Nov 22, 2017 - In politics, timing is everything. So it might have been inopportune amid a faux furore over Auckland Council business-class travel spending for Mayor Phil Goff to have to made public the details of his two-week sojourn to Europe and Britain. Goff, however, has been around too long in the public eye, and is too much of a swot, to allow his time astride the world stage to be portrayed as some cosy junket writes Tim Murphy on Newsroom.
Instead, in full-press workaholic mode, he has revealed in a written report to councillors an eye-watering work programme of research on transport and housing and of diplomacy on climate change and World War 1 commemorations.
His 15-page note supplemented by photographic evidence and graphs, even explains that both Goff and an adviser's return airfares to Europe and accommodation in France were paid for by the global Bloomberg philanthropic foundation. (For completeness, that charity deemed business-class appropriate for a travelling public official).
What did the mayor - and the public - learn from the former foreign minister's return to a jet-setting life?
* He may have uncovered a "major New Zealand expatriate investor who is interested in investing in large-scale, built-to-rent developments to help alleviate Auckland's housing shortage. Goff's report says Kent Gardner, of multi-billion dollar investment company Evans Randall, is returning to New Zealand and is interested in projects here similar to those the company developed in the UK. "His goal is to build good-quality long-term rentals with secure tenure, including some social housing. This could represent a major opportunity to increase housing stock to address Auckland's housing shortage."
* He met New London Architecture, an independent forum for discussion on design and planning for the city, which has used 3D technology to create a 12.5 long metre scale model of London, showing in miniature the city's full 85 square kilometres. Notably, Goff says the Auckland Design Office is working with AUT on a similar model for Auckland.
* He had four and a half hours with the chief executive of Transport for London, Mike Brown, and his officials, learning that rubber-wheeled trains that can run along roads without the cost of tram-tracks were not the cost savers some think, because roads have to be strengthened to take the weight of the trams, they need power and the rides are not comfortable. TFL's experience also helped persuade Goff that elevated light rail costs four times as much as grade-level light rail - and underground light rail cost ten times that on the ground. "These costs largely rule out these options for Auckland."
* From TFL, the mayor also learned that autonomous vehicles were "highly . . .
| Continue here to read the full article on Newsroom || November 22, 2017 |||
Nov 22, 2017 - Company to streamline business operations and support a drive for efficiency across the entire organisation. Coda Group, one of New Zealand’s leading and most innovative logistics companies, has commenced deployment of Promapp’s cloud-based business process management software (BPM) to streamline business operations and support a drive for efficiency across the entire organisation.
Coda Group was established two years ago as a joint venture between Port of Tauranga and freight and logistics company, Kotahi, to boost the efficiency of New Zealand’s nationwide supply chain, remove wasted capacity and reduce the costs of consolidating the cargo necessary for big ships.
The joint venture brought together four of New Zealand’s leading freight brands, including DTL, Tapper Transport, Priority Logistics and MetroPack, each with their own processes, many of which were paper-based and held in a variety of formats. Many of these processes couldn’t be shared, accessed and updated across the entire Coda Group business operation.
“In order to support the overall business in driving continuous improvement, optimising freight flows and creating a leaner, more efficient organisation we needed to ensure that our processes across the business could be easily aligned with business objectives,” said Wendy Mallowes, Business Process Improvement Lead, Coda Group.
Coda Group has company-wide processes, including those involving freight management, import-export procedures, and health and safety. These need to be consistently adhered to while individual customer requirements also add to the complexity of processes and procedures with specific legal and compliance requirements.
David Choong, Coda CFO, says, “As the business has grown and gained momentum, we concluded that we needed a central repository of business processes and documents on anything relating to operations, from staff induction and everyday warehouse operation to import and export procedures. We needed these processes to be universally followed and updated by our 310 staff at any time and from any location."
Promapp was selected to support Coda Group’s requirements based on its ease of use, friendly graphical user interface and its central repository which enables individuals in an organisation to store and update processes, supporting continuous business improvement.
“Being cloud-based also means that Promapp gives us the ability to share processes with our customers and provide staff with the comfort that they are always working with the latest information,” said Mallowes.
“Promapp’s feedback options will support Coda Group’s approach to continuous improvement which will enable customers to provide feedback and remove waste from the logistics network, boost efficiency and help streamline operations."
Coda Group has also set its sights on deploying Promapp’s Process Variant Management (PVM) software which will help the company manage or eliminate process variations.
Coda Group will be able to standardise processes across the entire company, while simply incorporating process variations to meet the requirements of a specific location, product, or customer.
PVM will also enable Coda Group to customise activities and manage service delivery for key customers helping to improve customer service.
“Ultimately, Promapp will support our strategy to remove wasted capacity, reduce the cost of consolidating freight and create real change in the logistics network. The end game is to provide greater value to our customers and logistics partners and to meet our target to handle more than five million metric tonnes of containerised cargo annually,” said Mallowes.
Promapp will be gradually rolled out across all Coda Group business units during 2018.
| About Promapp
Established in 2002, Promapp (https://www.promapp.com) works with hundreds of organisations worldwide to foster a thriving business improvement and process management culture. Promapp’s cloud-based business process management (BPM) software makes it easy to create, navigate, share and change business processes, enabling continuous improvement, risk management, quality assurance and business continuity. Providing an intuitive online process repository, an integrated process mapping tool, and a process improvement toolset, Promapp’s proprietary software supports the development of smarter and safer ways to work, while encouraging sharing of information by operational teams rather than limiting it to process analysts and technical specialists.
Promapp’s wide range of public and private sector customers includes: Coca-Cola Amatil, Air New Zealand, WesTrac, Lumo Energy, Toyota, Ricoh, McDonald's, Audi Australia, Department of Justice, Victoria, Adelaide City Council, Waikato District Council and Southland Regional Council. The company is headquartered in Auckland, New Zealand. www.promapp.com
| A CSO release || November 22, 2017 |||
Nov 22, 2017 - Kiwi tech companies urged to ‘eat more of their own dog food’ when it comes to selling – Kiwi technology needs to sell itself smarter to realise its full potential to become the country’s largest export industry, according to the latest Market Measures report.
“We don’t face the same environmental constraints of the other two major export sectors –agriculture and tourism – so the potential for tech is virtually limitless,” says Owen Scott, Managing Director of Concentrate Limited, who organise the study along with fellow tech marketing company Swaytech.
“Improving our ability to sell efficiently is one way of unlocking this potential, and ultimately becoming New Zealand’s primary export industry,” says Scott.
Now in its ninth year, Market Measures gathers information about sales and marketing from over 300 New Zealand technology companies, and compares the results to similar data from the USA.
“In the 2017 study we have found that Kiwi companies are over-reliant on company founders and high-value sales people to sell their products and services. More than 46% of companies said a founder was still closely involved in sales, and the average sales person in an export market was paid a base salary almost 50% higher than the typical equivalent US sales person.”
“It’s not a scalable approach to generating export sales – 40% of the surveyed companies reported that productivity was their main problem when it came to managing their sales teams,” says Scott.
Bob Pinchin, Managing Director of Swaytech, says the fact that US companies used on average three times the number of digital sales tools (e.g. email automation, contact intelligence and similar) than their New Zealand counterparts, was evidence they were more focussed on efficiency.
“In the tech industry we call this ‘eating your own dog food’, but our firms are turning their nose up at these tools at the moment.”
“We have talented tech sales people who convert leads at an incredibly high rate, but it’s the volume of sales that is the issue – this productivity challenge is one we have to solve to overtake the other two big export industries,” says Pinchin.
“Our tech sales people are really ‘artists’, talented and creative and able to craft sales, but what we need more of is scientists – people operating within a rigorous system able to produce repeatable, predictable sales results at a lower cost,” says Scott.
Scott says that more than ever before, New Zealand tech companies must be willing to invest in sales and marketing, which has been a constant trend of Market Measures since it began in 2008.
“It ranges from a stable 25% of annual revenue spent on sales and marketing (including salaries and costs) for established companies, through to an aggressive 86% for start-up tech businesses.”
“NZTE works with an increasing number of internationally successful tech companies but as the Market Measures study suggests, some of them – big and small – are forgetting to cover some of the basics that lead to export growth,” says Charles Haddrell, Customer Director at NZTE, the principal sponsor of Market Measures.
“Getting your sales and marketing strategies right isn’t just a nice to have – it’s a must have. We’ve worked with hundreds of companies and know from experience that implementing robust sales processes, developing sales and execution skills, hiring well, and being aware of the technologies to support the sales and marketing functions are vital to being successful overseas,” says Haddrell.
The full Market Measures 2017 report can be downloaded from www.marketmeasures.co.nz at a cost of $375.
| A Concentrate release || November 22, 2017 |||
Nov 22, 2017 - Scott Technology outbid an overseas buyer when it bought Dunedin-based engineering firm DC Ross out of receivership, a six-monthly report from the receivers shows. DC Ross, which supplies precision metal formed parts, was tipped into receivership in September 2016 and in June this year Scott Technology said it had entered an unconditional agreement to purchase all the assets of the company for a total purchase price expected to be less than $500,000.
In its annual report, Scott Technology, also based in Dunedin, said it paid $375,000 for DC Ross, and its tool room and tool design capability has already enabled it to undertake significant work for an appliance manufacturer in Australia.
It also noted the inventories, plant and equipment of the DC Ross business were purchased from DC Ross’ receivers for an agreed total value which was less than market value, resulting in a fair-value gain on acquisition.
In today's report, DC Ross's receiver Malcolm Hollis of PwC said they had corresponded with multiple interested parties and attracted an overseas buyer. He did not identify the company and was not immediately available for comment. However, prior to settlement, it received a "large offer from a third party," he said in the report. "We consulted with our appointer, who agreed this was the best possible offer received to date and retained employment for all staff," said Hollis.
Hollis also said the receivers are in negotiations with third secured creditor Fletcher Steel regarding the quantum of its purchase money security interest claim - which gives it the right to receive debtor proceeds up to the value of steel contained in the part sold. According to the report, Fletcher Steel is owed $609,670.
"Once we have undertaken a review of the calculations we intend to make a final distribution to Fletcher Steel," said Hollis.
The first secured creditor is Bank of New Zealand, which is owed $4.3 million while the second secured creditor is Aorangi Laboratories, owed $13.8 million. According to Hollis' report "based on the realisations to date there will be a significant shortfall to the secured creditor and therefore no funds available for a distribution to unsecured creditors."
Scott Technology shares last traded up 1.4 percent at $3.70 and have gained 70 percent this year.
| A Sharechat release || November 22, 2017 |||
Palace of the Alhambra, Spain
By: Charles Nathaniel Worsley (1862-1923)
From the collection of Sir Heaton Rhodes
Oil on canvas - 118cm x 162cm
Valued $12,000 - $18,000
Offers invited over $9,000
Contact: Henry Newrick – (+64 ) 27 471 2242
Mount Egmont with Lake
By: John Philemon Backhouse (1845-1908)
Oil on Sea Shell - 13cm x 14cm
Valued $2,000-$3,000
Offers invited over $1,500
Contact: Henry Newrick – (+64 ) 27 471 2242