A new event every week bringing you interesting, informative sessions with people from our community, on topics that you’ve asked for. Our format is all about engagement, dialogue and learning! Come join our community of 4,500 people, ask your questions and learn some stuff!
Join us online, September 19th @ 10am (NZT) to hear from Cassie Roma, Head of Content Marketing @ The Warehouse Group.
We’ll be discussing:
Storytelling
The Role of Social Media in the Marketing Mix (new & emerging channels & learnings)
The Importance of Brand over Time
Tune in, or catch up later, we bring you a digestible format that you can listen to whilst at your desk working, or come back and watch the recording later.
SPEAKER BIO: Cassie Roma | Head of Content Marketing @ The Warehouse Group
A San Diego girl transplanted in Auckland, New Zealand, I’ve got my feet firmly planted in two hemispheres.
As a born creative with my head firmly in the clouds – I’m most at home playing the role of storyteller, public speaker, writer, media strategist and photographer. In fact, I love nothing more than connecting with people and places. And, in doing so, delving into the stories and experiences that both bind us as human beings, and allow us to stand out as individuals. Cheesy, but true.
By day I get my kicks as a Head of Content for some of New Zealand’s most beloved brands – working alongside innovative, creative, and kind people to help brands & influencers find their own unique voice. And, in doing so, marrying geekery, content strategies, & creativity to create memorable moments & strong engagement in an omni-channel world.
I’m also a keynote and public speaker. I am blessed to have had the opportunity to share my thoughts, experiences, & insights in many countries across around the world. Some highlights include VidCon, Social Media Marketing World, NZFW, Simpliflying, and New Zealand’s own Digital Day Out.
HOST: SIAN SIMPSON | Director of Community & Content @ Kiwi Landing Pad
Kiwi Landing Pad (KLP) was established in 2011 to help New Zealand high growth technology companies expand into the US market. KLP is a rapidly growing community created by entrepreneurs for entrepreneurs.
A new event every week bringing you interesting, informative sessions with people from our community, on topics that you’ve asked for. Our format is all about engagement, dialogue and learning! Come join our community of 4,500 people, ask your questions and learn some stuff!
Join us online, August 22nd @ 10am (NZT) to hear from Tanya Neary, People Geek @ CultureAmp.
We’ll be discussing:
Why should I hire an SDR
When is the right time to hire
What does a good SDR and AE relationship look like
Tune in, or catch up later, we bring you a digestible format that you can listen to whilst at your desk working, or come back and watch the recording later.
SPEAKER BIO: Tanya Neary | People Geek @ CultureAmp.
Tanya Neary joined Australian start up Culture Amp post Series A as employee number 35 and one of the early sales team members. 3 years on, Culture Amp now employs 200 people across 4 offices and works with over 1400 customers worldwide. Prior to working at Culture Amp Tanya started her career in Financial Services working in Retail Banking and Asset Management in Ireland. Working in Financial Services during the recession gave Tanya a real taste for how companies operate from a culture, customer and industry perspective in extremely trying times. Landing in Australia in 2009 Tanya worked in Recruitment and Employee Benefits prior to joining Culture Amp in 2015.
HOST: SIAN SIMPSON | Director of Community & Content @ Kiwi Landing Pad
Kiwi Landing Pad (KLP) was established in 2011 to help New Zealand high growth technology companies expand into the US market. KLP is a rapidly growing community created by entrepreneurs for entrepreneurs.
Join us online August 8th @ 10AM NZT to hear from Angie Judge, CEO & Co-founder @ Dexibit.
Tune in live, or catch up later; we bring you a digestible format that you can listen to whilst at your desk working, or come back and watch the recording later.
SPEAKER BIO: Angie Judge | CEO & Co-founder @ Dexibit
Angie Judge is the CEO & Co-founder of Dexibit, empowering the world’s cultural future with artificial intelligence. For visitor attractions like museums, Dexibit’s award winning big data analytics software predicts, analyses and reports on visitor experience and venue performance to enable commercial and social outcomes.
Judge is a prominent speaker on the topics of AI and big data, having presented at numerous conferences and events globally including TEDx, the American Alliance of Museums, AI Day, and as a keynote speaker at the Microsoft Ignite conference. She also guest lectures in data science, and talks to young women about building careers in STEM.
Furthermore, Judge is the Co-Chair of the Museum Computer Network’s Data & Insights SIG, Deputy Chair of the Media & Technology Leadership Team for the American Alliance of Museums Professional Network, and runs a series of regular working groups for attractions analytics.
HOST: SIAN SIMPSON | Director of Community & Content @ Kiwi Landing Pad
Kiwi Landing Pad (KLP) was established in 2011 to help New Zealand high growth technology companies expand into the US market. KLP is a rapidly growing community created by entrepreneurs for entrepreneurs.
Every month at the Kiwi Landing Pad, we do a monthly update that covers who is in, what’s going on, and companies we have meet, come across or talked with lately, they are in varying industries and stages and in no particular order, sometimes old, sometimes new.
To subscribe for updates please follow this link or send us an email to [email protected]
NZ Companies you should know – check them out:
GameStatix - Gamestatix is a social platform for the co-creation of PC games, that recognises, encourages and rewards user contribution, whilst giving game developers access to global pool of talent to efficiently generate, curate and promote their content.
Couchdrop - Couchdrop is the only true Cloud SCP, SFTP and Rsync server. Couchdrop lets you SCP, SFTP and Rsync directly to cloud storage (Dropbox, Box, BackblazeB2, GoogleDrive etc.). With Couchdrop you do not need to install additional software as it uses the native Rsync, SFTP and SCP applications. Couchdrop offers a secure means of transfer as both applications run over SSH.
Wine Grenade - The Wine Grenade is a simple and cost effective tool to help winemakers make great reds through the process of micro-oxygenation.
Re-leased - Re-Leased is a powerful, award-winning cloud-based commercial property management software.
SwipedOn- Welcome people into your world with a smart but simple visitor management solution. Our paperless gateway makes connecting people intuitive and easy.
Tradify - The app of choice for thousands of Tradies. Track jobs from quote to invoice and everything in between.
A2X - Automated Accounting For Amazon Marketplace Sales, Fees, Cost Of Goods Sold, And FBA Inventory
Cemplicity - The Cemplicity Aim - a powerful patient voice. We believe every patient should have the opportunity to tell their story and that a patient’s positive view of their own health is the ultimate measure of success.
Aider.ai- Aider is the digital assistant for your small business. Using the latest AI technology, Aider helps small business stay connected and utilize insights to make smarter business decisions. Ask Aider questions from anywhere, get easy answers, then share the learnings with your staff, partners and advisors. Aider is your business’ own AI engine.
Orbica - Location Data Connectivity. Orbica unlocks the value of location data to create effective business solutions and products. You’ll develop new insights that improve and accelerate your decision making, increase performance, reduce risks and costs, enhance your customer’s experience and generate revenue.
“Building a business is hard, building a global business is even harder” - Sam Morgan
The idea for Kiwi Landing Pad began in the Kiwi entrepreneurial community in 2008 with a small group of entrepreneurs reflecting on their own journey and how to make it easier for the next wave of entrepreneurs to successfully follow - but faster and smarter.
The New Zealand government planned to invest more to support the technology and innovation ecosystem to make it easier for our companies to land and expand into the US market. During an “NZ Inc” meeting in 2010, John Holt & Sam Morgan put up their hands to collaborate and make the vision of a physical hub in Silicon Valley a reality three years ahead of plan - KLP was born.
In July 2011 we opened our doors in San Francisco for the first time, and with our first residents Xero, Vworkapp and Magritek.
On September 16th 2011, we held our very first Kiwi Landing Pad event. This year it’s now been 6 years, and we’ve had over 250 events with no signs of slowing down, right now we have one a week, at least.
This month we are celebrating the success of 6 years, with 6 events - as our community is global, 4,000 members in 36 countries around the world, we decided to have something for everyone whether thats a jam, webinar or our very first party in New Zealand. We encourage you to come along and meet our community (your peers) and learn more about where we are going in the future.
The Events:
Webinars
September 14th 10am NZT: Kiwi Founder Series - Elizabeth Iorns, CEO & Founder @ Science Exchange
September 21st 10am NZT: How To Actually Close Deals - Emmanuelle Skala, former VP of Sales & Customer Success @ Digital Ocean
Thanks for your support over the last 6 years, onwards to make technology the number #1 export in New Zealand and continue building great businesses, great products and helping Kiwis think big.
Join us online, Friday 23rd June at 10am (NZT) to hear from Kiwi Product guru Zheng Li - VP of Product at Raygun.
Themes:
What do Product Managers actually do, Building and communicating your roadmap, How to avoid the common Product Management pitfalls (dealing with churn, prioritisation, distributed teams, comms and office politics) & exploring a day in the life of a Product Manager (and some tools to help you along the way).
Zheng Li is the VP of Product at Wellington-based software intelligence company, Raygun. Raygun is used by over 40,000 developers worldwide to build better software and websites. The company processes billions of data points every day for customers and provides the most complete crash reporting and real user monitoring solutions on the market. Customers that improve their software with Raygun include Microsoft, Domino’s Pizza, 4 Seasons, Nordstrom and AutoDesk
Zheng has deep product and UX expertise, including four years as Founder and CEO of Zing Design, where her design agency helped traditional businesses create and market their products online. Zheng has 10+ years experience in UX and product design, having previously worked for Trade Me, Rabobank and Nike.
Zheng is an ambassador for FutureinTech, Co-Founder of Women Founders NZ, a Women of Influence Awards double finalist and was named as one of the top 50 Women in Tech in Australasia by the Startup Daily.
To continue the momentum of our Sales & Marketing Jam Series, we’ve listened to your feedback and bring you the next session in our Kiwi Founder Series. The aim is to continue the conversation and bring you awesome people in market who are ‘doing it’ in a simple ‘crowdcast format‘ that allows access to targeted knowledge sharing without taking too much time out of your busy day.
Ask your burning questions, upvote questions you want to see answered, take part in polls and chat with the community while you listen. This is another of those ‘what you put in is what you get out’ type scenarios. We bring you the people; you ask what you want to know.
Join us online Wednesday April 26th @ 10am NZT to hear from Ezel Kokcu - Founder of Passphere & Co-Founder of Area360.
Tune in, or catch up later, we bring you a digestible format that you can listen to whilst at your desk working, or come back and watch the recording later.
SPEAKER BIO: EZEL KOKCU | FOUNDER @ Passphere
Continuing her journey, Ezel has now Co-Founded the event and analytics platform, Passphere that successfully secured investment October 2016 and will see a product launched late 2017 with a core team of 5. Passphere’s initial launch will be in New Zealand with quick movements overseas soon after.
Ezel has a passion for entrepreneurship that was formed at a young age. Ezel spent 3 months travelling around Turkey teaching English in schools for underprivileged children. She then returned to New Zealand to begin working on a degree in Computer Science at Victoria University. While studying, Ezel was involved in a start-up doing social and digital marketing that sparked a passion in starting and growing businesses. Shortly after, starting the discovery and exploration app that disrupted the Museum and Cultural market, STQRY. As Co-Founder of STQRY, Ezel’s ideas and narratives help to guide and shape the business every day.
3 years on, STQRY is now known as Area360 and are shaping the way visitors and organizations engage and share stories on a daily basis. With capital backing from one of the most reputable Venture Capital firms in the United States, Area360 were able to raise $5.5M in funds and are now developing and selling in over 4 countries to over 500 organizations worldwide. The team in New Zealand has grown to 35 and 7 in the United States.
Ezel then decided to move full time in her next venture as Co-Founder of Wellington-based Ticketing startup, Non-Stop Tix. After 18 months of operation, the company was sold to a New Zealand-based private investor.
HOST: SIAN SIMPSON | Global Community Manager @ Kiwi Landing Pad
Kiwi Landing Pad (KLP) was established in 2011 to help New Zealand high growth technology companies expand into the US market. KLP is a rapidly growing community created by entrepreneurs for entrepreneurs.
The SaaStr Annual is this week and what a week it will be. In my opinion one of the best weeks of the year. It’s the annual conference for SaaStr (the blog, if you don’t know it you should) where founders, CEOs, VP’s and VC’s come to meet their peers in SaaS. Learn, hire, connect and inspire. It’s the ultimate almost week long shopping spree for those who make it a priority to attend. Read on and you’ll learn why.
SaaStr was started in 2012 by Jason Lemkin as a simple WordPress blog as well as a few answers on Quora. It was designed to share the learnings of Lemkin who, a 2x founder gone VC sold his company EchoSign (now the AdobeCloud) to Adobe, which he took from $0 to $100m ARR.
The vision behind SaaStr is to enable the next generation of great SaaS and B2B entrepreneurs. It’s the ultimate bible for SaaS founders and B2B folk to keep up with all things SaaSy from people who have been there and done that and who are currently doing. The playbook of SaaS is told through a variety of content and comes to head at the SaaStr Annual Conference, which is held in February every year.
Since launching the blog in 2012 it has gone on to become the largest SaaS community on the planet and has over 3 million views per month and has had over 16 million+ views on Quora. It’s often syndicated in the media (Forbes, The Wall Street Journal) and is a go to for many people in the entrepreneurial community.
February 2015, the SaaStr team (of 2!) decided to do an experiment and hold a conference to talk about everything past, future and present. Whats happening? What can we learn from? And how can we do better, faster? - Culminating in a February conference that attracted over 2,000 SaaS founders and execs in an intimate gathering that was power packed full of the most incredible speakers. You couldn’t have asked for a better line-up from the seasoned veterans to the up and comers who now have gone on to 10X their companies in just a year. (Yes this happens!).
After being blown away by the first conference, the Kiwi Landing Pad put the SaaStr Annual on their roadmap for the year as a must attend conference. There is an enormous volume of SaaS companies spinning out of New Zealand, this year we have a cohort of 30 founders attending that we know of. It’s the ultimate place to come and learn the ‘playbook’ for the would-be SaaS entrepreneur.
Here are six reasons why the SaaStr Annual is the perfect shopping spree:
1. Meet your future customers
SaaStr Annual is the perfect place to meet your future customers. As Kyle Porter, CEO & Founder of SalesLoft said last year, all of their customers are here, and I have enough business cards to add 70 more.” People go shopping for technology, what a perfect place to do it, with companies that not only invest in themselves but are doing well and often thought leaders in their own right. People are solving real problems for people like you who need solutions.
2. Meet with your future funders (VC’s)
Where every good company is, are good VC’s right? SaaStr is the breeding ground of capital and experience. In an interview we did with Jason earlier this year, we asked him what happened last year. “Everyone who was on stage got funded.” It’s the perfect place to meet, pitch and see if you can find that person with the purse strings - no pun intended. This year they are doing a “meet with a VC” day where 130+ startups get to meet with well known VC’s from the Valley and beyond to pitch their ideas and see what happens. It’s the perfect capital spree for founders and VC’s alike as long as you bring your A game.
3. Meet with your peers in SaaS
The SaaStr Annual is the culmination of like minds. It is an event that brings together people in a room to learn from those who are slightly further ahead from where you’re at or miles ahead and aim to inspire. Friendships forged over many a learning, beer or shared ‘powerpoint’ meetings. SaaStr does such an excellent job of creating space to chill with your fellows and also meet with them after the conference in “off hour” settings. The conversation goes beyond that of the ‘conference.’ As Sean Kester (VP of Sales @ SalesLoft) stated, “if you dropped a bomb on this building, the entire SaaS community of San Francisco would disappear.”
4. Meet and hire your VP’s
Shop for talent. VP’s are the most sort after talent in the world, only culminating in particular technology hubs around the world. A lot of the reason tech companies move to the valley is in their search for talent as the further out you go from San Francisco the less there seem to be. SaaStr attracts many VP’s of Sales, Marketing, Revenue and the like, they are leaders aligned with their playbooks of how to succeed in growing their respective teams. This year we are blessed with a tactical stage where we’ll learn the ins and outs of these playbooks from the talented people who wield them.
5. Meet your content on stage
Many of the people who speak at SaaStr have just been ‘doing their thing.’ Well thought out speaker sessions and panels, last year it was ‘Jimmy Fallon’ style, this year we have three days and three themes - Down at the Pub, Daisies and Unicorns, Zen Learnings. ‘The just doing their thing’ usually results in (SaaStr’s case) companies that 10x and apparently come back and share the learnings. Last year, one of the greatest examples of this we had was OpenDNS where founder David Ulevitch was certainly one of the “younger” founders on the stage, who then went on to sell his companies to Cisco for upwards of $600 mil. Quite the feat.
The content is the boss. There is no doubt about it, bring two notepads, sit down and learn. It’s nugget after nugget of golden one-liners that can instantly change how you think about things. Expect many an “a-ha” moment and seek pure pleasure in the quirky one liners which are rampant especially if Jason Lemkin or Aaron Levie are on stage.
6. Meet your “stack” on the sponsor floor
When you think conference, you think terrible food, too much coffee, booze and lots of over zealous sales people.. The shopping spree finishes with the sponsors who are the black horse of the SaaStr Annual. They are the high-quality businesses that offer web services that people pay for, essentially making life easier for all of you. Not only that but they are also a powerhouse of knowledge and entertainment. The golden children of SaaS and future leaders of the SaaStr stage - it will happen, just you wait. Pre-nicorns in the making.
If this isn’t enough to convince you, I have one last surprise which is to hear it from the founder himself - Jason Lemkin. He is the ultimate uncle in SaaS, the guy you call when you need some advice that you don’t want to tell your dad and also the man who has most likely been there and done that.
At an interview in early January I asked Jason a few questions about how to do the SaaStr Annual well this year and why should you come, here’s what he had to say:
How do you break through the noise?
What is the ROI on a founder’s time?
How should you prepare for the SaaStr Annual?
What happened last year?
Summary
This year the Kiwi Landing Pad is very excited to have over 10+ New Zealand SaaS companies in town with around 30 founders and Execs. This is one of the largest, self-directed groups we have had in San Francisco so far. This week is undoubtedly going to be one of the best and biggest weeks of the year. We are excited to share this journey and experience with our Kiwi community and also convince more of you to come along next year. There is no explanation for what is about to unfold. From 3 days to 5,000 people, to events every night of the conference, to two stages to dance crews, 80+ Golden sponsors and surprise guests that are going to blow your mind this is not one to miss.
Post written by Kiwi Landing Pad Global Community Manager – Sian Simpson
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Kiwi Landing Pad (KLP) was established in 2011 to help selected high-growth New Zealand technology companies establish and grow their business in the USA by offering a soft landing point into the US market, where they can hit the ground running and be plugged into the community from day one.
Walk into the research labs in any of the top 25 universities across the globe and you’ll find their Molecular Biologists working with software designed by Kiwis.
Biomatters CTO Matthew Landry describes their primary product line Geneious as sort of Microsoft Office for Molecular Biologists. A broad set of computational tools that a Scientist can use for data management, visualisation, presentation, and image generation.
Their software’s heavy R&D application, means that Biomatters has a huge presence in academia. The San Francisco Bay area is a prime example of that, with Biologists at top Universities UC Berkeley, Stanford, and UC Santa Cruz, all using the software designed in Auckland, New Zealand.
While Biomatters’ ten year strong Geneious product line is what they’re is best known for, Matthew was excited to update us on their latest product offering. A kind of App Store for Bioinformatics has just been launched, and Biomatters is one of the earliest software companies to develop a new cloud based product line available through the store - the Molecular Profiler (currently in Beta).
With new products and exciting indications of the app store model leading the way forward in their industry, Biomatters is growing. One of the reasons that Matthew has been over in San Francisco is that the company is investigating the possibility of a second development team stateside. San Francisco is not only home to a large number of customers at top Bay Area universities and companies, it’s also the spot to find the very best developer talent in the world.
Biomatters already has a regional virtual sales office operating out of San Francisco, and when in town, CTO Matthew and CEO Brett enjoy being able to get the most out of their time by having a base at the Kiwi Landing Pad. With growth in mind, and the convenience of a direct flight from Auckland, San Francisco is shaping up to be an ideal U.S. location for Biomatters to develop even more indispensable tools for labs and research centres all over the globe.
