With the latest cohort of 11 awesome SaaS businesses kicking off their five-week NZTE Export Essentials training with OFNZ this week, we’ve now worked with well over 300 Kiwi exporters over the past seven years through the delivery of the programme. And while OFNZ has a particular specialisation in SaaS, Services, and Technology exporting, we’ve historically also worked with FMCG and F&B exporters since partnering with NZTE to deliver the course.

Nothing makes us happier than seeing some of our alumni succeeding on the global stage. This story about Huski ice-free champagne coolers in Exporter Today is a cracker and you can check it out here. And then there’s Toku Eyes which won the Most Innovative Hi-Tech Software Solution for its AI-powered product BioAge at the 2025 NZ Hi-Tech Awards.

While many more companies have made the news, or have simply and quietly made their way offshore, Export Essentials can also provide an excellent opportunity to test whether you’re ready to go offshore. While we celebrate those who do make the leap, it’s also courageous and clever to pause if you figure you may not be ready to invest the time, resources, and effort required to head offshore just yet.

If you’re thinking about exporting, or looking to grow your team’s export capability, you can check out the course options with NZTE  here or get in touch with our Export Coach Lead, Paul Sinclair (paul@onlyfromnz.co.nz) to receive OFNZ’s free export readiness assessment.

We’re delighted to welcome Louisa Rodani to the OFNZ team. Louisa leads our Games & Film service line and most recently worked at NZTE where, among many other things, she worked as OFNZ’s Customer Manager. This gave us ample opportunity to see Louisa in action, and to appreciate the creative thinking and awesome effort she put into us over several years helping our business grow offshore.

While working at NZTE, Louisa established the Gaming & Interactive Media Division which probably says a lot about where her personal and professional drivers nicely collide. Louisa also helped implement the Game Development Sector Rebate Scheme (NZGDSR), a $40m per year scheme to support the development and growth of New Zealand’s game development sector.

As OFNZ’s Creative Business Strategist, Louisa will continue to build on the positive relationships she has established across New Zealand’s thriving games and film sector and will be helping a group of those companies accelerate their international growth, with a particular focus on export markets across the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC).

New Zealand’s game development industry has enjoyed wickedly strong growth in 2024, generating NZD $547.794 million in pre-tax revenue, a 26% increase from the previous year. This growth confirms the industry’s resilience and expansion, particularly in global markets given that 97% of this revenue comes from offshore.

OFNZ has worked with several games and film companies over the past five years through our delivery of NZTE’s Export Essentials export training programme. Our focus on this sector has been sharpened hugely with Louisa’s arrival as her knowledge and network in the games and film sector across NZ and in the GCC is significant.

Louisa has relationships with a number of GCC interests that have been asking to meet with NZ companies in this space and will now be working to help NZ companies secure market growth in this exciting region.

Dubai Expo 2020’s Water-Food-Energy (WFE) Summit, hosted in association with the United Nations, runs over 18 & 19 January 2022 at Expo’s Nexus for People & Planet venue. OFNZ Director & Co-Owner Lesley Kennedy is presenting as a panelist between 12.00pm and 12.30pm on Day Two of the Summit which focuses on the WFE nexus for Sustainable Development Goals, under the headline of Water-Food-Energy in Today’s World. Lesley will be sharing some of the learnings from our research into agricultural water-use and water-balance in hyper-saline and hyper-arid environments and joins Dr. Tarifa A Alzaabi, Acting Director General, International Centre for Biosaline Agriculture (ICBA), and Rana Adib, Executive Director, REN21 (Renewable Energy Policy Network) for the session.