Startup World Cup NZ Regional, Raumati#
The Techstars Startup Digest New Zealand email nudged me toward the Startup World Cup NZ Regional final at Coastlands Theatre in Raumati. Transmission Gully should have been a calm evening run, but Wellington’s gusts and sideways rain demanded both hands on the wheel. We arrived damp, greeted by a foyer full of old friends and a sponsor-funded table of dumplings and chicken skewers that kept the pre-show conversations lively.
I’ve sat through judging panels before and rarely enjoyed the wait, even when the right team wins. This time I slipped out before the verdict and promised myself I’d compare notes once Scoop Techstars Startup Digest publishes the official recap. As I write, I genuinely don’t know who took the trophy, so here’s my shortlist from the floor.
Highlights from the Pitch Floor#
Scentian Bio: Translating Scent into Data#
Andrew Kralicek and the Scentian Bio team delivered the pitch that stayed with me. Their handheld “insect nose on a chip” mimics the olfactory system of insects to translate metabolic signals into usable data. Food supply chains are the first frontier, with the promise of rapid quality checks that can sit on a loading dock instead of a laboratory bench. But the platform potential stretches far wider:
- Health: Spotting early disease markers otherwise trapped in specialist diagnostics.
- Biosecurity: Detecting invasive insects or plant pathogens before they spread.
- Environment: Monitoring air quality, toxins, and industrial hazards in the field.
What impressed me most was the engineering backbone under the story. Andrew went deep on calibration, data models, and the need for APIs other developers can trust. It was a rare pitch where the operational scaffolding sounded as considered as the science.
“These signals are a chemical language just waiting to be translated.” — Scentian Bio
Orba Shoes: Sustainability with Discipline#
Orba, a certified B Corp from Kāpiti, took a different path to the judges’ shortlist. Their Ghost sneaker keeps style in play while using more than 95% bio-based, biodegradable materials. The team walked us through each component — flax yarn canvas, natural rubber soles, cotton eyelets — and the independent testing that validates every claim. They pair that with social sustainability, funding supplier training programmes to meet the BSCI code of conduct and holding partners to their own Supplier Code of Conduct.
The transparency is refreshing: Orba publish how each material breaks down and why it was chosen. The only wrinkle flagged in Q&A was how every design tweak triggers a lengthy recertification cycle. The rigour is admirable, yet you could hear the exasperation. My hope is they keep leaning into that discipline rather than looking for shortcuts when the paperwork piles up.
Goldie: Clear Story, Open Questions#
Goldie, led by Campbell Maclachlan, offered a confident take on fractional ownership of tangible assets — gold, silver, art, and collectibles. “$0 marketing; the name says it all,” was the opening salvo, backed by a gleaming gold bar on stage and a product that blends secure, treasury-grade storage with a direct, no-middleman platform. The clarity of their brand and the ease of the demo made the investment case feel within reach for newcomers.
Where I’m still curious is the plumbing behind the promise: custody arrangements, settlement flows, and the economics of onboarding investors without heavy marketing spend. There’s a difference between articulating trust and engineering it. I’m keen to see how their operational model matures as they chase scale.
Ops Matters: Why OpsDev.NZ Shows Up#
Even the non-software teams on stage depend on invisible infrastructure: billing rides on SaaS, logistics lean on APIs, and customer trust crumbles if notifications stall. Yet operations still gets treated as an afterthought until a failure forces the point.
OpsDev.NZ is our response. The initiative keeps development anchored in operations from day one, so early-stage teams can onboard to cloud, comms, and data platforms without inheriting fiscal or technical debt. We are still shaping the collective, but the goal is plain: shared tools, automation, and governance patterns that help founders focus on shipping value instead of untangling brittle systems.
Reducing toil is a big part of that mission. Toil is the repetitive, manual, soul-sapping work that burns out engineers and erodes quality. It’s not just an SRE mantra; it’s a survival strategy for startups that want to grow responsibly. If the concept is new, the short explainer Reducing Toil — Site Reliability Engineering Foundation is a solid primer. The collective is still forming, but nights like Raumati prove the appetite for ops conversations that sit alongside product strategy rather than behind it.
What’s Next for SMUNZ#
The future stays collective. We’ll keep building on OpenCollective.com while OpsDev.NZ matures from idea into toolkit. Immediate priorities are to stabilise income by closing out current negotiations, publish the DNS-as-Code workflow alongside KiwiPyCon 2025 prep, and lock in a 2.5-day-per-week director so governance and partnerships don’t stall when client work spikes.
If a resilient, ops-first approach to startup building resonates, let’s talk. I’m especially keen to hear from people with board-level experience and an organiser’s mindset who could help steward SMUNZ. Drop a line at john@startmeup.nz or flag your interest and we’ll follow up once the formal expression-of-interest page goes live.
Nice to see everyone who braved the weather and kept the Raumati energy high. Nights like this make the quiet, methodical work between headline moments feel worthwhile.
Update: After publication I learned from the Techstars Startup Digest recap that the judges and I agreed on the winner, though my runner-up and third place picks diverged from the final call. Their write-up captures what actually happened on the night, and you can sign up for their excellent newsletter at read.letterhead.email/techstars-new-zealand.