Manufacturing Technology

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 Every successful project needs more than a timeline. It needs people who can anticipate risks, make practical decisions in real time, and keep everyone aligned. That is what project engineers do. They combine design knowledge with delivery discipline, bridging the gap between disciplines and helping transition drawings to reality. On capital projects across food processing, heavy industry, and advanced manufacturing, project engineers often make the difference between a clean handover and weeks of extra work and significant variations. They understand both the design intent and the realities of construction. They know when to challenge assumptions, when to push for clarity, and when to make a call on the spot so progress is not lost. Why It Matters Now NZ manufacturers are juggling more complexity than ever: tight labour markets, growing compliance demands, and the high cost of downtime. With stretched teams and costly shutdowns, there is little margin for error when delivering capital projects. Manufacturing projects today carry more moving parts (compliance, cost control, and tighter schedules) which makes disciplined delivery even more important. Project engineers bring that discipline and most importantly technical oversight. By planning ahead, coordinating suppliers, and promptly solving problems, they reduce delays, avoid rework, and keep production running. Real-World Impact We see this value play out across industries. Food Processing Upgrade On a major line expansion, the design work was sound, but the risk lay in how quickly equipment could be installed and commissioned before production needed to resume. A project engineer coordinated trades, validated as-built […]

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 handled a breakdown, approved a quote, covered for someone off sick, chased an overdue invoice… and by evening they’re back on email. Not by choice, but because if they don’t, no one else will. David Altena is head of Growth & Partnerships at SmartSpace.ai and C0-Founder and Host of The Better SMB Podcast. We call it leadership. In reality, it’s survival with a spreadsheet and it’s no wonder we’re producing 30% less than our OECD peers. Here’s the uncomfortable truth: if your business grinds to a halt the moment you step away, you don’t own a business, you own a job with overheads. That’s no foundation for a high performing business, growth, or succession. Rob is Director of the New Zealand Lean Academy. www.rob@nzla.net Survival isn’t strategy Contrast that with firms operating at a higher level of maturity. Leaders aren’t caught up in the day-to-day, they have clear business plans and measurable KPIs. They hold quarterly reviews where leaders coach instead of firefight. They invest in systems to capture knowledge and create consistency and aren’t reliant on one person’s memory or availability. Their systems are stronger than their heroes. The markers of operational maturity Operational maturity doesn’t come from a new machine or a fresh ERP licence. It comes from design and discipline, doing the boring things brilliantly: Clear purpose and numbers: every employee knows the three metrics that matter most and how their work moves them. Standard work before scale: processes are documented, taught and audited so improvements stick. […]

“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 to eat into profits. Many local manufacturers now find themselves running at full capacity but achieving less output per hour than they did a few years ago. The question leaders should be asking is simple: Are we working harder, or are we working smarter? The Productivity Wake‑Up Call New Zealand’s ongoing productivity slide isn’t a reflection of a lack of effort. It’s a signal that many manufacturers are stuck in a cycle of firefighting meeting daily demands while long-term efficiency initiatives fall down the priority list. True productivity improvement isn’t about longer hours or more pressure; it’s about creating systems that make workflow more efficiently, engaging people to solve problems, and embedding smarter measurement. Becoming more profitable and productive can feel like a daunting challenge when you’re struggling just to get product out the door. But here are my top five tips. Choose just one to focus on for the next 90 days and let me know how it goes. Engage Your People The best productivity ideas often come from the people who do the work every day. Leaders who create time and space for operators, planners, and even office staff to identify improvement opportunities can unlock huge value. Start by running short weekly sessions focused on “fix one thing” improvements. Empower staff to own small wins, such as setup time reduction or improved information flow. When people see that their ideas are acted on, engagement and performance rise together. Measure What Matters Many manufacturers collect a sea of data but […]

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 voice and collaborates with many companies for better business and better times. Your company is invited to be a part of NZPO, as we share stories and experiences of our businesses as they tell them to us. And we find ways to greater prosperity. We were extremely concerned that the NZ Productivity Commission ceased with no noticeable feedback and input from the business community. Is it missed? Does anyone care? We intend to find out. Contact publisher@xtra.co.nz or Tel: o27 280 1992 to discuss further and be added to the NZPO Data Base.

Alpha Group visit, Prof Yihau Gao is presented with a letter of acknowledgement by Provost Prof Giselle Byrnes (1)

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 we celebrate and support the people behind it. NZ Manufacturer business advisor and director of public relations agency Impact PR Mark Devlin, says Gao’s success highlights the need for New Zealand to broaden its definition of innovation beyond agriculture and technology start-ups. When New Zealand talks about innovation, the spotlight too often shines on technology start-ups, film, or agriculture. Yet the nation’s manufacturing success stories are equally compelling and frequently overlooked. The recent recognition of Professor Yihuai Gao by Massey University is a timely reminder of the people driving breakthroughs behind the scenes of our manufacturing economy. A life in science and manufacturing Earlier this month, Massey University honoured Professor Yihuai Gao for a two-decade scientific collaboration centred on medicinal mushrooms. Gao, founder of nutraceutical manufacturer Alpha Group, has built a bridge between science, manufacturing, and international commerce. 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. Alpha Group operates a biotech manufacturing facility in Manukau alongside a growing international footprint. Its nutraceuticals, built on validated bioactives from fungi and plants, are distributed to markets across Asia and beyond. This is not just a research story. It is a manufacturing story. Turning fungi science into certified health products that meet stringent global standards requires advanced processing, regulatory expertise, and scale. Alpha Group exemplifies the type of high-value manufacturing New Zealand needs more of, yet the name of its founder is unfamiliar to many outside the sector. From […]

Supporting manufacturers to succeed

By Hon Chris Penk, Minister for Small Business and Manufacturing While the Government has been setting out a pro-growth agenda, a question I often hear when I visit manufacturers or speak to business audiences is: what support is available for firms that want to expand and contribute to a stronger economy? For those who haven’t come across it yet, I want to highlight the Regional Business Partner (RBP) Network. This nationwide programme, delivered in partnership with business chambers, economic development agencies and the national provider Poutama Trust, offers practical, tailored support to help small businesses grow. The past financial year has been one of the strongest yet for the RBP Network. Nearly 4,500 businesses engaged with the programme, which is the highest number outside the COVID-19 response. That’s a seven per cent increase on the previous year, and 13 per cent higher than in 2022/23. This growing uptake tells us that business owners value the advice and connections on offer, and that word-of-mouth recommendations are carrying real weight. One example of what this support can achieve is Coastwood Furniture, a long-established manufacturer in Greymouth. Known for solid timber furniture designed for both retail and commercial clients, Coastwood has been in business for more than 25 years. Like many regional firms, it faces challenges: rising operating costs, softening retail demand, and limited access to experienced leadership talent. Within the company, some staff had stepped into management roles without formal training. Across its retail network, staff were not always equipped to present Coastwood products consistently. With support from Development West Coast through the RBP programme, Coastwood put targeted training in place. This included leadership development workshops, advanced health and safety training, and a “train the trainer” sales initiative to help retail partners around the country. The impact has been clear. Leaders […]

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 […]

How the EMA’s Manufacturing Safety Dashboard can help to transform workplace safety

By EMA Head of Advanced Manufacturing Jane Finlayson In an industry where precision, productivity and performance define success, safety must never be treated as a background concern. For manufacturers, every injury represents not just harm to a valued person but also disruption to production, increased costs and reputational risk. Yet despite decades of progress, manufacturing remains New Zealand’s highest-harm sector. At the Employers and Manufacturers Association (EMA) we’ve been looking at ways to assist the sector and one result was the Manufacturing Safety Dashboard, which we launched earlier this year. It’s a dynamic online tool designed to help manufacturers understand, benchmark and reduce workplace harm. This dashboard can be a catalyst for cultural change in manufacturing businesses. It was designed to take what has too often been a reactive approach to safety and turn it into a proactive, informed strategy for harm reduction. Recently, I had the opportunity to present the dashboard to a group of structural steel manufacturers and distributors. Drilling into the data revealed not only the levels of harm prevalent in their subsector but also the types of injuries occurring most frequently, and how that compares to other manufacturing subsectors. This level of visibility sparked meaningful conversations about risk mitigation, training, seasonal workforce management, and the role of leadership in fostering safer workplaces. The Manufacturing Safety Dashboard was developed initially by WorkSafe, in partnership with ACC and data specialists at Flock, with a clear objective: to make harm data accessible and actionable. Drawing from ACC claims data and overlaying it with BIC (Business Industry Classification) codes, the tool provides a transparent picture of injury trends across the many subsectors that make up manufacturing. Whether a company operates in plastics, food processing, metal fabrication, or structural steel, the dashboard allows users to filter by industry, region and time […]

Building resilience through age-inclusive practices in New Zealand manufacturing

By Shyamini Szeko, reflecting on Master’s research into ageing and work in New Zealand manufacturing (AcademyEx, 2025) When I began my Master’s research into age-inclusive practices in New Zealand manufacturing, I thought I was studying a “future of work” issue. What I quickly realised was that it is also a very human story, one about resilience, knowledge, and how we value people at different stages of their working lives. New Zealand’s workforce is changing fast. By 2033, nearly half (44%) of workers will be over 45, with 8.6% aged 65 and older (MBIE, 2023). We also stand out globally for how many older people remain in the workforce. Overall, about one in four New Zealanders aged 65 and over are still working, and for those aged 65 to 69, it is close to half (Te Ara Ahunga Ora, 2023). This is an extraordinary contribution, but also a challenge if workplaces do not adapt. What the research revealed Through conversations with older workers, younger colleagues, industry leaders, and cultural advisors, five themes became clear: Flexibility matters, but it is uneven Office-based employees often have access to flexibility, while factory workers rarely do. Yet small changes, such as a shorter week or a different shift pattern, can keep people engaged and thriving. Knowledge transfer is fragile Long-serving employees carry decades of know-how, often undocumented. Without structured mentoring, this experience is easily lost. Digital change can feel out of reach Many older workers lack confidence with technology and want safe, supportive ways to learn. Younger employees are often keen to help but need structured opportunities. Age is overlooked in inclusion While gender and ethnicity are visible priorities, age rarely makes the list. This gap leaves older workers feeling undervalued. Ageism is also evident in recruitment. Many people over 50 report being overlooked for […]

Salus Aviation’s advice for successful expansion

From NZ Manufacturer September edition Salus Aviation’s story began in 1936 as a small aviation support provider based in rural Auckland, right next to Ardmore Airport. Over time, the company evolved through mergers and acquisitions to create a vertically integrated aviation company. Today, it’s a true ‘nose-to-tail’ provider, leasing out aircraft, performing line maintenance, conducting heavy overhauls, manufacturing specialist equipment and supplying parts. The EMA’s Nicholas Russell sat down with Salus Aviation CEO Greg Edmonds to discuss the company’s evolution, which has been driven by customer demand for comprehensive solutions and a desire to prove that a New Zealand company can compete with the biggest players internationally. Q: What does Salus Aviation’s manufacturing workshop produce? Greg Edmonds: We marry stringent aviation standards with world-class design and MRO capabilities to serve our clients globally Our experienced design and manufacturing teams create specialist role equipment and modifications for both fixed-wing and rotary aircraft. Operating under NZCAA Part 148 manufacturing certification, we build and install advanced systems tailored to specific mission profiles – anything from agricultural operations to search and rescue. We also manufacture crop-spraying systems, infrastructure inspection role equipment, and even full aircraft assemblies and modifications. Our bespoke solutions extend aircraft capabilities and make operators safer and more efficient. Q: What lessons can other manufacturers draw from Salus Aviation’s successful expansion? Greg Edmonds: Vertical integration matters: We offer a ‘nose-to-tail’ service suite: design, MRO, parts supply, line maintenance, aircraft leasing and heavy overhaul. That gives us resilience and a competitive edge. Certification and quality are non-negotiable: Our Part 148 certification ensures our products meet top-tier aviation standards. Building a strong, proven foundation is key to successful growth: We sunk deep roots in New Zealand before looking outward, investing in markets like the Americas and Africa. Niche specialisation sells: For example, we’re […]

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