Stirring Up the US Market

“Challenging older, slower companies is all in a day’s work to many technology start-ups – and nowhere more so than in New Zealand,” says dual Canadian/New Zealand citizen Andrew Ferrier, currently the chair of New Zealand Trade and Enterprise. “In my observation, companies from New Zealand, recently named Forbes ‘Best Country for Business’, share a cultural focus on speed to market and problem-solving. For example, Xero, which makes accounting software for small businesses, is emerging as the number one challenger to Quickbooks in the U.S. market. Xero, co-founder and New Zealand serial entrepreneur, Rod Drury (pictured), asserts that for Internet-based businesses, the paradigm is ‘the fast eats the slow,’ and company size – or home-market size – is no longer a determining factor in success.”