Known for its iconic Razr from the early 2000’s, Motorola is set to launch a new iconic phone for this new generation with te ao Māori capabilities. The new moto g collection by Motorola is offering a ground-breaking technology for Kiwis: a fully localised user interface in the Māori language. As the interest in learning the Māori language grows within New Zealand, Motorola has created a device, a first-of-its-kind to meet the demand. The three moto g devices in the collection will be offering more than just the ability to use Māori characters but also a broader CLDR (Common Language Data Repo ..read more

Founded by entrepreneur Bruce Jackson, Kai’s Education is reaching new heights after successfully expanding into the US and recently being named as a finalist in the 2024 EdTech Awards. The Kiwi-designed AI learning robot, KaiBot by start-up Kai’s Education, is seeing large success across the world. Designed by Jackson due to the challenge of teaching coding, KaiBot is a small AI-assisted robot that helps teach the principles of coding in a fun and interactive way. “We’re excited to be one of the first businesses in the world to combine robotics, AI and both physical and online tools to create ..read more

News site Stuff Group Te Puna is partnering up with Straker and Microsoft to launch their AI tech pilot programme to increase the number the number of te reo Māori articles. Through their new technology partnership, Microsoft and Straker are combining human translation with artificial intelligence to help normalise te reo Māori on Stuff’s platforms, digital channels, and publications. With this partnership, Microsoft and Straker will enable the translation of Stuff’s content at scale, which is then followed by quality-checks by translators and editors before publication. “Bilingual articles ar ..read more

Kiwi AI tech company, MACSO is backed by a US venture capital firm to  tackle the increase of vaping in schools in New Zealand. With the use of artificial intelligence (AI) technology, MASCO is detecting and measuring air impurities created from vaping and cigarette smoke, which will help reduce the act in New Zealand schools. With a growing number of people under the age of 18 now vaping regularly, MACSO hopes this will help prevent adolescents getting addicted. MACSO is partnering up with the US-based tech company Piera Systems to create hardware for their AI technology. “As a purpose-d ..read more

Telecommunications company Spark is harnessing the power of AI and advanced digital technology to move New Zealand forward. In a study by Spark and the New Zealand Institute of Economic Research (NZIER)– Accelerating Aotearoa businesses one technology generation forward – the country is looking towards advancing its technological capabilities over the next decade. The report revealed that a 20 percent uplift in the use of advanced digital technologies like AI can increase industry output by up to $26 billion and an increased GDP of 2.08 percent over the next decade. “New Zealanders generate si ..read more

With the cleantech industry seeing an $80 billion NZD investment each year, twelve Kiwi companies are ready to take a slice of the pie as they attract Silicon Valley investors. Cleantech Trek USA, led by Callaghan Innovation, helped connect these Kiwi companies with corporates and investors at the 2024 Cleantech Forum in Silicon Valley, to further their ventures developing solutions to global challenges in areas like renewable energy, clean water, waste-to-value, carbon capture, and carbon-free concrete. The Mission Lead, Phil Anderson, says the twelve companies ranging from pre-revenue to gro ..read more

New Zealand’s most popular tourist town, Queenstown has revealed plans to nurture its growing tech industry and become the next hotspot for the sector. Hoping to grow the local tech industry, the Queenstown Lakes District has unveiled its newly established technology development agency, Technology Queenstown. The agency has released an analysis that estimated the tech sector in Queenstown could generate $1 billion in annual GDP or 10 to 20 percent of the local economy by 2043. The analysis also found Queenstown’s tech industry has the potential to boost employment rates and the district’s tech ..read more

Deep tech start-up, Marama Labs successfully raises $1.75 million in Euros to scale up its wine analysis technology. New Zealand and Ireland-based tech start-up Marama Labs is creating a spectroscopy technology, named CloudSpec that is set to be used within the wine industry. CloudSpec will allow for opaque liquid samples like wines and nanomedicines, to be analysed in a fraction of the time it takes with existing instrumentation, giving customers chemical data to optimise and improve production processes. For winemakers, they will be able to use the technology to support and enhance their dec ..read more

In 2023 it was undeniable that artificial intelligence (AI) takes home the prize for being the most talked about topic across the world, but heading into 2024, are we getting tired of it all? Collins Dictionary named AI their word of the year after it was seen nearly everywhere you looked. From celebrity AI voices, generated AI images, the ChatGPT takeover, and so much more, it is no surprise that a word to define 2023 would be AI. With the popularity and hype around AI, experts across the board expect that this era is only going to continue heading into 2024. But as the general public, are we ..read more

According to Michele Wong, Spark IoT Lead, 2023 has been an exciting year for technology as many people are introduced to the possibilities of what tech can do, and this is expected to continue next year. From the takeover of artificial intelligence (AI) to the continued evolution of 5G, tech is continuing to innovate and come up with new ways of operating, and it shows no signs of slowing down. Wong sits down with us at Idealog to talk us through some of the trends to look out for in the new year. The growing demand for sustainable technology One of the things to look out for in 2024, says Wo ..read more