Five NZ Entrepreneurs Who Built Something Different

New Zealand produces a disproportionate number of founders who build companies around ideas most people would call impractical. What follows are five of them, not ranked, not listed as “secrets”, but presented for what they actually did.

Brianne West, Founder of Ethique

Brianne West founded Ethique in 2012 to eliminate plastic from personal care. Her approach, solid beauty bars instead of bottled liquids — has prevented over 25 million plastic bottles from reaching landfill. Ethique now sells in over 20 countries.

Businesses need to have a mission beyond making money if they want to stand out in this day and age. To me, a brand that wants to futureproof itself actually has to care about people and the planet
Brianne West, Founder of Ethique

Mike Casey, Founder of Forest Lodge Orchard

Mike Casey turned Forest Lodge Orchard into New Zealand’s first fully electrified commercial orchard, eliminating fossil fuels from its operations and cutting emissions by around 60 tonnes per year. As CEO of Rewiring Aotearoa, he now advocates for electrification across New Zealand’s industries and communities.

I’m an orchardist, so I love low-hanging fruit and on-farm and household electrification is the low-hanging fruit of emissions reduction.
Mike Casey, Founder of Forest Lodge Orchard

Vaughan Fergusson, Founder of Vend

Vaughan Fergusson founded Vend (now Lightspeed) in 2010 after noticing the first iPad could replace the clunky, expensive cash registers small retailers were stuck with. One of the first cloud-based point-of-sale systems, Vend grew into a global retail platform before being acquired by Lightspeed in 2021 for around US$350 million.

Do what you can, with what you’ve got, where you are.
Vaughan Fergusson

Eric Laakmann, CEO of Vessev

After a career at Apple, Eric Laakmann brought his engineering expertise to Vessev, a marine startup developing energy-efficient hydrofoil vessels. The company’s VS-9 achieves a 90% reduction in fuel costs and has entered the global superyacht market as a leader in sustainable marine transport.

The development and commercialisation of the VS-9 opens entirely new possibilities on the water, enabling a shift toward more efficient, more reliable and more comfortable marine transport.
Eric Laakmann, CTO of Vessev

Peter Beck, Founder of Rocket Lab

Peter Beck founded Rocket Lab in 2006 to make space launches more frequent and more affordable. The company’s Electron rocket has completed dozens of missions and its Photon spacecraft platform serves customers from defence agencies to commercial operators. Beck’s work has made New Zealand a spacefaring nation.

It takes the same amount of pain and grit to build a little company as it does a big company. So you might as well just build a big company and go after the really big problems
Peter Beck, Founder of Rocket Lab

For more, explore our 25 Kiwi companies making a global mark, or browse Profiles of the founders behind them.