addition to helping create a collaborative space for stakeholder engagement, he built relationships with the local ICT community, including the software development cluster and venture capital (VC) firms, as well as with other universities, corporations, government, and innovation centres throughout NZ. Based on his extensive academic-industry partnership experience, several initial joint programs were developed to engage the industry founders, academic teams, and start-up companies.
Advantages
Technology Strengths – The basic research themes of the centre were primarily aligned with the globally leading research capabilities of UC. Many of the research projects were directly supported by the industry partners. The principal themes were: Disabilities Assistive Technology, Geospatial, Human Interface Technology, Wireless Communications, Software Engineering, Artificial Intelligence, and High-Performance Computing. Inter-disciplinary activities between research themes were strongly encouraged.
Collaboration Centre – From the start, a building was a crucial element in the effort to create a collaborative centre for interaction. The building itself has won international architectural awards for integrating some unique structural capabilities and was the first academic building in NZ to receive a 5-Star Green Rating. It is not just the design of the building that is unique, but how it supports open collaboration. The gem of this facility is the second floor – an open 2,300m2 area with no pillars or walls, and floor-to-ceiling windows to capture the natural light. This space housed all of NZi3’s technology research areas, mixing disciplines as well as academic researchers, industry employees, and start-up companies. To create practical innovation, “proximity matters” was a guiding principle. As hoped, the silos of technology sectors and academic-industry segmentation disappeared in this shared idea-generating atmosphere.
Industry Engagement – One of the underlying objectives for NZi3 was to create economic growth for NZ’s ICT industry. Two well established, NZ-founded, global-tech leaders – Tait Electronics (wireless) and Jade Software – embraced the NZi3 concept as a way to advance their global market positions and support leading-edge academic researchers. IBM NZ and Hewlett Packard NZ became involved by supporting critical hardware, such as a Blue Gene supercomputer for research, and telecommunications hardware to create one of the most advanced tech facilities in the Southern Hemisphere. Even early on, NZi3 housed several small start-up companies that were directly engaged in some of the technology themes. After the first year, activities were expanded to support the local software cluster and venture capital firms.
Challenges
Location – Christchurch, a city with a population of about 350,000, has few support companies specific to innovation and product development. For an innovation centre to flourish and have an impact, there must be a robust innovation ecosystem with an embedded mentality of creativity and support throughout the region.
University Culture – The creation of NZi3 was on a scale UC had not done before and did not fully appreciate the level of effort needed to support this applied research and industry-based institute. The university’s financial mechanisms and drivers needed alignment to fund such an endeavour.
Summary
NZi3 did build strong innovation foundations – with both large and small industry partners. Industry had been invigorated by their experience in the collaborative NZi3 culture and took the innovation concepts to heart. Jade and Tait developed their own in-house innovation facilities, creating several start-ups from technology within their companies, and proactively engaging with other smaller software companies in the community. In this way, the spirit of NZi3 did indeed have a lasting impact on the ICT industry in NZ.