Ian Taylor from Animation Research Ltd is recognised as one of New Zealand's leading Maori innovators. After 20 years with TVNZ Ian left in 1988 to establish three successful technology businesses. Taylormade Media - a television and multi media company; Animation Research Ltd,(ARL), one of the country's most celebrated high tech companies; and BookIt, a specialist on line booking company.

In 1999 Ian merged ARL's 3D graphics into a new company, Virtual Spectator and produced the world's first live, real time 3D Internet coverage of a sporting event, The Americas Cup in Auckland.

In 2006 ARL's Air Traffic Control Simulator, built in partnership with Airways New Zealand, won three categories of the Computer World Excellence Awards.

Ian is also an award winning producer of a number of documentaries including Back Yard Visionary/The John Britten Story, Burt Munro, The Worlds Fastest Indian and the highly acclaimed 'Aramoana'.

Mike Carden is the CEO and Co-founder of Sonar6: the world conquering Human Resources internet business with the tag line "At last, performance reviews that don't suck". Hundreds of thousands of employees in businesses all around the world use Sonar6 for their annual performance review.

Sonar6 was founded in 2004 based on the idea that performance management should be simple and rewarding. The first generation of the Sonar6 online toolset was launched in February 2006.

Growth since then has been rapid. Sonar6 now has customers all around the world, and is well known as the innovator in Human Resource software.

Mike originally trained in Artificial Intelligence but ended up spending much of his early career in consumer marketing for global corporations like HP where he established a number one market share position for HP as they launched their Pavilion home PC in Asia/Pacific.

Kathryn Wilson is New Zealand's premier footwear designer.

Now into her eighth year of business, Kathryn has forged a reputation of designing beautiful footwear inspired by international trends that caters to a unique male and female customer worldwide.

Kathryn is looking forward to expanding her collections to a bigger global audience in the near future, and made a bold step in that direction by launching the 'Miss Wilson' diffusion line in 2010.

NZFW 2011 has been another milestone for Kathryn as she delivered another 'first time ever' event to her legion of loyal fans by opening her NZFW show to an audience of 3000 public.

Rosanne Meo , OBE, having worked as company director for almost 20 years was amongst the first professional women directors in New Zealand. She was also the first woman to chair an SOE, [Forestry Corporation and TVNZ] , and first woman chairman of a company listed on the NZSX.

She is graduate of Auckland University .

Her directorships have obviously been principally in New Zealand but also in Australia, and cover both public and private companies. She also does extensive work in the voluntary sector, particularly in the Arts and community support.

She is currently Chairman of Briscoe Group Ltd, the Auckland Philharmonia , the Real Estate Institute, AMP Services [NZ] Limited, a director of Overland Footwear, a trustee of the Kelliher Trust and of South Auckland Health Foundation.

Rod Duke has spent all his working life in the retail sector. After leaving school in Adelaide, he commenced work with retailers in South Australia before moving to Waltons Ltd in Sydney in 1980. From 1981 to 1988 he held the positions of New South Wales Manager of Homecraft/Eric Anderson Stores, a Senior Merchandise Executive for Grace Brothers then Managing Director of Norman Ross Ltd. In September 1988, Rod accepted the position of Managing Director of Briscoes (New Zealand) Limited, at that time a subsidiary of Hagemeyer of the Netherlands, with a mandate of returning the company to profitability and preparing it for sale. In January 1990, Rod reached agreement for the RA Duke Trust to purchase 100% of the shares of Briscoes and he has continued to be the Group’s Managing Director. In 1996 Rod established, and in subsequent years expanded, the Rebel Sport chain of sporting goods stores in New Zealand as a business within the Briscoe Group.

John Buchanan is Chairman of Smith & Nephew plc; Chairman of the International Chamber of Commerce (UK); Senior Independent Director of BHP Billiton. Former NED positions include Boots and AstraZeneca. He retired from the Board of BP plc as CFO in 2002 after 33 years with the company. Early in his BP career he was seconded to the UK Cabinet Office, 1976-1977, and he was a member of the UK Accounting Standards Board from 1997-2001.

A UK-based New Zealander, he is active in educational and arts philanthropy and serves on two UK Trusts, for the University of Auckland and Auckland Grammar School, as well as being Chairman of the UK Christchurch Earthquake Appeal. He was educated in Papatoetoe-Otara Intermediate and AGS, the University of Auckland to PhD in Chemistry, then Oxford and a post-experience Harvard Business School program.

He has broad sporting, cultural, business and family interests.

So who would have picked that this kid from a small seaside town in New Zealand would some day step out onto the world stage, featuring on shows like The Late show with David Letterman, The Today Show, 60 Minutes, NBC news, BBC World to name just a few..

Part stuntman - part conservationist and self confessed ‘mad fisherman’, Matt captures the attention of his audience by pulling off impossible catches - unbelievably big fish from ridiculously small boats.

While he’s better known for leaping out of a helicopter to wrestle a marlin, Matt started fishing as most of us do with his father and grandfather as a 3 year old. Today Matt has become a popular character in New Zealand and abroad for his engaging energetic presence on television.

Mike is Chief Executive of Z Energy, the company that purchased the downstream oil business of Shell in New Zealand on 1 April 2010.

Mike has 25 years of experience in the global energy industry with his expertise covering supply, trading and marketing businesses. In 1983 he joined BP in New Zealand with his early roles in sales, marketing, information technology and finance.

Since 1992 he has served in various leadership roles in South Africa, China, Singapore and the United Kingdom. His last role with BP was as CEO for BP’s Integrated Supply and Trading business unit in the Eastern Hemisphere, a geography including Australasia, Asia, the Middle East and sub-Saharan Africa.

Mike has served as a Director of various private and public companies and joint ventures in Singapore, China and South Africa. He is a Director of the New Zealand Refining Company Limited and Loyalty New Zealand Limited.

Owen G Glenn ONZM is founder, and executive chairman of OTS Logistics Group - a billion dollar revenue company with offices in 105 countries. It’s one of the world's largest logistics companies with a point of difference – it owns virtually no assets - utilising state of the art eCommerce solutions that allow clients to track where in the world their goods are.

Owen sees education as a key element in today’s world and over the past four years he has contributed over $8 million to Auckland University for the development of the Business School’s facilities and scholarships.

Philanthropy is a huge part of Owen’s life. In addition, the Glenn Family Foundation made a $3.85 million donation to the National Training Centre for High Performance Sport at the Millennium Institute on the North Shore.

Owen Glenn received an Officer of the New Zealand Order of Merit in the 2008 as recognition of his business achievements and philanthropy.

Richard Till burst into our living rooms as the opinionated, unpretentious and likeable chef in “Kiwi Kitchen”. The first season of Kiwi Kitchen won The Ocean Spray Electronic Media Award from the NZ Guild of Food Writers. The judges described the winning entry as "engaging, humorous and very real". Since then, he’s written books and toured the country with the second series of his top rating TV show. He’s so popular in fact, that Foodtown and Countdown have chosen him as their pin up boy.

Richard has owned his own restaurants but he really cracked the food market by doing comedy cooking shows in Arts Festivals in Wellington and catering for visiting music tours such as U2, Simply Red and Stevie Wonder, Miles Davis, Jimmy Barnes, New Order, the English cricket team, and thousands upon thousands of kiwis.

Chris Liddell was the Vice Chairman and CFO of General Motors, where he led the company’s global finance operations. Chris’s international career has alsoe seen him as CFO and senior Vice President of Microsoft, CFO of International Paper, CEO of Carter Holt Harvey and joint CEO of CS First Boston NZ .

He is currently involved in a number of philanthropic projects in New Zealand, is a trustee of the New Zealand Institute, a patron of the University of Auckland fundraising campaign. He is also a Director of IMG, the leading sports management company in the world.

Chris holds an Engineering degree with honors from the University of Auckland in New Zealand, and a Master of Philosophy degree from Oxford University in England.

Jenny Morel, founded No 8 Ventures in 1999, to invest in exciting young technology companies from New Zealand. She is currently Chairman of Martin Aircraft Company, and Rex Bionics, and a director of Open Cloud and Surveylab.

Jenny is also the founder of an annual gathering of New Zealand high growth companies, Morgo, which will be held for the 9th time in October this year.

Before No 8 Ventures Jenny founded an investment bank to work with NZ technology companies.

In the past several years she has been named as one of the 50 most powerful people in New Zealand by Listener Magazine. In 2006, Jenny was made a Companion of the New Zealand Order of Merit for services to business. In 2011, Jenny was honoured by the NZ High Tech Awards for her “Outstanding contribution to the NZ high tech industry”.

Andrew launched Talent2 International (TWO) in 2003, a publicly traded company on the ASX, to focus on HR Outsourcing and Executive Search and Selection. Talent2 International is now a team of 1,700 professionals operating in 19 countries - a result of both organic growth and 15 impressive acquisitions. Before this time he worked with US listed company TMP (a result of the merger with Morgan & Banks) in New York as Global Director. It was an exciting time after a successful 14 years at the helm of Morgan & Banks which he founded with Geoff Morgan in 1985. Morgan & Banks grew to become the dominant recruitment force in Australia and Asia, and commanded 17% market share. At the point the company went public in 1995 sales had grown to over A$800m, before its merger with TMP/Monster.com in 1999.

Jonathan Ling is Managing Director and CEO of Fletcher Building Limited, Australasia’s largest building materials group.

Fletcher Building has six divisions: Building Products, Crane Group, Distribution, Infrastructure, Laminates & Panels, and Steel, and operates more than 40 businesses in hundreds of locations throughout Australasia, the South Pacific, the Americas and Asia. The Company has annual sales of around NZ$10 billion and has more than 20,000 employees.

The Company’s operations are varied – from housing developments and commercial construction to manufacturing plants and quarries to distribution centres. Fletcher Building companies produce and supply a large proportion of the products and services required for commercial, industrial, infrastructure and residential construction.

Jonathan has a Bachelor of Engineering (Mechanical) degree from the University of Melbourne and an MBA from the Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology.

From the time he first appeared in representative rugby as an 18-year-old in the Auckland union's centenary fixture against a President's XV in 1983 there was a special romance to the career of John Kirwan.

JK performed with astonishing maturity, not only in his Auckland debut but in the entire 1983 season for Auckland and the New Zealand Colts. At nearly 1.90m and strongly built he was unusually tall for a wing in those years and coupled with that was his considerable pace and determination.

From 1985 through to 1992, JK was pretty well an automatic All Black selection, with his golden years being the three seasons between 1986 and 1988.

Kirwan remained a world-class player for the rest of his career and when he finished with the All Blacks in 1994 his 63 tests had brought him 35 tries, which was then the New Zealand record. In his entire first class career, which also ended in 1994, he had finished with 199 tries.

New Zealand rugby has had few players who has won such wide popularity and affection as Andrew Mehrtens, who in a 12-year career at first class level became a national figure rather than simply an icon of his beloved Canterbury province.

There was never much doubt that Mehrtens belonged among the elite of New Zealand first fives. He had much of the steadiness and almost the same kicking ability as the man who preceded him by a year or two in the All Blacks, Grant Fox.

At the end of the 2005 Mehrtens left New Zealand rugby to play for the Harlequins in Britain.

He left behind a formidable record: 281 first class games for 3178 points, 108 games for Canterbury for 1056 points, 87 for the Crusaders and 981 points, 72 games for the All Blacks and 967 points in 70 tests.

Alan Whetton's All Black career spanned more than eight years, from 1984 to 1991, including two Rugby World Cups.

As an outstanding blindside flanker, Alan formed one of the best loose forward trios to ever appear for the All Blacks. Alongside Buck Shelford at No 8 and Michael Jones on the openside flank, Alan had an outstanding 1987 World Cup scoring a try in every match except the final.

Alan was also a key member of the highly successful Auckland team from 1981 to 1992, playing 150 matches for the province.

Following retirement from rugby in New Zealand, he was a player/coach for Kobe Steel between 1996 and 1999. He was a commentator for TV3s 2007 Rugby World Cup coverage and is currently General Manager of OAMM NZ – a company involved in providing LED signage advertising at Super Rugby / ITM Cup matches in NZ.

Rob Tapert is the longstanding producing partner of acclaimed director Sam Raimi. Tapert and Raimi have been working together since they met at Michigan State University. After producing the horror cult classic Evil Dead, they collaborated on Evil Dead II: Dead by Dawn, Darkman and Army of Darkness.

Tapert was the executive producer on Hard Target and Timecop. He also executive produced the worldwide sensation TV series Hercules: The Legendary Journeys and Xena: Warrior Princess.

In 2002, Tapert and Raimi formed Ghost House Pictures which was conceived to produce feature films that would deliver great scares and offer horror fans a thrill ride experience. Tapert has since produced a string of #1 box office hits; The Grudge, Boogeyman, The Messengers and 30 Days of Night and Drag Me To Hell.

Tapert recently produced the TV series The Legend of the Seeker. He is currently producing the second season of the hit series Spartacus.

Kevin Roberts is CEO Worldwide of Saatchi & Saatchi, one of the world’s leading creative organizations. His career was built in sales, marketing, and leadership roles at Mary Quant, Gillette, Procter & Gamble, Pepsi-Co and Lion Nathan. Since 1997 Saatchi & Saatchi has achieved record creative and financial performance under his leadership. Kevin has authored several books and is best known for his creation of Lovemarks, an idea that transforms conventions in marketing. His book Lovemarks: The Future Beyond Brands has been published in 18 languages. He is Honorary Professor at the University of Auckland Business School, and Honorary Professor of Creative Leadership at Lancaster University, England. Kevin is Business Ambassador for the NZ US Council, a member of the Board of Directors of Telecom New Zealand, the Chairman of USA Rugby, and a Trustee of the Turn Your Life Around Trust in West Auckland.

Australian-born Alison Mau has been a journalist for 20 years.

She has reported for various organisations in Australia, the United Kingdom and New Zealand including a stint as London correspondent for the Republic of China's CTS Network which broadcast to over 50 million viewers.

Her first on-screen appearance for TVNZ was in 1994's Eyewitness programme. From there she went on to present TV2's Newsnight before joining the ONE News team.

After a year-long stint presenting Breakfast with Mike Hosking, Alison returned to a ONE News weekend presenting role after the birth of her second child, Joel.

In 2004 Alison moved from the ONE News slot to present Breakfast.

In May 2010 Alison joined New Zealands favourite consumer show Fair Go as presenter.

Ali Mau co-hosts and reports for one of New Zealand’s iconic TV shows – Fair Go.

A journalist since her late teens, first in newspapers in Melbourne and then in television, she has worked for news organisations in the UK, Australia and New Zealand.

A stint as the UK Correspondent for CTS Taiwan in the early 90s led to a role presenting and producing a business programme for the fledgling satellite TV channel BBC World - World Business. By 1994 she was in New Zealand hosting TV2’s cult hit Newsnight, with Marcus Lush.

In the past 15 years Ali has hosted TV One’s Breakfast with Mike Hosking, and later Paul Henry, in between stints as news anchor across the One News schedule.

Alongside her work with Fair Go, Ali owns and runs a presenting training business, On Camera Ltd