Innovation opportunities

Predicting fruit yield in orchards and vineyards has always relied on manual counting, but different counters can vary by up to 25% on the same plant. HoloCrop replaces this with an autonomous rover that navigates through orchards and vineyards using GPS and LiDAR, capturing thousands of images from multiple angles as it goes. These images are stitched into a 3D model, with computer vision detecting, counting, and sizing individual fruit to build accurate size-class histograms and virtual packouts. This gives growers a fast, consistent, and objective yield prediction they can rely on at scale. 

Project Status: Working prototype in industry validation, building commercial partnerships and preparing for spin-out and investment. 

DSA® electrodes are essential to chlor-alkali production, electrowinning, hydrogen production, and wastewater treatment, but their catalytic coatings depend on iridium and ruthenium, rare platinum group metals that have risen 160% and 80% in price over the past year alone. Our novel manufacturing technique produces iridium oxide and ruthenium oxide coatings with reduced precious metal loading, while maintaining the performance and durability the industry requires. Having validated lab-scale production, we're now scaling toward industry-relevant specifications and seeking DSA manufacturers interested in licensing this process.

Project status: Proof of concept, looking for ongoing research or commercial partners.

Dental and clinical students learning injection-based procedures like administering local anaesthesia have long relied on practising on peers or expensive mannequins, leaving many underprepared before treating real patients. This mixed reality haptic platform pairs a real dental syringe with wireless haptic feedback, force simulation, and motion tracking in an immersive environment, recreating the feel of a real procedure. Developed for Inferior Alveolar Nerve Block administration, it builds spatial awareness, procedural accuracy, and muscle memory through safe, repeatable practice, and is adaptable to other syringe-based procedures across medicine and healthcare.

Project status: Working lab prototype, looking for industry trial partners.

High-power conversion systems often exceed what a single transistor can handle, so devices are connected in series or parallel. Tiny variations between devices cause destructive imbalances during nanosecond switching, limiting reliability. Our technology solves this with an active control system that precisely balances voltage and current across semiconductor arrays, letting them act as one high-performance switch. This unlocks efficient, megawatt converters using emerging GaN, SiC, and Ga₂O₃ tech, spanning EV and heavy transport drives, grid inverters, solar power, and hydrogen aircraft propulsion. We are seeking partners to bring this to market. Discover the future of power conversion.

Project status: proof of concept, looking for ongoing research or commercial partners.

Our patented microfluidic valve technology enables lab-on-a-chip devices to run complex, multi-step chemical reactions with no external pumps, actuators, or peripheral equipment. It uses capillary action alone to control exactly when and how liquids mix. Backed by MBIE Endeavour funding, the platform is being developed into rapid, cost-effective biosensing devices for point-of-care and in-field diagnostics, with prototypes underway spanning early detection of Alzheimer's disease, multi-drug workplace and roadside testing, and wine quality control. This gives users lab-grade results in minutes, wherever and whenever they need them.

Project status: proof of concept, seeking application development partners.

Rugby has one of the highest concussion rates of any contact sport, with junior players particularly vulnerable to the short and long-term impacts of head injuries. In New Zealand alone, thousands of potentially dangerous head collisions occur every season, creating significant health, educational, and economic challenges for players, whānau, and communities. Despite growing awareness of concussion risks, existing standards and products often fail to provide meaningful protection. We are addressing this by developing headgear designed to reduce the linear and rotational forces associated with rugby collisions while maintaining comfort, performance, and regulatory compliance.

Project status: proof of principle, seeking strategic partners and investors to support commercialisation of our headgear.

Proton-selective membranes are critical to battery performance, but existing options are often expensive and can allow unwanted species crossover that reduces efficiency and operating life. We are developing a new class of membrane materials made from low-cost hydrophobic salts that self-assemble into bilayer-like structures on porous supports, enabling proton transport while acting as a barrier between electrolytes. The membranes can be fabricated using straightforward coating methods, have shown proof-of-principle performance in the lab, and can be dried and rewetted without losing function, offering a practical alternative for redox flow batteries and related electrochemical systems.

Project status: proof of principle, looking for development partners.