Ratu Mataira: OpenStar CEO on the company getting the funding for a new research facility

A Wellington fusion energy start-up’s getting a major boost, with fresh funding to build a next generation research facility.

The Government will lend up to $35 million from the Regional Infrastructure Fund to OpenStar Technologies to help develop its nuclear fusion machine, known as Tahi.

Fusion is the process which powers the sun, and the company's hoping to create a fusion power source that can be scaled up for commercial use.

OpenStar CEO Ratu Mataira says Tahi is of a scale that they'll be able to show the world it's as valid as other approaches. 

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:09):
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Speaker 2 (00:16):
The government is putting thirty five million dollars into a
local fusion energy company. Now that's a reasonable injection of
taxpayer money, especially given no one in the world appears
to have cracked fusion energy just yet. Fusion is, by
the way, the process that powers the sun and the stars.
And Ratumataida is the CEO of Open Star Technologies based
in Wellington.

Speaker 3 (00:35):
That ratu Hello, Hello Heather, thank you for having me on.

Speaker 2 (00:39):
Yeah, no, you're welcome. Thirty five million dollars is a
fair chunk of change. What are you going to do
with it?

Speaker 3 (00:45):
So their capital is there to help support building a
facility in New Zealand that will allow us to undertake
our next major project, that's building a device we call Tahi.
And so we are the ones who have to go
raise the capital to actually build the machine. But the
government is effectively stepping in to help build the facility

(01:05):
that we need to be able to do that. And
ALTI are.

Speaker 2 (01:08):
Okay if you raise the money for Tahi, what does
tahi do?

Speaker 3 (01:13):
So Tahi is a global scale fusion demonstration device. So
really what we're looking at is lots of different ways
of doing fusion, and open Star is pushing forward a
particular approach. We basically need to show the world that
our approach is as valid, if not absolutely better than

(01:33):
the other ways that people have done this are before.
TAHI is of a scale that will actually achieve that
in a way that scientists, engineers, business people, government governments
across the world will have no choice but to recognize how.

Speaker 2 (01:51):
Far away do you reckon? We are years wise, time
wise from being able to actually crack fusion energy and
make it work.

Speaker 3 (02:00):
So there's a couple of steps to that. I think
very legitimately it will be the early twenty thirties where
we see more energy out then in and actually giving
people electricity out of a fusion machine. Now that's not
really what you're asking. The real question is when will
it impact people's lives? When will people see a reduction

(02:23):
in their power bill? Because we have fusion reactors being
deployed around the world, and that's actually, you know, probably
the real challenge. There's no point developing these machines if
they can't solve problems for real people in their everyday lives,
and that's a challenge that starts. You know, we've got
a good shot at in the early twenty thirties, but

(02:44):
we'll be spending the decade and the decade after that
rolling that out to humanity and hopefully, yeah, making the
difference that needs to be made.

Speaker 2 (02:53):
So ten plus years possibly.

Speaker 3 (02:56):
For our first impact.

Speaker 2 (02:58):
Yeah, okay, So what does the government get for thirty
five million dollars? Does it get a stake in the business.

Speaker 3 (03:05):
There is potentially a portion of that arrangement I want
we'll get into details on that, but there is room
for something like that. But importantly, the reason why we're
focused on a facility is to balance the risk reward
for say, the private investors into open Star, who are
taking a bet on us as a technology and a team,

(03:27):
versus the government who have to take a longer term view.
And so the support being focused on a facility means
that we come in, we build Tahi, but that facility
will exist after Tahi is complete. It will exist after
open Star is done. And I can tell you that
we are not the only project that could use a
facility like that, because these kinds of facilities exist around

(03:49):
the world and it's time that New Zealand had that infrastructure.

Speaker 2 (03:53):
Yeah, that's fair enough, Thank you very much, and I
really appreciate us in a tighter open Star Technology CEO.

Speaker 1 (04:00):
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