Deel, a global hiring, payroll and employee experience platform that helps businesses hire contractors and employees in over 150 markets, today launches in New Zealand.
Founded in 2019, Deel makes global hiring accessible to all companies. It helps businesses easily enter new markets, hire talent wherever they are, at the same time managing teams, contractors, and payroll in multiple markets – all in one centralised platform. When a company hires workers, Deel takes on the responsibility to ensure the business is compliant with local laws.
Deel expands into New Zealand in the midst of an unprecedented workforce crisis. The NZ Reserve Bank states that there are now double the job vacancies than there are unemployed people in New Zealand. A June 2022 study by Hays, found that 91% of employers of professionals are experiencing a skills shortage. With 83% saying it will impact the effective operation or growth plans of their organisation, with this number being higher (96%) in New Zealand’s tech sector.
“In light of the chronic talent shortages in New Zealand, employers are looking beyond our borders for the right people. Previously there have been significant roadblocks to hiring international talent including lengthy entity set-up times averaging six-to-eight months, compliance risks, confusing local laws, complicated tax systems and hefty fines if you don’t get this right. Deel’s platform and compliance expertise solves these issues, giving businesses the tools to expand, hire, and pay teams more easily than ever before,” said Shannon Karaka, Managing Director, Australia and New Zealand.
Fast growing Tauranga-based LawVu, which develops software for organising in-house legal teams, is using Deel to add to its 120 strong workforce as it signs large international clients.
“LawVu has the capital and international customer opportunities to create a global significant business - we just need the staff to help make it happen. Deel enables us to expand rapidly into new international markets, confident that we can do so in an efficient and compliant manner that also creates a positive experience for new staff working remotely for a start up headquartered in New Zealand,” says Karly Boast, VP of People.
The rise of extended remote working as an option, alongside the challenge of cross border immigration introduced by the pandemic, has driven a new global hiring movement. According to Deel’s latest data, the most popular countries that NZ businesses are hiring overseas talent from include the United States, UK, Philippines and Australia.
Additionally, the top roles that New Zealand companies are hiring for are software developers, digital designers, software engineers and sales team members.
NZ’s talent is highly sought after by overseas companies. The USA, Australia, UK, Canada and Singapore are the top countries currently hiring NZ talent.
Research from Kea New Zealand, who have formed a strategic partnership with Deel, shows 60% of Kiwis living offshore want to remain connected to New Zealand and support New Zealand businesses to grow. Kea Global CEO Toni Truslove says being able to work for a Kiwi company while living offshore is one way to do that.
“Hiring offshore Kiwi allows companies to tap into a community of people who understand the New Zealand culture and business landscape, but also understand the landscape of the market they are based in. This is a huge advantage when it comes to growing a team offshore.”
Deel also provides payroll services that make it easy to pay employees and contractors globally, in their preferred currency, in one bulk payment, and with just a click. The platform supports 120+ currencies, and contractors have access to 15 different withdrawal options ranging from local payment networks to cryptocurrency.
Globally, Deel serves 9,000+ customers, including Airwallex, Coinbase, Dropbox and Shopify.
Deel has raised US$630 million dollars in total from venture capitalists such as Andreessen Horowitz and Y Combinator. It raised US$425 million in October 2021, valuing Deel at US$5.5 billion, making it the highest-valued company in the global hiring, payments, and compliance space.
Today New Zealand, the USA, Twitter, and Microsoft, announced investment in a technology innovation initiative under the banner of the Christchurch Call. This initiative will support the creation of new technology to understand the impacts of algorithms on people’s online experiences.
Artificial Intelligence (AI) algorithms play a growing role in our everyday lives, including in how we organise information, and experience the internet. A majority of the content we encounter and view online is curated by algorithms in some form.
Through the Christchurch Call to Action, we have committed to work together to better understand the impacts that algorithms and other processes may have on terrorist and violent extremist content. Leaders and the Call Community regard this algorithmic work as a top priority.
In order to study those impacts, we have to overcome challenges around: how to protect user privacy and proprietary information; how to investigate impacts holistically across society; and how to achieve reproducibility, affordability, and scale for independent researchers. Working with an open-source non-profit organisation called OpenMined, the Algorithms Initiative will develop and test ground-breaking privacy-enhancing software infrastructure to address those challenges and help us move forward work under the Call.
While this initiative won’t tell us all we need to know about the outcomes algorithms are driving online, it will help us better access data so researchers can answer these very questions.
The Christchurch Call Initiative on Algorithms is committed to supporting this work so that we can empower independent researchers to help us build safer platforms and more effective interventions to protect people both online and offline.
If successful, these technologies will be made available to the whole Christchurch Call community and beyond it. The technology, once tested and proven in the Call context, could open up a new field of algorithmic research with a much wider application.
Our community wants to understand the role of online activity as a factor in radicalisation, how terrorist and violent extremist content spreads across platforms. The privacy protective technology being developed through our initiative is one of the most promising ways to open those questions to independent research at a suitable scale. It could also help people working in a number of other fields.
We hope that this work will ultimately help the Christchurch Call Community to understand what online service providers, community organisations, and governments can do to make the online environment safer and more user-friendly.
Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern said: “We simply won’t make the progress we need on these important issues, without better understanding how they are operating in the real world in the first place. Companies, governments, civil society, we will all benefit from this initiative. It will help us create the free, open and secure internet we are all driving for.”
Brad Smith, of Microsoft, said: “The Christchurch Call is about bringing governments, tech companies, and civil society together to make meaningful progress to stop the spread and amplification of violent extremist content online. The responsible use of AI, including explaining how algorithms recommend content to people on social media platforms, is an important challenge we must address.”
Vijaya Gadde, of Twitter, said: “Our work with the New Zealand Government and Microsoft to support the development of innovative technology by OpenMined is a key building block to significantly expand the ability of researchers to understand the role of algorithms in content discovery and amplification while protecting the privacy of people’s data. There is significant potential to provide a far more robust evidence base for a policy debate of critical importance to the future of online services.”
Andrew Trask, of OpenMined, said “Few in civil society have been able to study how major algorithms impact society, owing to privacy, security, and logistical challenges. We think that privacy enhancing technologies can remedy these challenges, and we're optimistic that this project will set the precedent that they can.”
Background and FAQs:
What is the Christchurch Call Initiative on Algorithmic Outcomes?
New Zealand, the USA, Twitter, and Microsoft are working under the Christchurch Call, partnering with OpenMined, to develop new software tools that will help facilitate more independent research on the impacts of user interactions with algorithmic systems.
What will the Christchurch Call Initiative on Algorithmic Outcomes do?
As the first project under this initiative, the partners will work together to build and test a set of privacy enhancing technologies. Once tested, replicated, and validated, these technologies could form the basis for an infrastructure to support independent study of impacts of algorithms and their interactions with users, including across multiple platforms and types of platforms, and could dramatically lower the barriers to doing this work.
If successful, these technologies will be made available to the Christchurch Call Community and could help support independent research that fulfils our collective Call Commitments, potentially opening up wider applications and new fields of responsible AI research beyond the Call itself.
How does this respond to the Christchurch Call Commitments?
Christchurch Call Supporters have committed to working together and with Civil Society to understand the outcomes of algorithms and other processes that may drive users towards terrorist and violent extremist content, to make changes where this occurs, and to develop effective interventions based on information sharing.
The technologies developed with the help of this initiative should help to overcome some of the barriers identified through our existing work and enable information exchanges among civil society, industry and government, to make it possible to realise those commitments.
Why is it needed?
At the moment it is costly and administratively complex for online service providers to provide access to independent researchers to study impacts on users, while complying with ethical and regulatory obligations. Current secure access programmes often entail significant costs and time from researchers and firms alike. That greatly reduces the possible scale and breadth of external studies of the sort needed to understand the impacts of algorithmic systems. That means independent research typically only studies user impacts on a single platform rather than across a broader demographic (i.e. across multiple platforms).
This new technology is intended to reduce the cost and complexity of access for independent researchers, and allow a multitude of different studies, for instance looking at how social issues manifest online, the impacts of user interactions on artificial intelligence, and the effectiveness of different actions intended to promote a safer online environment. It could also enable studies on a range of other algorithmic and responsible AI topics.
For example, Governments should not require access to private user data from online platforms. However they can benefit from insights obtained by independent researchers that can help inform policy. Civil Society has an interest, among other things, in ensuring privacy is preserved, and that human rights outcomes are effectively assessed and acted upon. These privacy enhancing technologies could help facilitate and scale access to allow important insights without governments or other parties requiring access to the base data.
What is being developed?
Software infrastructure is being built which will integrate a new set of privacy enhancing technologies (PETs). This will enable data scientists to remotely study data and algorithms distributed across multiple secure sites. Technologies including remote execution, federated learning, differential privacy, and secure multi-party computation will enable this remote research in a way that conforms to the data-use policies of the platform under study.
The current project plan envisages work taking place approximately over a 9-month timeframe with a total cost of approximately US$1.5m.
In brief these milestones are to:
What is each partner contributing?
New Zealand is providing a financial contribution and assistance with establishing the initiative. New Zealand will also provide coordination between the Call Community and the project to ensure transparency, visibility, and that opportunities are maximised for Call supporters and partners to make use of the project’s output.
The support of New Zealand and the USA will help to ensure the project outcomes are developed on behalf of the wider Call Community and will be tested for different types of online service provider.
Twitter‘s ML Ethics, Transparency and Accountability team will be providing the proof-of-concept for the PET’s infrastructure. At the conclusion of Phase 1, trusted partners will be able to securely access and replicate the findings of our Algorithmic amplification paper published last year. Enabling secure access to this data is a milestone in data transparency and security.
Microsoft is providing financial support to the initiative and is exploring options to enable the initiative to be tested on a different platform.
How can I be involved?
As part of the project, OpenMined will provide periodic briefings for the Call Community about its work, and an opportunity to discuss its potential applications.
In subsequent phases of this work, there will be scope for other online service providers who want to test the capabilities of the new tool on their system, and for Call supporters who wish to help finance the development and testing of new functions and capabilities.
We envisage that these tools will take some time to build, test, validate, and refine. In the long term they hope to create significant new opportunities for independent researcher involvement and the application of these tools across the Call Community and beyond it.
If the pilot is successful, what are the next steps?
If successful, the pilot will prove that the underlying techniques can be scaled to meet real-world legal, policy and other requirements. Subsequent phases could focus on additional testing, moving towards building a production-ready system to enable use for a wide range of objectives by a wide range of independent researchers.
Source: https://www.beehive.govt.nz/
First Dunedin, next step, the lucrative American market for a pair of entrepreneurial former Scarfies.
The Flatpack Co founders Angus Syme, 23, and Cam Leigh, 22, have just made a whirlwind trip around New Zealand’s campuses visiting first-year students.
That market – young people set to go flatting next year – is the company’s bread and butter. The Flatpack Co specialises in boxed mattresses and frames and a guarantee of delivery on the first day a student moves into their new flat.
And it has worked, with the pair selling and delivering some 3000 beds over the last couple of years. In February, Stuff reported that The Flatpack Co was set to turn over its first million dollars.
“We blew it out of the water ... we’ve had a fantastic year,” Syme said.
That success meant the pair are now looking to expand to the United States.
Syme said their business model was about getting in front of students the entire year, and getting them to pre-order their bed before they finished the year, “so they can go away for summer and not worry about it” – meaning that by the time other companies tried to target returning students, they were already committed to The FlatPack Co.
It was during their first year at the University of Otago that the pair came up with the idea to supply beds to fellow students, putting in $5000 a piece to buy 30 second-hand beds from graduating students and re-selling them to their mates.
“There is a culture, in Dunedin especially, to buy a bed from us.’’
Of the 4000-odd first-year students at Otago university, the company sold beds to 550 of them last year, and this year is on track to sell between 800 and 900 to them.
The success of their Dunedin-born idea is a key part of their American drive, as the New Zealand student city has been their strongest market.
To replicate that in the United States, the pair researched similar “college towns”, contacting students over social media about their universities – often three times the size of those in New Zealand.
Many of those were in the Midwestern US, with the pair also looking for college towns made up of mainly houses as opposed to apartment complexes with already furnished accommodation.
Syme and Leigh will visit mattress wholesalers in the US next month, later heading to some of those colleges to employ teams of students.
And if all goes well, the pair plan to return to the US in January “on a one-way ticket”.
“We are all guns blazing, ready to rip, s... and bust.”
The pair will start in Kansas, before concentrating on college towns in other states including Indiana, Virginia, Texas, Ohio, Nebraska, Alabama and Arizona.
“The plan is we will be in 25 universities in five years,” Syme said. “The goal is to immerse ourselves in the college.”
Despite their aspirations for America, New Zealand remained an important market, they said, with the pair looking at employing a “hot-shot grad” to become the manager.
Source: https://www.stuff.co.nz/
Partnership will accelerate New Zealand’s transition to 100% renewable electricity with over $1.0bn on track to be deployed over next decade
AUCKLAND. solarZero, New Zealand's leading provider of solar, battery storage and energy services, announced today that a fund managed by BlackRock Real Assets has agreed to acquire the company . New Zealand is currently leading Asia Pacific's clean energy transition, and solarZero has built the region's largest virtual power plant using its proprietary smart battery and energy management platform. BlackRock's Climate Infrastructure business, which sits within BlackRock Real Assets, will work with solarZero's management team to build on the company's market leading track record and drive its next phase of growth, both in New Zealand and internationally. "Kiwis want clean and resilient energy. BlackRock Climate Infrastructure team's investment and backing will enable us to rapidly scale, grow our energy services network, and accelerate the transition to a 100% clean energy future" said Andrew Booth, Founder and CEO of solarZero. "By 2030, 50% of the world's energy will be generated in the Asia Pacific region. The window to prevent the worst impacts of the climate crisis is closing fast and the power couple of solar plus storage isone of the few true paths to energy security, stable power prices, prosperity, and a liveable planet." solarZero's unique energy-as-a-service model accelerates solar and battery uptake without the need for government subsidies and with $0 upfront removes the barrier of a $25,000 plus upfront to install and maintain a solar and battery system. Uptake of the service is flat across the deprivation index, democratising renewable energy to help ensure that the transition to a net-zero economy will bring about a more equitable society. solarZero is installing a new system every 35 minutes and plans to invest $1.0 billion in new insolar and battery systems across New Zealand over the next 10 years. The service currently powers the homes of almost 9000 families, generating over 89GWh of energy each year and with over 48MWh of storage its service provides active support to the national grid by reducing peak loads across the country by 16MW every day. Combined, solarZero customers have saved over $4.5 million on their power bills, reducing carbon emissions by 10, 950 tonnes, the equivalent of planting 102,000 trees. Charlie Reid, Asia-Pacific Co-Head of BlackRock's Climate Infrastructure team said, "New Zealand is widely recognised as a global leader in renewable energy and climate finance, and we are pleased to make our first investment in this market. Our move into New Zealand demonstrates BlackRock's commitment to invest in attractive markets as part of our broader efforts to offer a flow of addressable global climate investment opportunities for our clients. solarZero is a global pioneer, and we look forward to supporting its expansion into other Asia-Pacific markets and, at the same time, to accelerating New Zealand's net zero journey." solarZero co-developed with Panasonic, the world leading battery manufacturer, its smart battery platform which is at the heart of its energy service. The platform gives customers a personalised energy plan and connects them together to form clean, resilient virtual power plants—freeing them from power outages and rising energy costs. "Our engineers in Japan and Singapore have spent the past five years working alongside solarZero's team in Auckland to achieve significant design, technology and cost breakthroughs. This is a world-first battery platform design, and we are looking forward to working alongside solarZero and the BlackRock Climate Infrastructure team to take this breakthrough technology global," said Stewart Fowler, Managing Director of Panasonic New Zealand. solarZero, a recipient of numerous financial and technology innovation awards, turns homeowners and businesses into active members of the new energy economy by giving them the freedom to generate, store, and control their own clean energy, and support their communities.
END
About solarZero solarZero is a smart solar energy service which allows homeowners to power their homes by streaming the sun’s energy and converting to usable electricity - at a price which can be up to 30% cheaper than buying electricity from the grid. This unique solar energy service requires no upfront costs. The hardware of the system remains the property of solarZero, who manage the installation, maintenance, and servicing while the homeowner enjoys the benefits without the investment. The solarZero system comprises solar panels and a smart battery - allowing stored power to be accessed even when the sun isn't shining or in a power cut.
About BlackRock Real Assets In today’s dynamic and complex global investing market, BlackRock Real Assets seeks to help clients access real assets that could help meet their investment goals by providing a distinct range of well defined, outcome orientated strategies, along the investment risk-return spectrum.
BlackRock Real Assets' dedicated teams of industry and sector specialists deliver global reach, with deep local expertise. They have decades of relevant experience, are deeply embedded in their operating industries by sector and geography and have developed strong partnership networks over time. BlackRock’s culture of risk management, knowledge sharing and investment discipline sets BlackRock Real Assets apart and underpins all that they do. With over 400 professionals in 30 offices managing over US$70 billion in client commitments as of June 30, 2022, BlackRock Real Assets partners with clients to provide solutions tailored to individual portfolio needs such as income, growth, liquid or balanced real assets outcomes. https://solarcity.co.nz/
Air New Zealand’s daily operations are now helping to enable new research into climate change, with a ground-breaking approach to collecting data for the global scientific community.
In a world-first, Air New Zealand flight NZ8844 took off this morning from Christchurch to Nelson carrying a NASA next-generation satellite receiver.
Using direct and reflected GPS and Galileo signals, the Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) receiver will collect unique environmental data to better predict storms and enable new climate change research.
Air New Zealand is the first passenger airline in the world to join a NASA earth mission, working together since 2020 on the design, installation and certification of the receiver onboard one of its Q300 aircraft.
Air New Zealand Chief Operational Integrity and Safety Officer Captain David Morgan says climate change is a shared challenge and the airline does not shy away from its responsibilities to address it.
“With a network stretching from Kerikeri to Invercargill and flying at an altitude of around 16,000 feet, the Q300 was the perfect aircraft to pilot this mission.”
“Flying much closer to the land and sea than NASA’s satellites, our aircraft can collect a daily feed of high-resolution, high-quality data, with significant potential for the science community.”
The University of Auckland has established a Science Payload Operations Centre to receive and process the data in what could become New Zealand’s largest source of environmental data. Project Lead, Professor Delwyn Moller, says the collaboration will put Kiwi scientists at the forefront of this emerging field.
“The data produced by this collaboration will be made publicly available, opening up a range of research possibilities, with many potential uses – from flood risk management to agriculture and resource planning.
“Air New Zealand’s commitment to the project’s success will hopefully inspire other airlines around the world to use their own aircraft for the benefit of science.”
The data collected in flight will also feed into NASA's Cyclone Global Navigation Satellite System (CYGNSS). Dr Will McCarty, NASA's CYGNSS Program Scientist in the agency's Earth Science Division, says the data from Air New Zealand flights will extend the CYGNSS mission to monitor environmental changes over land.
"CYGNSS bounces GPS signals off the ocean to measure wind speeds to help predict hurricanes and cyclones. Over land, the technology can determine soil moisture levels, so it can also monitor climate change indicators such as drought, flooding and coastline erosion.
“The receiver that Air New Zealand is flying has advanced capabilities with the potential to be used for future space bound missions, so we’re excited to test these out.”
The project to fly a next-generation GNSS-R receiver on Air New Zealand’s aircraft to advance earth observation has been gifted the name Rongowai, combining the Māori words rongo (to sense) and wai (water).
For video of David Morgan, Delwyn Moller, b-roll footage, and the original announcement of the project in 2020 https://airnz.sharefile.com/d-s83cb9c5e42ff4d2f8323fe5d2621c020
Note to editors:
Gallagher, the leading security solutions manufacturer, is proud to announce the expansion of its technical support services to the Americas with a dedicated team of people based in Atlanta, Georgia.
The team in the Americas will create stronger connections in the region, while also alleviating the New Zealand team’s current load of operating all day and all night.
“It’s an evolution of our technical support. We’ve been providing 24/7 technical support from New Zealand and we’re growing really quickly elsewhere, particularly in the Americas. So, this expansion has been a couple of years in the making,” says Shane Keesom, Gallagher’s Technical Support Manager.
“Expanding our global support capabilities is a natural progression of our vision to provide exceptional customer experiences. The team here in the Americas adds to the diversity within our global team,” says Paul Wilson, the Gallagher’s Director of Technical Services for North America.
The new team consists of four engineers, servicing the entire globe during their shift, with one member who is able to provide technical support in Spanish too.
“This is going to be gold, being able to talk to our partners and customers in their own language and lingo,” says Matthew Dean, Gallagher’s Technical Support Team Leader.
To find out more about Gallagher’s 24-hour technical support team structure and plans, join Dean and Keesom as they lend their voices in the latest Tech Talk podcast episode hosted by Chief Technology Officer at Gallagher, Steve Bell. Listen here.
https://security.gallagher.com/
Marken, a critical part of UPS Healthcare, has reached an agreement to purchase the medical courier business of Cedra Express, a New Zealand-based transportation and logistics provider serving the life science and pharmaceutical segment. This acquisition will enhance Marken’s presence and capabilities as a healthcare logistics provider in the region.
‘With this new direct presence in New Zealand, Marken will be able to expand its service offerings to the local clinical trial client base, including our patient-centric solutions such as Home Healthcare and Direct to/from Patient services’, said Marken President Ariette van Strien.
The medical courier business of Cedra Express will now become Marken New Zealand, with operations in Christchurch and Auckland. Marken has had a strategic partnership with Cedra Express since it was founded in 2001 by Graham Tappin, who will support this exciting transition of the medical courier business from Cedra Express to Marken New Zealand.
‘We are excited to reach agreement to acquire this New Zealand-based business, which will help position Marken as the preferred partner for innovative clinical trial and cell and gene supply chain logistics solutions throughout the biopharma and healthcare landscape’, said Wes Wheeler, President, UPS Healthcare. ‘We welcome the expertise and capabilities this brings to UPS Healthcare and Marken, helping to serve customers’ complex, global needs. We thank Graham for his years of dedicated support to Marken and look forward to continuing to serve customers across New Zealand.’
Customers in the region will continue to benefit from Marken’s world-class real-time tracking with GPS technology, specialised packaging solutions, temperature monitoring and end-to-end visibility. Find out more about Marken here.
Minister for Trade and Export Growth and Minister of Agriculture Damien O’Connor will visit the USA this week to help further New Zealand’s economic recovery through cooperation efforts with a range of US and Indo-Pacific partners.
“My focus is on export growth so we can ensure New Zealand is best protected from the rough edges of a global downturn. We’re continuing to work in partnership with our businesses to take full advantage of our open borders,” Damien O’Connor said.
In Los Angeles, Damien O’Connor will represent New Zealand at a ministerial meeting on the Indo-Pacific Economic Framework for Prosperity (IPEF). IPEF is a regional cooperation initiative, developed by the United States and now involving 14 economies throughout the Indo-Pacific region, including New Zealand.
“New Zealand has been actively engaged on the IPEF since its inception last year. I am looking forward to meeting face to face with my ministerial counterparts from other IPEF economies and taking stock of how the scope of the Framework is shaping up,” Damien O’Connor said.
“IPEF presents a unique opportunity to boost regional cooperation on a range of future-focused economic, trade and climate issues. At the ministerial meeting in Los Angeles, I will be seeking to ensure that the scope of IPEF contains meaningful commercial elements, drives global climate action, and has a focus on sustainability and inclusivity which is at the heart of New Zealand’s trade policy.”
While in Los Angeles, he will also hold bilateral meetings with ministerial counterparts from other IPEF economies.
In San Francisco, the focus will be on growing New Zealand’s relationship with California and supporting sustainable agriculture connections.
This will build on Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern’s and Minister O’Connor’s visit to California in May this year, where the Prime Minister and Governor Newsom witnessed the signing of a new climate partnership.
“We have an exciting partnership with California on shared economic, agriculture and climate ambitions. I’m looking forward to meeting with California Agricultural Secretary Karen Ross and visiting innovative companies and the UC Davis College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences,” Damien O’Connor said.
“California is a world leader in technology and has some of the world’s most ambitious climate goals. By growing our partnership with California we will create new opportunities for New Zealand businesses and improve our access to new technologies that will make the New Zealand economy more competitive and sustainable.”
Damien O’Connor will depart New Zealand on Tuesday 6 September. He will be in San Francisco on 6-7 September and Los Angeles on 7-9 September, returning to New Zealand on Sunday 11 September. Source: https://www.beehive.govt.nz/
ATLANTA--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Texas Chicken™, one of the largest quick service restaurant chains in the world, announced today a new expansion deal with existing New Zealand franchisee George Constantinou through his company Good Taste Co Pty Limited, who will add 20 units to his current five restaurants as part of a new development agreement with the brand. Those 20 new restaurants – in the brand’s updated Blaze design – will begin to open in 2023.
Impressed by the brand’s solid presence in the APAC region, George became a franchisee in 2015 and has been a dedicated leader ever since, bringing the bold, spicy flavors of Texas Chicken™ to New Zealand backed with support and encouragement from the brand.
“Texas Chicken™ – through its global reach as well as its understanding of local flavors and customs – is a true leader and collaborator in the growing fried chicken segment,” said Constantinou. “The brand has helped my franchise organization tackle challenges and identify opportunities for innovation and growth, offering significant support in all areas of the business.”
Aside from being part of the brand’s extensive international growth plans, these additional Texas Chicken™ restaurants are also part of the re-branding campaign known as the Blaze initiative, which features a modernized dining experience and elevated food and service quality. Constantinou and his team are currently exploring various areas throughout the country to find the ideal location for his restaurants expected to open next year.
This expansion announcement comes after the recent announcement of the agreement reached for the Texas Chicken franchisee in Malaysia to add 125 additional restaurants, furthering its reach and responding to its increasing popularity in Asia Pacific.
Russ Sumrall, Sr. Vice President, International Strategic Development, coordinated the expansion agreement with Constantinou. Sumrall added, “We are very grateful to George and his team for their leadership in the region and their trust in Texas Chicken™. Of course, we are always proud to bring our brand to new countries, but I love it even more when our existing franchisees request to build more Texas Chicken™ restaurants! There’s no doubt more and more Kiwi’s will get to know the flavorful legendary taste of Texas soon!”
About Church’s Texas Chicken® / Texas Chicken™
Founded in San Antonio, TX, in 1952 by George W. Church, Church’s Texas Chicken®, along with its sister brand Texas Chicken™ primarily outside of the U.S., is one of the largest quick-service chicken restaurant chains in the world. The brands specialize in Original and Spicy Chicken freshly prepared throughout the day in small batches that are hand-battered and double-breaded, Tender Strips®, sandwiches, honey-butter biscuits made from scratch and freshly baked, and classic, home-style sides all for a great value. Texas Chicken™ and Church’s Texas Chicken® have more than 1,500 locations in 26 countries and global markets and system-wide sales of more than $1 billion. For more information about Church’s Texas Chicken®, visit churchstexaschicken.com. For information on Texas Chicken™, visit texaschicken.com.
Kiwis have more ways to access news and information than ever before. Today, we are announcing major new investments that will continue our support of New Zealand’s vibrant and diverse news industry to help people find quality journalism and contribute to the sustainability of news organizations. These investments will also help newsrooms engage their readers in new ways, today and into the future.
Launching Google News Showcase in Aotearoa New Zealand
To support news organizations and readers in New Zealand, we’re launching Google News Showcase, our curated online experience and licensing program. News Showcase panels display an enhanced view of an article or articles, giving participating publishers more ways to bring important news to readers and explain it in their own voice, along with more direct control of presentation and branding.
Starting today, News Showcase is rolling out in New Zealand with seven news publishers representing more than 20 publications, including national, regional and local news outlets like the New Zealand Herald, RNZ, Crux, Newsroom and Pacific Media Network. This launch builds on News Showcase deals signed with more than 1,700 news publications in more than 17 countries, including Australia, United Kingdom, Japan, India, Germany, Brazil, Italy and Argentina.
News Showcase panels from our New Zealand news partners will begin appearing on Google News on Android, iOS and the web, and in Discover on iOS and Android. The panels direct readers to the full articles on news publications’ websites, enabling them to deepen their relationships with readers.
“By helping us build deeper relationships with readers, Google News Showcase will support the development of the BusinessDesk brand, which in turn boosts our editorial operation,” says Matt Martel, General Manager of BusinessDesk, a leading business and economy digital publication. “Our relationship with Google is a key factor in growing our newsroom from five to more than 20 journalists."
News Showcase highlights news publishers that are investing in comprehensive public interest journalism, giving them a new way to curate their high-quality content on Google’s News and Discover surfaces and bringing essential news coverage to Kiwis looking for it.
“Being able to further highlight the talent of NZME’s 300 editorial staff across our newsrooms is a really positive development," says Michael Boggs, NZME CEO. “NZME is strongly focused on transforming our business digitally, and the Google News Showcase partnership supports that focus."
“At RNZ we’re huge fans of making sure the brilliant stories from our award-winning journalists reach as many people as possible,” says Megan Whelan, Interim Chief Content Officer of RNZ, New Zealand's independent public service multimedia organization. "This new agreement is another way to make sure trusted public media content is available to more people via Google News, and that’s definitely a good news story.”
As part of our licensing agreements with publishers for News Showcase, we're also paying participating news organizations to give readers access to some of their paywalled content. This feature means readers will have the opportunity to read more of a publisher’s articles than they would otherwise be able to, encouraging them to learn more about the publication — and potentially subscribe.
"Pacific people from all over the world follow the news and journalism of our New Zealand-based newsroom,” says Don Mann, CEO of Pacific Media Network, a public interest broadcaster that works to empower Pacific cultural identity. “We aim to be the preeminent Pacific media entity for the Pacific diaspora and our relationship with Google will help us achieve this.”
“Crux has already developed a large, loyal local readership, but Google News Showcase will provide our readers with options like the ability to follow their own personal mix of trusted news sources,” says Peter Newport, Managing Editor of Crux local news for Queenstown, Wānaka and Cromwell. “We’re excited about the opportunity, and we think it’s a great initiative in support of strong New Zealand journalism.”
Google News Initiative programs in New Zealand
Google News Showcase is just our latest effort to support publishers of all sizes and the news industry in New Zealand. Through the Google News Initiative (GNI) we have been partnering with news publishers around the world to build a sustainable, diverse and innovative news ecosystem. The team offers training, products and funding to journalists and newsrooms to help strengthen their work in the digital age, and has reached more than 800 journalists and journalism students in New Zealand. These high-demand GNI programs provide an introduction to many of the core skills required to run a digital news business, based on the best practices and lessons of other news publishers around the world.
As New Zealand publishers continue to embrace technology to deepen their engagement with readers, we’re proud to be strengthening our commitment to working with and supporting publishers in Aotearoa. Through News Showcase, our other News products and GNI programs, we’re proud to promote quality journalism and a reliable and diverse news industry.
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