Business Is Boring

A self-proclaimed "high school drop out", Janine Grainger now works in the blockchain and cryptocurrency tech fields as the CEO and co-founder of New Zealand-based cryptocurrency purchasing platform Easy Crypto. She joins the pod to chat about the company's build to a billion in sales, and where they – and crypto – are headed next. 

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Coming from humble beginnings in an ambitious yet small market, Special Group has built itself up big from day dot. With a driven mindset of being the biggest and best agency in the world, they have now found huge success as one of NZ's most awarded agencies. Co-founder and CEO, Tony Bradbourne, joins us to talk opening offices around the world, their work (including Gwyneth Paltrow eating her infamous candle), and growing in an industry that’s seen a fair few struggles.

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NewFish is a startup aiming to change the fishing industry for the better. Using fish that might otherwise be waste, they are looking to massively increase our use of macro and micro algae, instigating further progressions of sustainability within NZ's food production systems. To talk the journey, the goals and what’s next, co-founder and GM Hamish Howard joins the pod.

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We first spoke to NZ company, Dotterel in 2019 as they were just coming together with a cool concept for making recording from drones less noisy. Now, over the last three years, they have become the global leaders in capturing sound in noisy environments. Having just announced a new raise of $3m to take a recording breakthrough they’ve made out of the drone industry, CEO and co-founder Shaun Edlin joins us to talk the journey, the biggest change in sound in decades, and taking NZ IP to the world.

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Michele Wilson, founder of AWWA period care, was once a corporate lawyer whose side hustle turned into her full time mahi. Now leading conversations around understanding the period cycle through her business, hear her journey of how she built AWWA from a standing start to half a million dollars in sales a month, and the mahi she does to share the sacred kaupapa of the business. Rawe.

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This week we’re talking tech companies and seeing it, to be it. Greg Denton excelled in his studies and afterwards, found himself in a big bank. Not loving life in a suit (and saying he was a banker), when he discovered the tech world, he couldn’t believe he hadn’t known it was open to him. If it was hard for him with his background, he wondered how hard it must be for others without his advantages. So, he set up Matchstiq; a way to create more visibility, pathways, and connections into the tech industry. To talk his journey, how people can get access to this world, and opening up more pathways, Greg Denton joins the pod.

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We’ve all heard a lot about the metaverse lately; the virtual worlds we soon might be spending a lot more time in. However, for Sam Ramlu (co-founder of pioneering studio, Method), it’s already beginning. Having built the super successful Wanderer VR game in the unreal engine (one of the leading virtual world builders), how did they pull this off? What is the story behind her success at Method? We find out, as well as how we can make sure the metaverse future is better than our tech present.

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Business is Boring is back! With the support of Spark Lab, we’ll be talking with some of Aotearoa’s most successful business people and checking back in with some of the 250+ guests we’ve had on the podcast over the last five years. We last spoke with Sharesies 3EO Brooke Roberts in 2017, when the site had been live for a month and had just ticked over 2000 users. Today the platform has half a million Kiwi on board, with $2 billion invested, and has recently expanded into Australia. Brooke returns this week to talk about all that’s happened in the last five years and what being a 3EO actually involves.

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Supply shortages earlier this year brought attention to the fact that although we grow plenty of oats here in New Zealand – and know a thing or two about milk – we have been importing all commercial oat milk. Boring Oat Milk founder Morgan Maw was in a place to do something about that, knowing oats through her first oat biscuit venture. To talk about the three-year journey she had to go on to get onto shelves, the state of the oat and alternative milk industry here, how she’s using brand and storytelling and what’s next, she joined Business is Boring via Zoom this week.

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This is the last episode of Business is Boring. Thank you so much to everyone who has listened, shared the podcast, got in touch, talked to me about it and been a supporter. It’s been an enormous privilege to have been able to talk to an interesting person doing cool things every week for five years.

We’re going to take a little bit of time off and come back with a new concept. I’m really looking forward to changing things up a little to keep hopefully providing value to you all, and to keep trying to do our bit to share some of the great stories of tomorrow in Aotearoa.

I hope that now after five years, more than 200 episodes, and more than half a million downloads, we’ve proven that business is not boring.

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Business is Boring is presented by The Spinoff in association with Callaghan Innovation.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

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Luke Nutting is an electrician who eight or so years ago saw that solar would be the future. He went from being a man in a van to now leading Lightforce, a company that does 20% of New Zealand’s solar installs, with more than 80 staff around the country. Now he has big plans to help create alternative energy choices by helping people sell their excess power back to the grid. 

Business is Boring is presented by The Spinoff in association with Callaghan Innovation.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices