Joy Keene: Game Development Association Executive Director on the impact of the rebate

A tax rebate scheme's helped boost the number of people employed in the video game sector by more than 20%. 

The four-year, $160 million Game Development Sector Rebate allows eligible studios to claim back 20% of their spend.  

Forty studios will receive a share of $22.4 million this year, for its second year. 

Game Development Association Executive Director Joy Keene told Andrew Dickens the sector's booming compared to a few years ago. 

She says it's been a game-changer, as a lot of New Zealand studios were looking to move to Australia because of their rebate. 

LISTEN ABOVE 

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Our video game sector is having a major boom. Jobs
and game development have increased twenty and a half percent
over the past year. That's just a year now. This
is due to a government tax rebate scheme that allowed
a number of studios to claim back twenty percent of
their spend. So Joy Keen is the executive director of
the New Zealand Game Developers Association and joins me now.

Speaker 2 (00:23):
Hallo JOI, helloa, good morning. How are you.

Speaker 1 (00:25):
I'm Greg You guys are great. I mean, that's quite
incredible growth, isn't it.

Speaker 2 (00:30):
It's absolutely phenomenal growth. We are so pleased with the
results of what the GENS has been able to do
for the industry.

Speaker 1 (00:39):
Why New Zealander so good at making video games?

Speaker 2 (00:43):
I love answering this question. I think game development is
a rule, is quite a passionate industry and we've got
a lot of experience here, especially when you take into
account we will workshop for example, There's a lot of
talent that's come out of here and has naturally fallen
from animation into game development.

Speaker 1 (01:03):
So this tax rebate that gives you the times to
get back twenty percent of your spend. Many other industries
would love something like that, but how good has it
been for your sector? Can you continue with it or
should it even be increased? Oh?

Speaker 2 (01:17):
Look, I think to answer the first question, how good
has it been for it's been phenomenal. A couple of
years ago, just before the rebate was announced, we saw
a lot of New Zealand studios looking to move to
Australia because of the rebate scheme there. So it's been
a game changer. The gs rebate has been able to

(01:42):
stem that movement overseas over to Australia. But also, yeah,
would we like it increased? Well, of course we would.
Everybody would like funding to be increased. But we think
that increasing the GDSR to twenty five from twenty percent
in line with the screen production rebate as a no brainer. Basically,

(02:09):
the matching that screen production rebate is an additional benefit
to businesses who are showing a direct economic benefit, and
we believe our studios actually show that.

Speaker 1 (02:20):
So where to from here? Can you get bigger?

Speaker 2 (02:24):
Yes, we can get bigger. Look, we're on track to
become a billion dollar industry. Last year, our total and
so let we start again. Gosh, so really our total
export revenue was five hundred and forty eight million dollars.
We know we're going to be a billion dollar industry
very very soon. So that's where we're heating.

Speaker 1 (02:44):
Good work joy and I thank you very very much.
They get a twenty percent rebate. The other day I
reported that EWEO authorities play a seventeen point five percent tax,
and they've shocked a lot of people. They seem not
to know that. And we've talked about the incredible growth
of the Maria economy. So here you go where you
do some tax rebates. When you have a favorable corporate

(03:05):
tax environment, you spur on industries. But the government's not
considering that for all.

Speaker 2 (03:11):
For more from Early Edition with Ryan Bridge, listen live
to News Talks. It'd be from five am weekdays, or
follow the podcast on iHeartRadio.