Check out this video that captures some of the highlights of Morgo 2009. The 2010 conference, with a theme of Taking Calculated Risks, is shaping up to be another great two days.

Morgo went very well.  Standing around in the warm sunshine at Waitangi with lots of exciting New Zealand companies.  The offshore speakers provide a great spark.  Bill Reichert from Garage Ventures was a popular speaker, and stayed around to lead a walking workshop on entrepreneurship on Saturday – where we ended up kayaking.  The Aconex founders provided an inspiration to follow.  Andy Scott delivered a great talk on the future of mobile, Catherine Mohr warned us not to watch the graphic images of robotic surgery, and Andy Lark gave yet another great talk, this time on networking in the current day.  The jetpack flew, although not a lot as the wind came up.  Look forward to seeing you all there next year.

Here’s Jenny’s quick take on venture capital in NZ from Radio NZ nine to noon.

We’re pleased to announce that Anthony Romano has joined the board of the Martin Aircraft Company.  Anthony is the former head of Luna Rossa’s 2007 America’s Cup syndicate, and prior to this was CEO of Calvin Klein Europe. His capability in building world class brands and his track record in developing businesses in the European market makes him an excellent fit within an already strong board.  In particular Anthony brings a real insight into the minds of the target customers for the Martin Jetpack – high net worth individuals with a sense of adventure.

Compelled to comment on the post below from Alarm Clock which was taking a look at investment levels across start-ups developing robotics technologies.
“Venture capitalists tend to be fairly conservative people – despite their reputation for risk taking. Consequently, few robot-makers have received venture funding as many VCs put the likelihood of robot products succeeding on a par with anyone conquering jet-pack transportation”.
Well, not so at No 8 Ventures.  The Martin Jetpack hit world headlines in July this year.  What’s more, we are excited about the prospect of introducing a very cool robotics company soon.

Surveylab and the ikeGPS product is having a real impact on the GPS handheld market. This review by Don Jewell, the editor of GPS World, is worth a read. We particularly liked his summary: ‘for their specific purpose they are certainly the best GPS devices I have ever seen or used, and the degree with which they can be upgraded and customized seems to be endless. The ike GPS is a range of devices our warfighters need to have .. now, and devices that our firefighters and police departments and other organizations could benefit from as well. I look forward to hearing…about all the uses and in what circumstances they have employed the capabilities of this incredible GPS-based device.’

Just back from Morgo. The best couple of days in a long time. The purpose is to give everyone a re-charge, to excite them about the business of being entrepreneurs, and it certainly seemed to do that. Lots of stars, including Glenn Martin talking about his Jetpack, Didier Elzinga from Rising Sun Pictures, Bill Day from Seaworks, and Paul Dyson talking about an Australian living in NZ setting up a business in India, Ultramotor.

After keeping our investment secret for 4 years, it’s great to have the Martin Jetpack out in the market. The interest has been amazing: front page of the New York times, the Today programme, Fox News, 2 pages in The Times and on and on. Now we need to use some of that interest to raise some more money for the company and get on with building the flight envelope safely: height and speed. Pity we are such a small fund!

Martin Aircraft Company today unveiled the world’s first practical jetpack at Airventure, Oshkosh, Wisconsin.  This is the culmination of nearly 30 years of research and development by Glenn Martin and a team of avionic, technical, design and production experts.  For the next week the Martin Jetpack features as one of the star attractions alongside Virgin Galactic and the Boeing Dreamliner at the world’s largest air show.   Martin Aircraft Company, then in a garage, received initial investment from the No 8 Ventures in 2003 and we have worked intensively with the company for the past 5 years to reach this point.  In 2005, the 9th prototype achieved sustained flight times, laying the foundation for a viable and successful pre-production prototype to be developed.  In 2008, the world’s first practical jetpack was launched.