Kea World Class New Zealand award winners 2022

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FRIEND OF NEW ZEALAND AWARD WINNER

Kaila Colbin

Kaila is originally from the US but moved to Christchurch in 2005. Just before the first earthquake she was responsible for bringing TEDx to Christchurch and immediately following the second quake she organised a further event which focused on the city’s rebuild – this event was attended by global speakers including people who had been instrumental in rebuilding quake damaged cities such as San Francisco.

A few years later she used her international connections to bring a panel of silicon valley experts to New Zealand for the country’s first Singularity University summit – a three day conference aimed at starting a conversation about our shared future, attended by top CEO’s business leaders, start-up entrepreneurs and school children.

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WORLD CLASS AWARD WINNER

Katie Sadleir

Katie Sadleir is a former Olympic and Commonwealth Games athlete, and the first female CEO of the Commonwealth Games Federation. Prior to this, she was the General Manager of Women’s Rugby at World Rugby, where she was responsible for promoting, growing and commercialising the Women’s game. She’s a passionate advocate for gender equality in sport and during the first year of her role at World Rugby she oversaw the appointment of seventeen women to the World Rugby Council, a council which had previously been made up entirely of men.

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WORLD CLASS AWARD WINNER

Zion Armstrong

Zion Armstrong is a former Commonwealth Games athletics champion who represented New Zealand in Kuala Lumpur. His first job was unpacking boxes at a Converse distribution centre at age 16. At 21 he joined the global brand Adidas where he worked his way up to become the President of Adidas North America. He is seen by his peers as a renowned leader and during his two decades offshore has used his Māori and Pacific values to connect and empower teams, foster a diverse and inclusive culture and grow talent. Zion didn’t finish high school and never attended university.

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WORLD CLASS AWARD WINNER

Guled Mire

Guled Mire was a former refugee who came to New Zealand at age six. He is a passionate human rights advocate and has been recognised for his leadership and contribution to public policy and his efforts to better connect ethinic and minority communities into Aotearoa. He is a Fulbright Scholarship recipient who spent time at Cornell University in New York and is using the lessons learned during his time in the USA to help inform public policy in this country. He’s twice spoken on behalf of New Zealand at the United Nations and chaired conversations with the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees.

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WORLD CLASS AWARD WINNER

Dave Ferguson

Dave is the co-founder of a technology company Nuro which is focused on accelerating the benefits of robotics in everyday life. He graduated from Otago University and went on to study his PhD in robotics in the US. He was a principal engineer on Google’s self-driving programme and one of his algorithms is currently being used for long-range autonomy on NASA’s Mars rover. During the pandemic Dave volunteered Nuro’s technology to enable contactless delivery of supplies to heath and essential workers in order to help slow the spread of the virus and allow those in high risk jobs to limit their contact with the general public.

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WORLD CLASS AWARD WINNER

Arama Kukutai

Arama is a global leader in the agritech industry. He is of Ngāti Tipa, Maniapoto, Te Aupouri, Parihaka descent, and started his career in finance at a time when Māori organisations were beginning to actively develop forestry, farming, and fishing assets. He served as executive chairman of PKW farms and also worked for the Government’s Trade & Investment agency in North America. Arama is a co-founder of, and partner at Finistere Ventures, one of the pioneering venture capital firms dedicated to agritech. He was responsible for the company’s global portfolios and used his connections to create a global agritech community to allow people to better share ideas and inspiration.