The hidden role of project engineering in NZ Manufacturing
Smart manufacturing is not just about advanced machines, data, or automation. It is also about how projects are delivered. In New Zealand, where margins are tight and downtime is expensive, project engineering is often the difference between a smooth delivery and one that struggles to get finished. Beyond the Plan […]
Beyond the roadmap: How Argus made people the engine of change
Adam Harvey, Business Performance Partner – Manufacturing, The Learning Wave Running operations today feels like living in two realities at once. On one hand, you know the plant has to modernise. The systems are creaking, customers want more for less, and digital tools promise the efficiency you need. On […]
Age-Inclusive Manufacturing: Making Flexibility Fair on the Factory Floor
By Shyamini Szeko, reflecting on Master’s research into ageing and work in New Zealand manufacturing (AcademyEx, 2025) Why Flexibility Matters “My 32-hour week lets me maintain a healthy sleep schedule and personal life,” one long-serving factory worker told me during my research. That small adjustment meant he could keep working […]
The Business Owners Exit Dilemma
David O’Connor, Platform 1 Many aging business owners have worked hard all their lives and are at a stage where they have built up a business that has given them a good income and lifestyle and it’s part of who they are. They know they should do something at some […]
From survival to strategy
Creating a business that runs without you Step into almost any Kiwi workshop at 6 a.m. and you’ll find the owner already there, fixing yesterday’s problem before the team clocks in. They’re signing off orders, juggling suppliers, answering calls and putting out fires faster than they ignite. By mid-morning they’ve […]
Could a laser-generated plume be the next biohazard scare?
By Ruth Nicholson, Laser Safety Officer and Director at NZ Laser Training Institute Ltd Lasers are an emerging technology used across various industrial applications such as precision cutting of metals, welding components with minimal heat distortion, or hardening to improve wear and corrosion resistance. Unlike ordinary white light, they emit a single wavelength […]
“We’re working really hard”
-Sean Doherty Across New Zealand’s Government and manufacturing alike, one phrase is repeated almost like a badge of honour: “We’re working really hard.” Yet, when you look at the numbers, it’s clear that hard work isn’t translating into higher productivity. Rising input costs such as wages, electricity, and raw materials continue […]
AI for Manufacturing Operations: It’s the bus you can’t afford to miss
Gareth Mitchell, Associate Partner, IRIS by Argon & Co Manufacturing globally faces relentless pressure for operational excellence, efficiency, and resilience. Over the past five years, Artificial Intelligence (AI) has emerged as a revolutionary innovation and a true economic engine reshaping modern manufacturing. As companies encounter supply chain disruptions, predictive […]
NZPO an impartial voice
Media Hawkes Bay Limited, publishers of this magazine, has founded and launched the New Zealand Productivity Organisation (NZPO) to assist in moving manufacturing and business forward. We understand that New Zealand companies may well have their own clients they communicate with regarding productivity. However, New Zealand Manufacturer is an impartial […]
New defence strategy opens doors for small businesses and manufacturers
By Hon Chris Penk Growing the New Zealand defence industry offers a significant opportunity for small businesses and manufacturers. Wearing both my hats as the Associate Defence Minister and the Minister for Small Business and Manufacturing, I launched the New Zealand Defence Industry Strategy alongside my colleague and friend Defence […]
New steel business exemplifies promise of more competitive building products landscape
The Government’s announcement of the new Building Product Specifications (BPS) document, designed to open the doors to thousands of additional building products and bring construction costs down, has been welcomed by the building industry – and one operator has already taken control of long-standing competition issues in the roofing sector. […]
Do we do enough to honour manufacturing pioneers?
What began in 1998 as a small garage start-up in West Auckland is now one of New Zealand’s largest dual-market export operations From a West Auckland garage start-up to a $225m global biotech expansion, Professor Yihuai Gao’s journey shows how manufacturing innovation can transform New Zealand’s economy if only […]
Is software development manufacturing?
The case for weightless exports Say “manufacturing” and most people picture sparks from a weld, sawdust from timber, or the whir of a CNC. We equate it with the physical and tangible. But what if our most scalable factories don’t make anything you can touch? What if software, intangible, weightless and infinitely reproducible, is already the most powerful manufacturing industry we have? David Altana is Head of Growth & Partnerships at SmartSpace.ai & Co-Founder & Host of The Better SMB Podcast. david@altana.solutions Rob Bull is Director of the New Zealand Lean Academy rob@nzla.nz It’s time we asked: Could software development be manufacturing? Manufacturing Principles, Different Medium ‘Manufacturing’, according to Wikipedia, is the creation or production of goods with the help of equipment, labour, machines, tools and chemical or biological processing or formulation. If you strip away the noise, manufacturing is about applying discipline to value creation: Standards before scale – chaos doesn’t scale. Whether it’s ISO audits on a production line or unit tests in a dev pipeline, quality comes from codified standards. Flow, not friction – lean talks takt time, bottlenecks and waste; Agile talks sprint velocity and backlog. Both are obsessed with minimising waste and maximising throughput. Customer Focus – whether it’s gearboxes or gigabytes, real manufacturing starts with solving actual customer problems, not filling time. Global scalability – once the process is right, standard processes are created, every extra unit costs marginally less. For plastics, that’s running another shift. For SaaS, it’s another thousand users for near-zero marginal cost. By those measures, software development is not only manufacturing, it’s the purest form we’ve ever had. The Scale Problem with “Stuff You Can Grow” New Zealand’s export story is dominated by the primary sector. Food and fibre exports are worth ~NZ$55–60 billion a year, more than half of […]