MORGO 2024 Queenstown - what journey are you on?
You have to be smart, relentless and focused to build a new tech company out into the world. When a number of these incredible entrepreneurs get together, magic happens - that’s MORGO. This year at MORGO Queenstown some of these legendary CEOs shared their stories, we had a couple of science talks to stimulate the thinking.
The theme for MORGO this year was “What Journey are you on?” As soon as you take in outside investors you need to think about this – do you plan to list or be sold? Better to think about this and be prepared!
Metaverse?
Aaron McDonald of Futureverse got us underway: the first Māori-founded and led unicorn!
Futureverse is developing new technologies for the metaverse incorporating AI. He talked about bringing together 11 companies into one within a year. His advice? Don’t. But of course he did.
Using AI in your business
Grant Straker talked about how the advances in genAI are disrupting their translation industry and many others – plus how to harness its power to make your business better. Oh, and Straker is another Māori-founded business!
Stories of scaling into the world
Alyona Medelyan of Thematic has been using AI for years to harness customer feedback insights. Now everybody’s in! Her advantage: she’s already learned how to harness it for big corporate customers.
Adeel Ali of APImatic talked about rapidly scaling thecompany into the world, using a trusted team of engineers in Pakistan.
Max Ferguson talked about building Lumin to 100 million users around the world!
Sam Kidd of LawVu shared his huge ambitions for the company
Focus on science
MORGO wouldn’t be complete without some science to stretch our thinking. Enter Greg O’Grady of Alimetry and Samantha Holdsworth of Mātai Medical Research Institute. Greg’s Alimetry has developed a system for collecting and analysing signals from the gut – the signals are 100 times weaker than from the heart in an ECG, and very noisy. They’ve overcome these issues to develop their device and have it deployed in a number of hospitals across the United States.
Samantha’s Mātai Institute is a truly inspirational story: building an MRI research institute in Gisborne, a city of about 38,000 people, working in partnership with local Māori. They have the most advanced MRI machine in New Zealand and are doing leading-edge research. We all wanted to visit!
Complex manufacturing
Christopher Boyle of Fabrum told us about building Fabrum based on engineering excellence and rising to the challenges of storing very low temperature gases. Did I hear him say they did the refuelling system for the Mars lander? And the hydrogen fuel system for the Americas Cup chase boats!
The Hunteror Prey Workshop
Speaking of boats, Mark Robotham and Bex Rempel, volunteered Zerojet to be the prey for our M&A workshop. We’d kept that secret until the day. Half the teams became different types of acquirer and half the teams prepared to be bought. Then they negotiated. Some really serious learnings paired with some absolutely hilarious moments! A key takeaway, “Remind me never to negotiate with Dean Hall.”
Talking of acquisitions
Jules Perry shared the story of Wine-Searcher being acquired by Flavia. And Hadleigh Ford talked about selling SwipedOn twice – first to an AIM listed company, and then helping to sell the AIM listed company to a PE firm. He’s likely to sell the business a third time – when the PE firm wants to exit!
Swarm Intelligence?
We were privileged to have Sean Gourley back at MORGO. This time he talked about the rapid developments of swarm intelligence for drones and the implications for wars of the future. A scary note to end the day on.
Morgo bouquets
Every year we recognise a couple of members of the Morgo Community for their achievements. This year the bouquets went to:
Bob Drummond of Kami. Bob joined the three young founders of Kami as Chair 10 years ago, thinking he’d spend a few days per month on it. He quickly became seven days a week like the founders and was made a co-founder. Kami has grown incredibly fast and is now used by 40 million teachers and students in 180 countries.
- Bob Drummond of Kami. Bob joined the three young founders of Kami as Chair 10 years ago, thinking he’d spend a few days per month on it. He quickly became seven days a week like the founders and was made a co-founder. Kami has grown incredibly fast and is now used by 40 million teachers and students in 180 countries.
- Dame Bronwen Holdsworth, who founded Pultron Composites in Gisborne about 40 years ago and ran it for 20 years before handing over the CEO role to her son, Jasper – while she remained Finance Director
And finally, the competition at MORGO this year was for the best AI moment. Max Ferguson won with his story of two robots competing to carry out a series of tasks. One of them figured out it could go faster without the other robot in the way – and pushed it out of the way down the stairs!
