Editor’s Letter – November/December 2019
On the day that we are going to print with this issue, there was a new report released that has found that New Zealand’s space sector contributed $1.69 billion to the economy in the last financial year and employs 12,000 people. This was, of course, timely given who is on our cover.
The Minister for Economic Development, Phil Twyford, quite rightly took a lot of pleasure in the findings and had a few positive things to say…
“The findings of this report show that New Zealand is extremely well-placed to increase its share in the NZ$647 billion global space economy,”
“The space economy’s $1.69 billion contribution in the 2018/19 financial year is significant for New Zealand and there is huge potential for us to grow our share.”
This report by Deloitte, which was commissioned by the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment or MBIE to friends, highlights the role of government and government agencies like MBIE and the New Zealand Space Agency (which sprung out from it) to foster innovation and growth by cutting red tape and supporting research, development, and all of those other important things, when growing an economy.
It is important to note though, as this report does, as well as Mr Twyford, the importance of private the sector in this new ‘New Zealand Space Economy.’ In fact, it is almost all private sector.
Mr Twyford does also note that Rocket Lab is a magnet to many leading international space companies who are starting to set up shop here. Rocket Lab is more than a magnet, of course. It is representative of something much bigger.
It’s all really exciting to look at numbers like these and start talking about GDP contribution and the employment of thousands in one of New Zealand’s hottest new industries. It’s another thing to stand beside a shed in Dunedin and imagine the potential of an industry.
Peter Beck has created the means to get small satellites into orbit cheaper and more efficiently than ever before, he has delivered payloads for NASA, he has helped develop a new type of satellite platform. Any of these are profound in their own right. Maybe more importantly though, Peter Beck has not only helped shift the dial on the New Zealand economy, he’s helped inspire a new industry here that is creating an ecosystem that will produce the talent and further breakthroughs and maybe even lead to the off-shoot of another billion-dollar-a-year industry or two along the way.