Trade NZ to target sales in Aust

By ADAM GIFFORD

Trade New Zealand is targeting the Australian food and beverage market as a way to test its $13 million internet strategy.

Chief executive Fran Wilde said the Sydney office felt it could radically enhance its ability to identify Australian buyers for New Zealand goods and produce by going online.

"The service will mean we can actively push a higher volume of qualified opportunities to New Zealand exporters," Ms Wilde said.

If the portal works, it will be extended to other industry verticals and other markets.

Ms Wilde said it would be a huge opportunity for small exporters "who are interested in doing business online but till now have not had the capability to fight their way through the bewildering maze on to the web and engage in internet trading."

Trade New Zealand estimates the prototype portal will cost up to $2 million. It has selected a consortium led by KPMG Consulting as the preferred tenderer to do the work.

Arama Kukutai, Trade New Zealand general manager of corporate services, said the project also involved a redesign of the organisation's website so it can do more business electronically.

He said KPMG Consulting would build the solution using off-the-shelf software and integrate it with existing Trade New Zealand systems.

Other members of the consortium include Cisco Systems, which owns part of KPMG Consulting, Microsoft, which has a global alliance with KPMG, and Telstra Saturn, which will host the site and which provides an entry into the mySAP.com and Corprocure marketplaces being developed across the Tasman.

"One thing which came out of our discussions is there is a lot of hype about portals," Mr Kukutai said.

"The idea of a portal in our strategy is its a link to marketplaces, and exporters do business in marketplaces. What e-commerce has created is new e-markets for exporters to get to grips with."

He said the portal would include detailed content on New Zealand exporters.

"People need to understand who they are doing business with and need to be comfortable they can trust the people they are trading with.

"Trade New Zealand is in a unique position because we are able to qualify the opportunity at the other end because we are in the marketplace. That's something electronic marketplaces can't take for granted, unless people are dealing with existing suppliers, which is all a lot of e-markets are doing."

Mr Kukutai said that each year Trade New Zealand got more than 25,000 trade inquiries into its posts.

"Client profiling is a way to make available to importers or buyers information about New Zealand exporters in a uniform format. That gives them the ability to home into companies which have the capabilities they need."

He said the majority of the $13.2 million over two years the Government had given Trade New Zealand for its internet strategy would go on marketing.

"This initial $2 million buys the commercial pilot and the software, which will then be applicable to other verticals."

Peter Kane, chief executive of KPMG Consulting New Zealand, said the project needed to fit in with Trade New Zealand's overall marketing efforts.

"This will be an integral part of its business. It's another channel which needs to be working with all its other channels."

He said that by using package solutions and working with companies with strong local and global links, the risks of the project were lowered.

Suri Bartlett, the managing director of KPMG Consulting, who leads the project, said lowering risk was a standard part of doing business with public sector organisations in a post-Incis environment.

"It's about breaking the development into bite-sized chunks, which are all reusable."