The free event will run from 9am to 4pm at the Due Drop Event Centre in Manukau this Saturday .
The programme will include speakers from the event’s backers: AWS, One NZ, Lacom, Ultra IT and Te Puni’s online learning company, Kōtui.
Expect some high-profile drop-ins, too. Ask Nicely and Huckberry founder Aaron Ward (Ngāti Maru) tells the Herald he’ll be checking out the event.
“Māori kids need Māori heroes,” is one of Ward’s mantras. His personal superpowers include building software firms and raising venture capital (some $89 million and counting to date).
“We’ve made progress, but there’s still a long way to go,” he told the Herald earlier this week.
“Māori are around 20% of the population [Census 2023 put the figure at 19.6%] but we’re only 5% of the tech workforce.”
An NZTech workforce survey released in mid-2023 found 4.8% of staff were Māori and 4.4% Pacific Peoples in surveyed companies – reflecting low participation in STEM subjects at school and low enrolment in IT degrees at university.
“They’re not only under-represented, but underestimated,” Ward says. “Diversity is an asset.”
Te Puni wants to encourage more into careers like software development.
But he adds, “Within technology, there’s also lawyers, there’s marketers, there’s business development managers and everything in between.”
A common thread: All the positions are better paid than most industries.
Te Puni wants kids, and their parents, to realise there’s opportunity in tech.
Ward will try to inspire some into ultimately founding their own companies, too.
“Māori are natural-born explorers, which is really what it takes to go and build start-ups. You need to be able to turn your back on the shore and go and discover the new,” he says.
Te Puni says last year 300 attended. This year, he’s hoping for 1000 through the door.
Chris Keall is an Auckland-based member of the Herald’s business team. He joined the Herald in 2018 and is the technology editor and a senior business writer.
