Undersea utterances
Researcher Shahriman Ghazali of Auckland University has discovered that fish communicate with each other in a secret language of grunts, growls, chirps and pops. Predators may even hunt out prey by intercepting fish talk,…
News of New Zealanders via Global Media
Sound Return
Researchers from the University of Auckland have discovered a potent new drug which once injected into the inner ear could reverse hearing loss caused by prolonged exposure to loud noise. The chemical agent ‘ADAC’…
Gender Surprises
Dr David Rowlands, a senior lecturer with the Institute of Food, Nutrition and Human Health at Massey University, has found after exercise women, unlike men, showed no clear benefit from protein during recovery. Several…
Inspiring survivor
New Zealand-born Denis Shackel, 68, a professor at the University of Western Ontario’s Richard Ivey School of Business and author of Five Seconds At A Time: How Leaders Can Make the Impossible Possible, is…
Own your own town
Remote Southern Alps township Otira, population 44 is for sale. Selling for $1 million, the deal includes a hotel, fire station, town hall and 18 houses. The Otira Hotel, which started life as a…
Kong is Back
The King Kong attraction at Hollywood park, the first theme park attraction that Peter Jackson’s New Zealand-based f/x shop Weta Digital has created, reopens on July 1 after a devastating fire two years ago….
Stopping the skim
BNZ fraud initiatives manager Michael Turner’s software-based technology for reducing credit-card fraud has been patented world-wide. The “liquid encryption number” (LEN) technology is used on all BNZ credit and debit cards, and has cut…
Geared-up for Top Show
The story of Hulme Supercars, the company behind the Hulme Can-Am, will feature on cult UK motoring show Top Gear, with the show expected to screen in August or September. Hulme managing director Jock…
Wwow What a Wwoof
From their wwoofing holiday in Northland, Californian couple Jacob and Kendall Madden describe their time spent working on five organic farms in the region in a guide about what it means to be a…
Revell’s field day
Te Aroha dairy farmer Richard Revell who has developed a fizzy cola-flavoured milk drink in a can, has met with multinational ire, with Coca Cola banning him from selling the beverage at the annual…
Share of the pie
The business activities of this placid South Pacific nation of four million, just west of the international date line, barely register elsewhere: America is logging off for the day, Europe is heading to bed…
Developing film ties
New Zealand and China have further strengthened their relations with a film agreement to host more Chinese-produced films in New Zealand. The agreement, made between the two nations in Shanghai and led by a…
Healthy advice for kids
Entrepreneur Dr Kate Hersov “was working as a paediatric doctor in her home country New Zealand when she and business partner Dr Kim Chilman-Blair struck the million pound idea,” Kate Lockyer writes in an…
Predicting sadness
New Zealander Professor Michael King, psychiatrist and Head of the Research Department of Mental Health Sciences at University College London (UCL), says reducing the prevalence of depression in the world is a major public…
Positive pitfalls
According to a New Zealand 3-year study people from positive family backgrounds are more likely to suffer depression, anxiety, alcohol dependence and drug dependence, tending to suffer more seriously and need more treatment. Researchers…
Super Swift and for Sale
Jock Freemantle’s super car company Hulme is now taking orders for 2 of its CanAm cars, which are priced around $64, and can reach speeds of 32kmh. Each car will be numbered and delivered…
On the job hero
Mark “Marko” Cunningham, 39, moved to Thailand 10 years ago to teach English, soon after beginning work as a volunteer paramedic. Cunningham tells CNN’s Julie Clothier about his role as a “body snatcher”. “I…
National carrier wins
Air New Zealand has won the Australia-Pacific’s best airline and the region’s staff service excellence award and was voted fifth in the world in the annual Skytrax awards. Eighteen million people voted in this…
Papery puns
Rangitikei artist Andrew Reilly has turned bull dung into paper, “perfect,” reflects Guardian blogger Roy Greenslade “for publishing bullshit”. After harvesting the dung, Reilly soaks it in water for a fortnight, explaining that there…
Tree house wins Webby
Warkworth’s onion-shaped treehouse restaurant, constructed 3ft up in a redwood tree, has won an award in the telecommunications section of the 21 Webby Awards. The Yellow Tree House campaign — a collaboration between advertising…
Smart Move
Auckland-based technology firm, NextWindow, has been bought out by privately-owned Calgary company, Smart Technologies. NextWindow, which employs 125 staff in offices in New Zealand, Taiwan, Singapore, South Korea and the United States, makes touch…
Police Found Culpable
The death of New Zealand anti-fascist protestor, Blair Peach, in a London demonstration against the National Front in April 1979, “marked one of the most controversial events in modern policing history”, writes the Guardian’s…
Dairy giant expands
New Zealand’s Fonterra Cooperative Group, the world’s biggest dairy exporter, expects a double digit jump in Middle East and Africa sales over the next year as the region’s thirst for milk products grows and…
Ash brings business
New Zealand orchid and salmon suppliers were working overtime after the volcanic eruption beneath Iceland’s Eyjafjallajokull glacier caused ash-related delays across the planet. “The phone started ringing hot from the East Coast of North…
Exercise Habits Studied
University of Auckland researchers have compared the exercise habits of 84 first-time mothers in a study which has shown that exercise during pregnancy may help babies start life at a healthy weight. The women…
Breathe with blackcurrants
Researchers from New Zealand’s Plant & Food Research (PFR) have found a compound in blackcurrants that may ease breathing in some types of asthma. The compound, a known antioxidant called epigallocatechin, was found in…
Moa Eggshells Tell All
Scientists in New Zealand and Australia have extracted the DNA from the fossil eggshells of 3000-year-old moa. It is the first time that scientists have succeeded in extracting ancient DNA from the fossilised eggshells…
Developing football
Wellington property developer Terry Serepisos, “who decided three years ago to save professional football in New Zealand, is the talk of his home town” writes The Sydney Morning Herald’s Michael Cockerill. “Wellington Phoenix are…
Courtesy code a model
In an article entitled, ‘New Zealanders’ code would help health debate’, Ron Eachus for the Oregon-based publication Statesman Journal ponders why this country, with its “way of treating people with respect … and common courtesy, untainted…
Qatar seeks NZ company
New Zealand Trade and Enterprise (NZTE) recently held an advisory board meeting under its Beachheads programme in Qatar. Through this two-year programme New Zealand companies are provided with faster access to better international networks….
Twomey triumphs
Artistic director of the New Zealand International Arts Festival Lissa Twomey has “put together a triumphant programme of calculated risk-taking”. Guided by her long experience with the Sydney Festival and her now shrewd understanding of…
Get Your Jet Pack Now
Inventor Glenn Martin’s jet pack will soon be commercially produced at an undisclosed site in New Zealand having finally secured sufficient investment. The 200 horsepower dual-propeller packs are the brainchild of Martin who unveiled his…
Lounging on Air
Air New Zealand is to introduce 22 “Skycouches” — formed out of three economy seats abreast that fold out to create a lie-flat space — in the first 11 rows in the economy cabin…
Green Hankshake
New Zealand will share its expertise in green technology with India to help the East Asian country produce clean energy and build an eco-friendly transport system. “New Zealand has a competitive advantage in green…
Top of the World
Air New Zealand has been named Airline of the Year, with judges of the Air Transport World magazine awards, “amazed and surprised at the degree of innovation that was occurring at a remote relatively…
Auckland Airport Expands
Auckland International Airports has acquired Westpac’s 24.55 per cent stake in North Queensland Airports (NQA) for AU$132.8 million as part of a strategy to grow beyond its New Zealand business. It sees Cairns as…
Missouri Dairy Kings
New Zealander Kevin Van der Poel, 46, remembers the skepticism and suspicion when he moved to Missouri more than four years ago to raise dairy cattle. When Van der Poel started construction on rock…
Dishy Beef Cakes
Wellington waiters Strip-of-Meat are a company with “a dress code that involves a lot of skin” writes website Inventorspot. “Yes, we’ve seen plenty of businesses of this sort lately, but with a name like…
Liddell to Detroit
General Motors, #4 on the Fortune 500 and now US-government-owned following a 30 year decline, has named Chris Liddell as Chief Financial Officer at possibly the most critical time in the company’s history following its…
Success at boiling point
Fahrenheit 212 co-founder and CEO Geoff Vuleta leans back in his chair and muses thoughtfully about his native New Zealand. “There’s a lawn at Oxford with a sign on it that clearly says, ‘Don’t…
Marriage Good for You
University of Otago clinical psychologist Kate Scott led a study of the effects of marriage on 34,493 people across 15 countries finding that it really is good for you and reduces the risks of…
Revered Geochemist
Port Chalmers-born Smithsonian scientist Brian Harold Mason, who was internationally known for his study of meteorites and moon rocks and who was the first to discover that a rock found in Antarctica came from…
Smooth operator
New Zealand-based bus manufacturer DesignLine, which already has three 37-seater vehicles valued at $784,000 operating as part of a pilot scheme in New York City, may be joined by 87 more buses by the end…
Model of all things
“People do not decide to become extraordinary. They decide to accomplish extraordinary things.” So said the mountaineer Sir Edmund Hillary. In the pursuit of the extraordinary, the dean of private business school INSEAD Frank Brown has…
Planet Earth is blue
From Great Mercury Island, 18km off the Coromandel Peninsula, Mark Rocket and Peter Beck of privately-owned company Rocket Lab successfully launched the 6-metre rocke Atea-1 into space. The rocket, which was carrying a 2kg payload of…
Pursuing World Domination
The Christchurch-designed YikeBike has been named one of Time magazine’s 50 Best Inventions of 2009, making the cover of the publication’s Asia edition. “It’s like getting your first Big Wheel all over again — and you don’t even…
Hawaiian theories
New Zealand may have been settled by sea-faring Hawaiians according to a new study of Polynesian canoe designs by Stanford University. The idea that ancient Hawaiians could have made the 4,400-mile journey south shouldn’t surprise anyone familiar…
Kanohi Ki Te Kanohi
Whale Watch Kaikoura has been named overall winner of the Virgin Holidays Responsible Tourism Awards 2009. The Telegraph’s Mark Chipperfield travels to the seaside town to spot some southern cetaceans. Whale Watch Kaikoura is…
Welcoming business nous
New Zealand’s migration policy has been relaxed in an effort to allow potential investors and entrepreneurs to gain permanent residency. Currently the majority of Brits hoping to live permanently in New Zealand must have…
Study proportionate
In a University of Otago study of over 500 women, researchers have found abortion “leads to significant distress in some” and that those reporting adverse reactions were up to 80 per cent more likely…
For the Pros
The New Zealand company behind Europe’s first artificial surf reef at Boscombe in Bournemouth, ASR Limited, has said the reef, now opened to the public, would provide a “substantial benefit” to the beachside community in terms…
Sweet Solutions
Researchers at the University of Auckland are working with dairy company Fonterra to develop a “medical dessert” which is proving to be useful in reducing the side-effects of chemotherapy in cancer sufferers. The ice cream, called ReCharge,…
Dengate Thrush Translates
New Zealander Peter Dengate Thrush, chairman of the board at the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN), has been in charge of reviewing what is being touted as the “biggest change” to the…
Txtn2quit
A New Zealand study has shown providing motivational support through daily text messages may help young cigarette smokers kick the habit. It is estimated that only about 5 per cent of smokers are able…
Discovering risk
Dr Rob Young, director of New Zealand-based Respiragene, developers of a genetic test designed for smokers, says that fear is a powerful motivator for smokers to quit the habit. The Respiragene test gives smokers…
Power to the people
Saatchi & Saatchi CEO Worldwide and nzedge.com co-founder, Kevin Roberts, appeared in an interview with Alixis Glick on FOX Business during the recent World Business Forum at Radio City Hall in New York, talking…
