Hi Growth team rethinks its strategy

The Government's ambitious Hi Growth Project, which aimed to have 100 companies generating sales of $100 million each by 2013, is being reviewed.

Hi Growth chairman Paul Hargreaves said the goal, which came out of an ICT Taskforce report two years ago, was best seen as a "sound byte".

The Hi Growth board was checking to see if it was realistic.

The idea that IT-based business could generate 10 per cent of GDP by 2013 was sound, said Hargreaves. But whether it would be from 100 companies was questionable. The rethink follows the departure of key members from the the Hi Growth team: executive director Catherine Calarco and venture capitalist Jenny Morel.

Calarco left last year to work on private interests and to lecture at MIT and Harvard University.

Morel said the pressure of her business interests saw her resign from the board of New Zealand Trade and Enterprise as well.

Hargreaves said the strategy talks over the next month were necessary and they could result in the target being refined.

"We still want the figure - but how we get it might be different."

He said more than 250 companies had signed up for programmes offered by the project.

Hargreaves said he expected the strategy would see it increasing the revenue of many small companies.

The Hi Growth Trust has expanded its board with the addition of Wayne Hudson, a partner at law firm Bell Gully and president of New Zealand Software Association, and Garth Biggs, the former chief executive of system integrator Gen-I, which was swallowed by Telecom last year.

The changes at Hi Growth come as there are moves to rationalise the plethora of IT organisations in New Zealand.