John Holt

John Holt is a Wellington-based serial entrepreneur, tech investor and startup ecosystem builder who has co-founded or helped build several of New Zealand’s notable technology companies.

Holt founded his first business, Technology and Innovations New Zealand, at the age of 17. After a corporate career spanning senior executive roles at Xerox, HP, IBM and ANZ Banking Group, he moved into entrepreneurship full-time. He studied military history at the University of Canterbury and completed a postgraduate diploma in business administration at Massey University.

In 2006, Holt co-founded Sonar6, a cloud-based talent management platform for small businesses. The company grew to more than 375 global clients before being acquired by Nasdaq-listed Cornerstone OnDemand in 2012 for approximately US$14 million.

In 2011, alongside Trade Me founder Sam Morgan, he co-founded the Kiwi Landing Pad in San Francisco, a non-profit that has helped hundreds of high-growth New Zealand tech companies establish themselves in the US market. Holt served as executive chairman and the initiative has become one of the country’s most important pieces of startup infrastructure.

He also co-founded Homes.co.nz, the property data and estimated-value platform, which was acquired by Trade Me in 2021. More recently, Holt founded All Things Considered, a platform that aggregates and verifies sustainability and ethics claims from fashion brands.

Holt’s profile is noteworthy because he has repeatedly built, exited and then turned around to build infrastructure for others. The Kiwi Landing Pad alone has shaped the trajectory of dozens of New Zealand companies reaching for the US market, making Holt as much an ecosystem builder as an entrepreneur.

Sources: University of Canterbury · NBR · BusinessDesk