April 13, 2025 • 32 mins
A successful Wellington business owner says if he were starting again today, he wouldn't start his business in Wellington.
"Whether you should do it in Wellington though, I would say no. I think Wellington is actually talent repellent system at the moment," Raygun founder John-Daniel Trask told Nick Mills.
"We’ve had people in our own organisation who have left and said I’m going to places like Auckland because they are so tired – their own words – of the abject wokeness that is in this city."
Trask's business sells software that monitors other software for faults, with 93% of its customers based overseas. The company employs 25 staff in Wellington.
Also joining Trask was Jugnu's Little India founder Jugnu Gill.
Gill owns three of the Indian restaurants across Wellington, having opened his first restaurant in the city in 1997.
"Wellington is not in good shape. There are very few places that are doing really well in Wellington at the moment," Gill said.
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Speaker 1 (00:07):
You're listening to the Wellington Mornings podcast with Nick Mills
from News Talk.
Speaker 2 (00:11):
Sed b.
Speaker 1 (00:13):
Mondays Mean Business. It's the Business Panel on Wellington Mornings
with Quardovic Property Management, a better rental experience for all.
Visit Quinovic dot co dot inshead.
Speaker 2 (00:24):
Let's get done, Let's get down to business.
Speaker 1 (00:27):
You monnight mo night gard We've had a million million night.
Speaker 2 (00:34):
Welcome back.
Speaker 3 (00:36):
It's that time of the week, that time of the
fortnight where we get a couple of well known Wellington
business people into the studio and we start talking business.
What can be done better, what's not being done well enough?
How can we make our city better? That's the aim
of the Business Panel. And joining us for the Business
Panel today is Raygun's founder, John Daniel Trusk. John, good
(00:57):
morning and welcome to the show. Tell me what does
raygun do?
Speaker 4 (01:04):
First off, thank you very much for having me. Neck
appreciate being here. So Reygun we build software that monitors
other software for faults. So you can think of us
as a little bit like the blacks black Box flight
recorder for other people's software. So we're all, you know,
we all suffer crashes and bugs and things like that.
Kiwis in New Zealand, probably interact with our software several
(01:25):
times a day without even knowing about it. We collect
what went wrong, we send it back to the makers
of the software and help them improve it and make
it better. So in the background of a lot of
bits of software.
Speaker 3 (01:34):
So would you describe yourself as an IT company? How
would you describe your company?
Speaker 4 (01:38):
Yeah, so we're a software products company and that we
don't do services work. We built this product and we
have subscription customers all around the world that use it.
We have a strong engineering culture in the business, so
very strongly aligned to software development processes and whatnot. But
we don't sort of go and get contracts where we
sort of deliver systems for other people and things like that.
(01:59):
We sell the raygun platform to others.
Speaker 3 (02:01):
And you set up from scratch and Wellington, New Zealand
and little Old Allen Street.
Speaker 2 (02:06):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (02:06):
Absolutely. So I've actually been building businesses now for eighteen years.
I started my first one when I was well first
proper one when I was twenty three. I've only actually
worked for another organization for three years of my life,
and I worked for Integen here in Wellington, which was
just an amazing experience, an amazing company here that was
doing it services work. Yeah, and so I just I've
(02:28):
always loved tech, I've always loved business. To me, both
of them are mechanisms to achieve more, you know, they
are actually a form of getting more done.
Speaker 3 (02:37):
Tell me how many people work with you.
Speaker 4 (02:39):
We've got about twenty five staff, so we're not unlike
a services business. We don't get bigger by adding more
people to the company. So we're a cash flow positive business.
We put money in the bank, you know. We're not
heavily venture backed or anything like that. We bootstrapped initially,
and we've built a range of other companies over the years,
so you might be familiar, for example, with brands like
give Alittle, dot Co, do on Nz, so we were
(03:00):
the technical partners in building that now and that sold
that off to Spark a few years back, as well
as a range of other companies Mindscape, Value, Cruncher, a
few others. But Raygun is what we're known for today.
Speaker 3 (03:12):
Yeah, because I mean people like me that think Raygun,
we think of a breakdancer in the Olympics and yeah, well.
Speaker 4 (03:20):
Very unfortunately, and the lawyers accosting me a bit on that.
But we'll talk about that another.
Speaker 3 (03:24):
Oh, let's talk about it. And obviously joining us also
is Jugnu's Little India owner Junu Girl. Yea, me and you,
we know each other pretty well. We've done business on
the same street for many years. You're one of the
good guys of our hospitality industry. You've run and owned
Indian restaurants, always been Indian since nineteen ninety seven, so
(03:46):
you're you're an icon of the city.
Speaker 2 (03:49):
Firstly, thank you Nick for having me and so honor
indeed to be here. Well, yeah, you are also a
restaurant and and yes, we started on in Blair Street
in nineteen ninety seven December twenty four and it's almost
(04:12):
twenty eight years we have been there now and it
was a great start for us. For many years, we
you know, we did really well.
Speaker 3 (04:24):
And you opened other restaurants around the city. At one
stage you had five, yes.
Speaker 2 (04:28):
I had five and uh and you know at the
stage now after COVID, uh, you know, we started to downsize.
So we're down to three restaurants now, and I feel
there's still too many. Three too many, three too many.
Speaker 3 (04:47):
That's not what we want to hear. Tell me what's changed,
what's changed? When you started to now, what what's your
biggest change in a restaurant, A licensed restaurant. I mean
in nineteen ninety seven there wasn't too many licensed restaurants
in what do you that's true?
Speaker 2 (05:03):
That's true. What has changed today is mainly after covid
UH and then the interest rates going going high, a
lot of people losing their jobs, Less people are going out,
there's less disposable income. And saying that, you know, we
(05:26):
have a following for the last twenty eight years. Regulars
are still regulars, but they come out less set of
you know, twice a week. They come once a week
or once in two weeks.
Speaker 3 (05:38):
Right, would you suggest that it's a good time to
start in hospitality now? Would you? Would you give? Would
I mean, I know you're a family business, would you
you know, because one of the questions I'm going to
come come up to starting a business, but you know
your you're a family based business. Do you want to
your children or your your family members to take over
from you?
Speaker 2 (05:58):
My son is very interested Sajkaha in joining and he is,
you know, taking some hospital courses at school. Opening another
restaurant at the stage probably not for me to do
as well as we were doing when we first started
(06:20):
in ninety seven. I think we have to think outside
of the box. If you're starting a restaurant, there's got
to be something really different and with atmosphere, ambiance, service,
and the product.
Speaker 3 (06:36):
Right has to be really different. Okay, right, let's start
with our first questions. Right, we're ready fight up. I'm
going to start with you on this one, JD. Right now,
goods from every country around the world exported to the
USA have been stung with at least ten percent tariffs,
while the trade war is ramping up between US and China. Meanwhile,
(06:56):
stock markets have plummet and risen again, and we don't
really know what's going on. What do you actually make
of it? I mean, you're an it nerd without in
the nicest post way. I'm not saying that as a
nerdy nerd, but that's your business. So what do you
make of it? How do you how are you playing
it out? Yeah?
Speaker 4 (07:13):
So, firstly, I take nerd as a compliment, but so
so first off, and I don't want to jinx myself here,
but from what I understand is that this doesn't actually
apply to digital goods or services at this point, So
it's the physical products going in.
Speaker 3 (07:27):
But I mean, if the companies that you're dealing with
suddenly has getting stuck with tariffs and allaying people off
to looking at your service, Hey, can we afford this?
Do we need this?
Speaker 4 (07:35):
Yeah? Fortunately, our service is quite affordable, but yes, there
will be some big sort of follow on effects over there.
So we, for example, Raygun is a ninety three percent
export based business. Most of our customers are overseas. About
half our revenue comes from American companies, so it's certainly
front of mind. The bigger impact to us is actually
watching the completely schizophrenic New Zealand versus US dollar exchange rate.
(07:57):
We build everybody in USD We're seeing that swing by
three to five percent every week, you know, and that
becomes quite difficult when you start thinking, well, hey, if
this dollar rockets from say fifty eight cents up to
eighty cents, that's going to have a significant negative impact. So,
at least from my point of view, the bigger risk
is around that currency just everywhere all over the show,
while Trump sort of you know, makes pronouncements left, right
(08:19):
and center. So that's the bigger concern in the near term. Personally,
I think that folks need to just take a breath.
You know, it's been a week and a bit, you know,
and I'm seeing some folks, you know, made a cheeky
comment where it's like it seems like an unbelievable number
of people wanted to liquidate their portfolios, you know, on
Thursday and Friday a week and a half ago. Okay,
(08:39):
the value went down unless you were selling. You know,
what's the what's the real issue there? So I think
the panic right now is overstating that what's going to happen.
I do worry a little bit about the impacts that
are going to occur. To be blunt, the software industry
has actually broadly been going through quite a recessionary environment
for the last few years. And again it might sound
a little bit rude here, but it's like nobody's talking
(09:01):
about that in the media because who's going to cry
about such high you know, highly paid people losing their job.
You know, they care more about the folks who can't
really afford to go anytime without a job. So software
industry has been been a bit challenging the last few
years overall because it went up so massively through COVID,
you know, in that shock, you know, we're talking across today.
Even in hospitality, right, there were things that kind of
have just moved around so much in the last few years.
(09:24):
It's been very difficult to navigate.
Speaker 3 (09:26):
But that's for everyone. That's not it's not just it.
It's hospitality, it's engineering, it's building, you know, it's just
life has changed. Yes, you know it would that be
a good way to describing it. Life has changed. Will
it change back?
Speaker 2 (09:43):
You mean after the tariffs?
Speaker 3 (09:44):
No, I mean saying after COVID and that now that
the tariffs, life has changed. We just don't. We don't
have the security or the normality that we once grew
up with.
Speaker 2 (09:55):
Uh, life will change. Life will change. It's a matter
of you know, getting the right people working in government.
I think we have a good government at the moment.
Wellington needs good leadership and with that, I think we
(10:16):
will see change.
Speaker 3 (10:18):
And do you think this tariff is going to upset
the Apple card a bit? Do you think it's going
to change things for us? Is it going to make
us the instability worse?
Speaker 2 (10:26):
I think? You know, Donald Trump is a businessman. Now
is the leader of the most important country in the world.
He is a deal maker and for him to these
(10:47):
tariffs are way for him to get leaders of the
world together. And as you can see already, the stocks
plump went really down and now they're up again. So
Donald Trump is flexible, you know he.
Speaker 3 (11:07):
So I'm making that you're not that concerned by it.
Speaker 2 (11:10):
No, I'm not concerned at all, are you? No, I'm
not concerned at all. I think it's a short term
pain for a long term gain. Yep.
Speaker 4 (11:20):
I'd also say I wouldn't be shocked if it really
is more about China than the rest of the world,
and the rest of us are all getting collected just
to appear to not be just about China.
Speaker 3 (11:29):
And there could be bonuses for us out of that.
When you think about all that stuff that's made in
China that they're not saying sending to America. That's got
to get it somewhere. Surely it's going to make cheaper
cars for us. Well.
Speaker 4 (11:38):
I'm aware of a few New Zealand businesses that have
identified key components that are made out of China that
aren't made anywhere else who are already thinking how do
we produce those or how do we even build a
factory in America. That's one thing when I say, like
people are overly focused on. The panic is do you
spend longer looking at the door that closed, or do
you look at the door that just opened. My real
bigger concern is that they turn around and say New
(11:59):
Zealand needs to tear up its agreements with China. I
think that would actually be something that hasn't an issue
for us. That happens, but it's all speculation.
Speaker 3 (12:08):
I'll take a short break, jud Gil and JD. T.
Trusk is with us on our business now. I've just
got to let you know that Rory McElroy has just
won the Masters, So he's finally won a Master's on
an extra hole and he's very very emotional, great celebrations
going on. That amazes me. That just told me, and
I didn't believe him, so we researched, and Jad got
(12:31):
onto his phone and researched. Jilu said, there has been
twenty fourteen was the last time that Rory had won
a major and it is you're right, thank you. I
should know that because you're a member of one of
those real exclusive golf clubs, aren't you the Royal? Are you? Yes?
What begger you are?
Speaker 2 (12:50):
There's a there's a lovely joke. One of my managers
at Blair Street, one of our members came in and said,
oh is Jugnuhu? You know I played golf with him,
and he said to this gentleman, oh he plays that royal.
(13:14):
So Peter Oliver recites this when he miss me at
the golf course and it's on going joke.
Speaker 3 (13:24):
Good on you, congratulations. I'm feeling love, feeling like a
poor but now I'm really feeling like I'm Where do
you play golf?
Speaker 2 (13:30):
JD?
Speaker 4 (13:32):
I actually take my six year old son to learn golf,
but I've never golfed myself, so I was pretty amazed
to learn that little kids from about the age of
four are smacking those balls down the fairway. Yeah, they
start young. We go out to Bullcot Farms and they
do a great sort of weekend teaching things for kids.
So yeah, he's been doing it for about eighteen months.
Speaker 3 (13:51):
Amazing. Right, let's talk about starting a business. Right now,
we have in the studio whether this is our business panel,
and in the studio we have today ray Gun's founder
JD Trusk and Little India owner Junkoose, Little India owner
Jug new Girl starting a business. We briefly chatted about
it before. I'm just thinking about it. When we were
(14:13):
talking about trying to find some questions to talk about today,
I thought to myself, would you start a business right now?
Could you achieve what you have achieved if you started
that business today. I'm going to start with you. Could
you have achieved what you have achieved over your very
very successful twenty eight years in business. Could you do
it if you started today?
Speaker 2 (14:35):
Absolutely not. Nick could not do it today. The Wellington
is not in good shape people. There are very few
places that are really doing well in Wellington at the moment.
And has said earlier. To be successful in Wellington with
(14:59):
all the work going on over the streets, you know,
and the council not having good leadership today, you have
to think I would set the box to really set
something up that will be successful. So I would say
(15:19):
I would not be looking at opening.
Speaker 3 (15:23):
Even if there was a younger man like you were younger,
you just would.
Speaker 2 (15:26):
Yeah, no, even if you're younger. I feel that Wellington
is not the right place at the present time unless
you have an extremely different idea.
Speaker 3 (15:39):
This is kind of sort of what's the word for me,
freaking me out a little bit because this is a
guy that's had six restaurants successful restaurant here over many decades,
two decades, saying he wouldn't open in Wellington if the
opportunity started again. Jad, Does that concern you as a
Walentonian with a successful IT business in the middle of
(16:01):
the city.
Speaker 4 (16:02):
Yeah, one d It's very concerning, and I mean we've
taken certain moves to try and help. So we've been
all back in the office now for about eighteen months.
You know, it's the same people we see walking around.
We're based on Allen Street, so it was a very
clique groove here. But you know, you go out at
lunch and we feel like we're one of the few
(16:23):
sets of folks that are helping actually invest locally, you know,
and spend our money locally. I like to make the
joke that Courtney plays KFC only really exists because Reagan
comes to the office.
Speaker 3 (16:34):
So tell me, could I put that question back on you?
Speaker 2 (16:36):
Yeah?
Speaker 3 (16:37):
You know, what are the biggest challenges facing somebody starting
up a company like yours? Could you? I mean, we've
got the movie theaters moving business in Wellington, We've got
you know, lots of I mean, the gaming industry, we've
got strong in that we've got some really strong IT
based companies in Wellington. Would you start out now again
(16:57):
right now?
Speaker 4 (16:59):
I mean I would absolutely start a business right now
in tech. I mean, the AI super cycle that is
just kicking off is going to dwarf the Internet. So
it'd be like sort of saying to somebody if it
was nineteen ninety five, do you think you should get
into tech? And you know, we kind of know in
retrospect that would have been a great time. Whether you
should do it in Wellington, though, I would say no.
I think Wellington is actually a talent repellent system At
(17:20):
the moment. We've had people even in our own organization
who have left and said I'm going to places like
Auckland simply because they are so tired of and this
is their words, but the abject wokeness that is in
the city. And you know, I, for my sins, I
use things like Twitter, and you know, as an employer
who's actually bringing money into the country, paying people that
(17:42):
are spending in our city. The just relentless, relentless attacks
from the keyboard warriors who never leave their house. It's
a very sad state of affairs. I moved here about
twenty years ago. And at the time, I say, like
Auckland was countercycled in nobody really wanted to go to Auckland.
Around two thousand and Wellington was amazing. And now that
(18:02):
is inverted in my opinion, you know. And my biggest
concern is is it going to take twenty years for
Wellington to turn this around? Because that was kind of
how long it took Auckland to make some pretty big moves.
Speaker 2 (18:14):
My friend just called me up yesterday from Sydney. He said, Jugnal,
what are you doing in Wellington? Let's open places are
pumping in Sydney. Outside of Sydney and and and I said,
(18:34):
my wife Iroha has told me, Juno, you need to
slow down. So but I love hospitality. I just love it.
You know, when customers come in, they leave happy, it's
you know, it's just such an amazing feeling. So so you.
Speaker 3 (18:54):
Know, there's Wellington the problem. I mean, that's what you're
both telling me.
Speaker 4 (18:58):
I mean, the psychology of Wellington is the problem. I mean,
what is a business? A business is something that provides
value to other people in the community, and it's one
of the most fire structures by many of the people
in this city. It's the most bananas set up that
I can consider.
Speaker 3 (19:15):
I'm going to take a break and have some news headlines.
I need a cup of tea, Ethan, can you make
me a cup of tea. I've never felt so down
about Wellington in my life as I'm feeling right now.
We're in our business panel with Ray Gun founder John
Daniel Trusk and Junu's Little India owner jug Nu gil Right,
we've been talking about how depressed you both are and
how much problems we've got. How many problems we've got
(19:37):
on Wellington. Let's add another one. The cleared candidates for
the Wellington mayoralty are Ray Chung, Carl Tevan Barker Tory Farno.
They seem to be the three main contenders, but former
Labor leader Andrew Little says he's considering the run.
Speaker 2 (19:52):
Now.
Speaker 3 (19:52):
I've got it on pretty good oil that that's a
done deal that he's going to do it. They're just
planning everything and get in the amount of phone calls
that I got over the weekend from people or contacts
or people saying me, you've got to get him behind Andrew,
You've got to support him. I said, I don't have
to get him behind anyone or support anyone. But to me,
what do you think? I mean, what do you think
of the You know, we've got some problems. You've sold
(20:14):
us we've got some problems. Do we need to change
a mayor? Tip? And is Andrew Little the answer?
Speaker 2 (20:20):
We definitely need to change the mayor for sure Andrew Little.
It depends, you know, why is he coming to be
mayor of Wellington? Does he really care for the city
or is it going to be a job. And I
don't like the fact that he's a Labor affiliated you know,
(20:43):
his background is Labor Party, So I really feel we
need a candidate that has everybody has some sort of
connection to a party. But to bring it on to Wellington,
I think you have to when you enter the councilor room,
you take that hat off and you enter as independent
(21:06):
and the room, and that's the only way I think
you can really look after the people and care and
for the best interests of the people of Wellington. So
depending on the angle Andrew Little is coming in, If
he's coming in really to look after the people of Wellington,
then I think it can be a good a good move, right.
Speaker 3 (21:30):
You almost to me sound like you had it in
the seventies where we had the mayor of the city
was really caring about the city and not caring about
anything else but the city. But JD, that seems to
be a thing in the past, isn't it. It's like
it's almost like now the mayor has become like a
career move.
Speaker 4 (21:47):
Yeah, it's pretty depressing to watch overall.
Speaker 3 (21:51):
I mean, she of you.
Speaker 4 (21:52):
We can't we can't get much worse than we have now,
you know. And I don't like the political you know,
I thought we banned gang patches, you know, we shouldn't
have them in our council. So it's concerning and I
share your you as well. On like Andrew like to
a degree, somebody with some competence that would be a
tick in the right box. But at the same time,
(22:12):
and I'm not trying to play favorites here, but look
at somebody like Carl, right, Carl has actually built a
chain of businesses here in Wellington. He took the risk,
he put his money on the line to do that.
He has fed Wellington, you know, he has cared for Wellington.
He's only been successful by providing things that Wealentonians want.
That is not something that career politicians can ever point to.
(22:34):
And so when we see things like, oh, we're going
to appoint you know, a kid out of university with
no life experience, you know when he was running for
counselor that's sort of we're getting the outcomes for the
decisions we make. And you know, that's the bit that
I find most depressing is you keep hearing them say, oh,
well it's forty years of under investment. Well, you know,
in forty years time, they're going to say, why the
(22:56):
hell did you spend you know, almost four hundred million
dollars strengthening one building. You know, absolutely moronic spending of
the of the rate payers money. Just just an absolute
clown car of a counsel At the moment.
Speaker 2 (23:09):
Nick and I ask you a question. Do you love Ellington?
Speaker 3 (23:13):
Of course I do.
Speaker 2 (23:14):
Would you like to see Ellington thrave again?
Speaker 3 (23:19):
Of course we all do.
Speaker 2 (23:21):
I reckon you're the best game.
Speaker 3 (23:24):
Up for that covered You've got to give me a
warning and that was covered well.
Speaker 4 (23:29):
The big concern I have is that there's a lot
of conversations going on where people are pretty had it right.
And my concern is, what if we have too many
people that are competent that come up. It just splits
the vote a little bit too much and then we
end up with the same pack of dogs we have now.
Speaker 3 (23:43):
You know what, if you really want me to be
honest amongst it, I think right now, even putting Andrew
Little's name in that hat, I think still think Tory
Faro is the favorite.
Speaker 2 (23:54):
Get I doubt that she's not going to win again.
Speaker 3 (23:59):
You don't think.
Speaker 4 (24:02):
Honestly if if she if she wins again, geez, like
you know that, I can't fathom it.
Speaker 3 (24:10):
We're in the middle of the business panel with jug
nig girl. Gosh, can I get your name right?
Speaker 2 (24:18):
Yes? You did it absolutely?
Speaker 3 (24:19):
You know I didn't. I got it wrong. You know
I didn't know.
Speaker 2 (24:21):
Yeah, you've got it right.
Speaker 3 (24:23):
Eventually, it's the putting right that counts. We grew up
with that absolutely and JD trust JD. I'm going to
ask you from Reagan. I'm going to ask you about
the budget that's coming up. Finance Minister Nikola Willis will
deliver this year's budget next month. Now, you're an it
intelligent person. I won't call you a geek price you
(24:44):
know what are you hoping for? What are you expecting?
Do you actually like our finance minister. You think she's
got us on the right track.
Speaker 4 (24:52):
Look, I've met Nikola a few times and I'm generally
a fan. My bigger concern at the moment with the
current government is that they're not being bold enough, you know,
and I've given that feedback on the occasional times where
I meet meet with various ministers. Is that I'm concerned
that we are going through another government that isn't doing
(25:13):
enough to make a change, and those changes need to
be How do we really drive actual business investment? As
I say, a lot of Kiwis have some sort of
issue against business, but business is actually how we provide
for each other and build wealth as a country. We
want to get more exporting businesses. What are the incentives
we're putting in place here, Because fundamentally it's all well
(25:34):
and good selling amongst ourselves, but we've got to bring
money into the country. We've got to close out you know,
moves around, but close our own trade deficit, you know,
be selling more to the world. So what are going
to be the things that actually incentivize that that aren't
just hey, we've allocated more budget for a ferry or
you know, We're going to put more money into changing
road signs. We need capital investment to be occurring.
Speaker 3 (25:55):
Now you've got me again on a couple of things.
We are a country built on small businesses that grow
to medium businesses that grow to big businesses. You have
a feeling, which I certainly do, that this government's really
aiming at the real, real top end in the small
business of people like yourself, which I still you know,
(26:16):
I don't want to disrespect your business, but twenty people
or one hundred people or two hundred people still a
small business, isn't it.
Speaker 2 (26:22):
You know?
Speaker 3 (26:22):
Well, are they looking after you? Well, I'd flip it around.
Speaker 2 (26:26):
See.
Speaker 4 (26:26):
This is where it's interesting because our business headcount does
not equal revenue, and I think we need more businesses
where it's not just about keeping people busy in the company.
It should be that we scale products. So, for example,
if we doubled our customer base today, I wouldn't need
to employ another team member. I'm not open to tariffs.
I export all around the world. Takes me five milliseconds
(26:49):
to get to market. That's the speed of light to
anywhere in the world. Right, So that's the future of
business US. I've long said and this turn into too
long of a conversation. But why our primary export from
the bottom of the earth has to sit on boats
is ridiculous and I often heard from people in government saying, well,
we don't like to pick winners. Well, if we want
to be a green country where we can send electrons
(27:11):
around the world and milliseconds, where you don't get held
up by tariffs, where you can basically build a great
product and people will adopt it, we should have been
pushing harder on tech many many years ago to try
and grow the country because that is the easiest path
to exports. Wow for us, and we have the talent.
We do have talent in New Zealand. Well, we've been
a bit negative about Wellington. You said talent repellent were
(27:33):
not Wellington. But as a country, you know, my experience
is there is very little difference between say the folks
here and the folks in America that you can employ.
The capability is here. It's just that we're not using
enough of it. We're not lifting the country up and
incentivizing it.
Speaker 2 (27:49):
Right, So how good the government help in that area?
Speaker 4 (27:54):
Well, they do have a range of programs that are available,
so you know, one of the things I always acknowledge
is that and I know that they're shutting down Callahan Innovation,
but the government does actually provide a range of different
incentive programs through NCTA and the former Callahan stuff that
do help tech. I actually would make the argument that
I think tech has had a reasonable amount of help.
I also think, you know, hearing your neck on the negativity,
(28:17):
one thing we didn't really acknowledge post COVID was that
our fiber network here is fantastic. We had no issues
with the Internet when everybody suddenly had to go and
work from home, and that was a great government investment
and initiative that was sort of public private you know,
things like that. So it's really about thinking about how
can we build stronger relationships with countries overseas, making sure
(28:39):
that we don't end up tangled in any of these
sorts of things. As they're good VISA programs, Could we
get better ways to employ people, you know and bring
them in those sorts of things would help, probably more
so than money.
Speaker 3 (28:50):
Can I just use that as a segue to get
into Jugna on something. Now, I know that you know
you're obviously very connected to in there, and you would
have been watching with bita breath with the Prime Minister
going over there. Your family would have been having connections
with you when they saw the publicy is it's way topic?
But is doing business with India as easy as we've
been led to believe or do you think anything will
(29:12):
come out of the idea of us doing more with India?
I mean, you know one point three billion population or whatever,
your population of India is huge. Do you think that's possible?
Speaker 2 (29:22):
Absolutely? Prime Minister Maudie Is We used to be Chief
Minister of Gujarat. When he was Gujarat was the leading
state of India, and now he's the Prime Minister and
he's put India on the map. And so Prime Minister
(29:43):
lux was there in India meeting and I'm sure that
we are going to have a good relationship with India,
New Zealand and India and there's going to be a
lot of business going to and fro. So I'm very
optimistic about that.
Speaker 3 (30:00):
Yes, okay, right. I was just explaining to my guests
my daily routine because one of them do I just
asked me if I have get up early in the morning. Yes,
to know I had to get up my alarm goes
off at four point thirty in the morning. Anyway, right,
what this very special deprety Prime Minister of India's arriving
and you've been told to go and pick him up
at Wellington Airport and show off Wellington for what do
(30:21):
you do with them?
Speaker 2 (30:24):
Deputy pregnans to a very important person, obviously, so I
would take firstly drive him up to Oha, up to
the Mountwak lookout. I think Wellington is a beautiful, beautiful
city and you get the best view from Mount wik lookout.
(30:47):
And then I would take him to the Basin Reserve,
which I think is the best cricket ground for test
cricket yep anyway in the world. And to eat. Obviously,
I think the deputy person from India would be looking
for some good Indian food. I feel reluctant to go
(31:10):
to my restaurant. You can say, but because my attention
would be on the operation rather than your guess, rather
than the guest or The answer is Hummingbird, I feel
is a great restaurant.
Speaker 3 (31:30):
Oh, you don't have to say that, No, I'll not.
Speaker 2 (31:33):
I'm coming to that. Why. Nick John Coleman, who started Hummingbird,
was one of the best front of house people have
ever met.
Speaker 3 (31:44):
Right, Okay, I've got to move on out to JD
because I run out of time. But thank you JD.
Where were you going to take that? Guess you've only
got like twenty.
Speaker 4 (31:52):
Six No, so I still you're coming earlier. I think
the driving around the water like you said, around even
Spain and all of that, see all of that. I'd
park up down the waterfront if you can find one,
and then take a walk up Cuba Street, have a
nice dinner at al Matator Moro.
Speaker 2 (32:06):
I always really like this.
Speaker 4 (32:07):
If you go there, try the Chimney Turro sorry, the
Turos for dessert. They're the softest ones in town. And
maybe then retire to Noble Rot for a drink and
some cheese.
Speaker 3 (32:16):
Right, what a great, What a great? That would be
a lovely pet. Thank you both so much, Reygun founder
John Daniel known as j D Trusk and Jugdu Little
India owner Jugdu Girl. Thank you for coming and sharing
your thoughts and steering your wonders of Wellington business.
Speaker 1 (32:31):
For more from Wellington Mornings with Nick Mills, listen live
to news talks It'd be Wellington from nine am weekdays,
or follow the podcast on iHeartRadio,
You're listening to the Wellington Mornings podcast with Nick Mills
from News Talk.
Speaker 2 (00:11):
Sed b.
Speaker 1 (00:13):
Mondays Mean Business. It's the Business Panel on Wellington Mornings
with Quardovic Property Management, a better rental experience for all.
Visit Quinovic dot co dot inshead.
Speaker 2 (00:24):
Let's get done, Let's get down to business.
Speaker 1 (00:27):
You monnight mo night gard We've had a million million night.
Speaker 2 (00:34):
Welcome back.
Speaker 3 (00:36):
It's that time of the week, that time of the
fortnight where we get a couple of well known Wellington
business people into the studio and we start talking business.
What can be done better, what's not being done well enough?
How can we make our city better? That's the aim
of the Business Panel. And joining us for the Business
Panel today is Raygun's founder, John Daniel Trusk. John, good
(00:57):
morning and welcome to the show. Tell me what does
raygun do?
Speaker 4 (01:04):
First off, thank you very much for having me. Neck
appreciate being here. So Reygun we build software that monitors
other software for faults. So you can think of us
as a little bit like the blacks black Box flight
recorder for other people's software. So we're all, you know,
we all suffer crashes and bugs and things like that.
Kiwis in New Zealand, probably interact with our software several
(01:25):
times a day without even knowing about it. We collect
what went wrong, we send it back to the makers
of the software and help them improve it and make
it better. So in the background of a lot of
bits of software.
Speaker 3 (01:34):
So would you describe yourself as an IT company? How
would you describe your company?
Speaker 4 (01:38):
Yeah, so we're a software products company and that we
don't do services work. We built this product and we
have subscription customers all around the world that use it.
We have a strong engineering culture in the business, so
very strongly aligned to software development processes and whatnot. But
we don't sort of go and get contracts where we
sort of deliver systems for other people and things like that.
(01:59):
We sell the raygun platform to others.
Speaker 3 (02:01):
And you set up from scratch and Wellington, New Zealand
and little Old Allen Street.
Speaker 2 (02:06):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (02:06):
Absolutely. So I've actually been building businesses now for eighteen years.
I started my first one when I was well first
proper one when I was twenty three. I've only actually
worked for another organization for three years of my life,
and I worked for Integen here in Wellington, which was
just an amazing experience, an amazing company here that was
doing it services work. Yeah, and so I just I've
(02:28):
always loved tech, I've always loved business. To me, both
of them are mechanisms to achieve more, you know, they
are actually a form of getting more done.
Speaker 3 (02:37):
Tell me how many people work with you.
Speaker 4 (02:39):
We've got about twenty five staff, so we're not unlike
a services business. We don't get bigger by adding more
people to the company. So we're a cash flow positive business.
We put money in the bank, you know. We're not
heavily venture backed or anything like that. We bootstrapped initially,
and we've built a range of other companies over the years,
so you might be familiar, for example, with brands like
give Alittle, dot Co, do on Nz, so we were
(03:00):
the technical partners in building that now and that sold
that off to Spark a few years back, as well
as a range of other companies Mindscape, Value, Cruncher, a
few others. But Raygun is what we're known for today.
Speaker 3 (03:12):
Yeah, because I mean people like me that think Raygun,
we think of a breakdancer in the Olympics and yeah, well.
Speaker 4 (03:20):
Very unfortunately, and the lawyers accosting me a bit on that.
But we'll talk about that another.
Speaker 3 (03:24):
Oh, let's talk about it. And obviously joining us also
is Jugnu's Little India owner Junu Girl. Yea, me and you,
we know each other pretty well. We've done business on
the same street for many years. You're one of the
good guys of our hospitality industry. You've run and owned
Indian restaurants, always been Indian since nineteen ninety seven, so
(03:46):
you're you're an icon of the city.
Speaker 2 (03:49):
Firstly, thank you Nick for having me and so honor
indeed to be here. Well, yeah, you are also a
restaurant and and yes, we started on in Blair Street
in nineteen ninety seven December twenty four and it's almost
(04:12):
twenty eight years we have been there now and it
was a great start for us. For many years, we
you know, we did really well.
Speaker 3 (04:24):
And you opened other restaurants around the city. At one
stage you had five, yes.
Speaker 2 (04:28):
I had five and uh and you know at the
stage now after COVID, uh, you know, we started to downsize.
So we're down to three restaurants now, and I feel
there's still too many. Three too many, three too many.
Speaker 3 (04:47):
That's not what we want to hear. Tell me what's changed,
what's changed? When you started to now, what what's your
biggest change in a restaurant, A licensed restaurant. I mean
in nineteen ninety seven there wasn't too many licensed restaurants
in what do you that's true?
Speaker 2 (05:03):
That's true. What has changed today is mainly after covid
UH and then the interest rates going going high, a
lot of people losing their jobs, Less people are going out,
there's less disposable income. And saying that, you know, we
(05:26):
have a following for the last twenty eight years. Regulars
are still regulars, but they come out less set of
you know, twice a week. They come once a week
or once in two weeks.
Speaker 3 (05:38):
Right, would you suggest that it's a good time to
start in hospitality now? Would you? Would you give? Would
I mean, I know you're a family business, would you
you know, because one of the questions I'm going to
come come up to starting a business, but you know
your you're a family based business. Do you want to
your children or your your family members to take over
from you?
Speaker 2 (05:58):
My son is very interested Sajkaha in joining and he is,
you know, taking some hospital courses at school. Opening another
restaurant at the stage probably not for me to do
as well as we were doing when we first started
(06:20):
in ninety seven. I think we have to think outside
of the box. If you're starting a restaurant, there's got
to be something really different and with atmosphere, ambiance, service,
and the product.
Speaker 3 (06:36):
Right has to be really different. Okay, right, let's start
with our first questions. Right, we're ready fight up. I'm
going to start with you on this one, JD. Right now,
goods from every country around the world exported to the
USA have been stung with at least ten percent tariffs,
while the trade war is ramping up between US and China. Meanwhile,
(06:56):
stock markets have plummet and risen again, and we don't
really know what's going on. What do you actually make
of it? I mean, you're an it nerd without in
the nicest post way. I'm not saying that as a
nerdy nerd, but that's your business. So what do you
make of it? How do you how are you playing
it out? Yeah?
Speaker 4 (07:13):
So, firstly, I take nerd as a compliment, but so
so first off, and I don't want to jinx myself here,
but from what I understand is that this doesn't actually
apply to digital goods or services at this point, So
it's the physical products going in.
Speaker 3 (07:27):
But I mean, if the companies that you're dealing with
suddenly has getting stuck with tariffs and allaying people off
to looking at your service, Hey, can we afford this?
Do we need this?
Speaker 4 (07:35):
Yeah? Fortunately, our service is quite affordable, but yes, there
will be some big sort of follow on effects over there.
So we, for example, Raygun is a ninety three percent
export based business. Most of our customers are overseas. About
half our revenue comes from American companies, so it's certainly
front of mind. The bigger impact to us is actually
watching the completely schizophrenic New Zealand versus US dollar exchange rate.
(07:57):
We build everybody in USD We're seeing that swing by
three to five percent every week, you know, and that
becomes quite difficult when you start thinking, well, hey, if
this dollar rockets from say fifty eight cents up to
eighty cents, that's going to have a significant negative impact. So,
at least from my point of view, the bigger risk
is around that currency just everywhere all over the show,
while Trump sort of you know, makes pronouncements left, right
(08:19):
and center. So that's the bigger concern in the near term. Personally,
I think that folks need to just take a breath.
You know, it's been a week and a bit, you know,
and I'm seeing some folks, you know, made a cheeky
comment where it's like it seems like an unbelievable number
of people wanted to liquidate their portfolios, you know, on
Thursday and Friday a week and a half ago. Okay,
(08:39):
the value went down unless you were selling. You know,
what's the what's the real issue there? So I think
the panic right now is overstating that what's going to happen.
I do worry a little bit about the impacts that
are going to occur. To be blunt, the software industry
has actually broadly been going through quite a recessionary environment
for the last few years. And again it might sound
a little bit rude here, but it's like nobody's talking
(09:01):
about that in the media because who's going to cry
about such high you know, highly paid people losing their job.
You know, they care more about the folks who can't
really afford to go anytime without a job. So software
industry has been been a bit challenging the last few
years overall because it went up so massively through COVID,
you know, in that shock, you know, we're talking across today.
Even in hospitality, right, there were things that kind of
have just moved around so much in the last few years.
(09:24):
It's been very difficult to navigate.
Speaker 3 (09:26):
But that's for everyone. That's not it's not just it.
It's hospitality, it's engineering, it's building, you know, it's just
life has changed. Yes, you know it would that be
a good way to describing it. Life has changed. Will
it change back?
Speaker 2 (09:43):
You mean after the tariffs?
Speaker 3 (09:44):
No, I mean saying after COVID and that now that
the tariffs, life has changed. We just don't. We don't
have the security or the normality that we once grew
up with.
Speaker 2 (09:55):
Uh, life will change. Life will change. It's a matter
of you know, getting the right people working in government.
I think we have a good government at the moment.
Wellington needs good leadership and with that, I think we
(10:16):
will see change.
Speaker 3 (10:18):
And do you think this tariff is going to upset
the Apple card a bit? Do you think it's going
to change things for us? Is it going to make
us the instability worse?
Speaker 2 (10:26):
I think? You know, Donald Trump is a businessman. Now
is the leader of the most important country in the world.
He is a deal maker and for him to these
(10:47):
tariffs are way for him to get leaders of the
world together. And as you can see already, the stocks
plump went really down and now they're up again. So
Donald Trump is flexible, you know he.
Speaker 3 (11:07):
So I'm making that you're not that concerned by it.
Speaker 2 (11:10):
No, I'm not concerned at all, are you? No, I'm
not concerned at all. I think it's a short term
pain for a long term gain. Yep.
Speaker 4 (11:20):
I'd also say I wouldn't be shocked if it really
is more about China than the rest of the world,
and the rest of us are all getting collected just
to appear to not be just about China.
Speaker 3 (11:29):
And there could be bonuses for us out of that.
When you think about all that stuff that's made in
China that they're not saying sending to America. That's got
to get it somewhere. Surely it's going to make cheaper
cars for us. Well.
Speaker 4 (11:38):
I'm aware of a few New Zealand businesses that have
identified key components that are made out of China that
aren't made anywhere else who are already thinking how do
we produce those or how do we even build a
factory in America. That's one thing when I say, like
people are overly focused on. The panic is do you
spend longer looking at the door that closed, or do
you look at the door that just opened. My real
bigger concern is that they turn around and say New
(11:59):
Zealand needs to tear up its agreements with China. I
think that would actually be something that hasn't an issue
for us. That happens, but it's all speculation.
Speaker 3 (12:08):
I'll take a short break, jud Gil and JD. T.
Trusk is with us on our business now. I've just
got to let you know that Rory McElroy has just
won the Masters, So he's finally won a Master's on
an extra hole and he's very very emotional, great celebrations
going on. That amazes me. That just told me, and
I didn't believe him, so we researched, and Jad got
(12:31):
onto his phone and researched. Jilu said, there has been
twenty fourteen was the last time that Rory had won
a major and it is you're right, thank you. I
should know that because you're a member of one of
those real exclusive golf clubs, aren't you the Royal? Are you? Yes?
What begger you are?
Speaker 2 (12:50):
There's a there's a lovely joke. One of my managers
at Blair Street, one of our members came in and said,
oh is Jugnuhu? You know I played golf with him,
and he said to this gentleman, oh he plays that royal.
(13:14):
So Peter Oliver recites this when he miss me at
the golf course and it's on going joke.
Speaker 3 (13:24):
Good on you, congratulations. I'm feeling love, feeling like a
poor but now I'm really feeling like I'm Where do
you play golf?
Speaker 2 (13:30):
JD?
Speaker 4 (13:32):
I actually take my six year old son to learn golf,
but I've never golfed myself, so I was pretty amazed
to learn that little kids from about the age of
four are smacking those balls down the fairway. Yeah, they
start young. We go out to Bullcot Farms and they
do a great sort of weekend teaching things for kids.
So yeah, he's been doing it for about eighteen months.
Speaker 3 (13:51):
Amazing. Right, let's talk about starting a business. Right now,
we have in the studio whether this is our business panel,
and in the studio we have today ray Gun's founder
JD Trusk and Little India owner Junkoose, Little India owner
Jug new Girl starting a business. We briefly chatted about
it before. I'm just thinking about it. When we were
(14:13):
talking about trying to find some questions to talk about today,
I thought to myself, would you start a business right now?
Could you achieve what you have achieved if you started
that business today. I'm going to start with you. Could
you have achieved what you have achieved over your very
very successful twenty eight years in business. Could you do
it if you started today?
Speaker 2 (14:35):
Absolutely not. Nick could not do it today. The Wellington
is not in good shape people. There are very few
places that are really doing well in Wellington at the moment.
And has said earlier. To be successful in Wellington with
(14:59):
all the work going on over the streets, you know,
and the council not having good leadership today, you have
to think I would set the box to really set
something up that will be successful. So I would say
(15:19):
I would not be looking at opening.
Speaker 3 (15:23):
Even if there was a younger man like you were younger,
you just would.
Speaker 2 (15:26):
Yeah, no, even if you're younger. I feel that Wellington
is not the right place at the present time unless
you have an extremely different idea.
Speaker 3 (15:39):
This is kind of sort of what's the word for me,
freaking me out a little bit because this is a
guy that's had six restaurants successful restaurant here over many decades,
two decades, saying he wouldn't open in Wellington if the
opportunity started again. Jad, Does that concern you as a
Walentonian with a successful IT business in the middle of
(16:01):
the city.
Speaker 4 (16:02):
Yeah, one d It's very concerning, and I mean we've
taken certain moves to try and help. So we've been
all back in the office now for about eighteen months.
You know, it's the same people we see walking around.
We're based on Allen Street, so it was a very
clique groove here. But you know, you go out at
lunch and we feel like we're one of the few
(16:23):
sets of folks that are helping actually invest locally, you know,
and spend our money locally. I like to make the
joke that Courtney plays KFC only really exists because Reagan
comes to the office.
Speaker 3 (16:34):
So tell me, could I put that question back on you?
Speaker 2 (16:36):
Yeah?
Speaker 3 (16:37):
You know, what are the biggest challenges facing somebody starting
up a company like yours? Could you? I mean, we've
got the movie theaters moving business in Wellington, We've got
you know, lots of I mean, the gaming industry, we've
got strong in that we've got some really strong IT
based companies in Wellington. Would you start out now again
(16:57):
right now?
Speaker 4 (16:59):
I mean I would absolutely start a business right now
in tech. I mean, the AI super cycle that is
just kicking off is going to dwarf the Internet. So
it'd be like sort of saying to somebody if it
was nineteen ninety five, do you think you should get
into tech? And you know, we kind of know in
retrospect that would have been a great time. Whether you
should do it in Wellington, though, I would say no.
I think Wellington is actually a talent repellent system At
(17:20):
the moment. We've had people even in our own organization
who have left and said I'm going to places like
Auckland simply because they are so tired of and this
is their words, but the abject wokeness that is in
the city. And you know, I, for my sins, I
use things like Twitter, and you know, as an employer
who's actually bringing money into the country, paying people that
(17:42):
are spending in our city. The just relentless, relentless attacks
from the keyboard warriors who never leave their house. It's
a very sad state of affairs. I moved here about
twenty years ago. And at the time, I say, like
Auckland was countercycled in nobody really wanted to go to Auckland.
Around two thousand and Wellington was amazing. And now that
(18:02):
is inverted in my opinion, you know. And my biggest
concern is is it going to take twenty years for
Wellington to turn this around? Because that was kind of
how long it took Auckland to make some pretty big moves.
Speaker 2 (18:14):
My friend just called me up yesterday from Sydney. He said, Jugnal,
what are you doing in Wellington? Let's open places are
pumping in Sydney. Outside of Sydney and and and I said,
(18:34):
my wife Iroha has told me, Juno, you need to
slow down. So but I love hospitality. I just love it.
You know, when customers come in, they leave happy, it's
you know, it's just such an amazing feeling. So so you.
Speaker 3 (18:54):
Know, there's Wellington the problem. I mean, that's what you're
both telling me.
Speaker 4 (18:58):
I mean, the psychology of Wellington is the problem. I mean,
what is a business? A business is something that provides
value to other people in the community, and it's one
of the most fire structures by many of the people
in this city. It's the most bananas set up that
I can consider.
Speaker 3 (19:15):
I'm going to take a break and have some news headlines.
I need a cup of tea, Ethan, can you make
me a cup of tea. I've never felt so down
about Wellington in my life as I'm feeling right now.
We're in our business panel with Ray Gun founder John
Daniel Trusk and Junu's Little India owner jug Nu gil Right,
we've been talking about how depressed you both are and
how much problems we've got. How many problems we've got
(19:37):
on Wellington. Let's add another one. The cleared candidates for
the Wellington mayoralty are Ray Chung, Carl Tevan Barker Tory Farno.
They seem to be the three main contenders, but former
Labor leader Andrew Little says he's considering the run.
Speaker 2 (19:52):
Now.
Speaker 3 (19:52):
I've got it on pretty good oil that that's a
done deal that he's going to do it. They're just
planning everything and get in the amount of phone calls
that I got over the weekend from people or contacts
or people saying me, you've got to get him behind Andrew,
You've got to support him. I said, I don't have
to get him behind anyone or support anyone. But to me,
what do you think? I mean, what do you think
of the You know, we've got some problems. You've sold
(20:14):
us we've got some problems. Do we need to change
a mayor? Tip? And is Andrew Little the answer?
Speaker 2 (20:20):
We definitely need to change the mayor for sure Andrew Little.
It depends, you know, why is he coming to be
mayor of Wellington? Does he really care for the city
or is it going to be a job. And I
don't like the fact that he's a Labor affiliated you know,
(20:43):
his background is Labor Party, So I really feel we
need a candidate that has everybody has some sort of
connection to a party. But to bring it on to Wellington,
I think you have to when you enter the councilor room,
you take that hat off and you enter as independent
(21:06):
and the room, and that's the only way I think
you can really look after the people and care and
for the best interests of the people of Wellington. So
depending on the angle Andrew Little is coming in, If
he's coming in really to look after the people of Wellington,
then I think it can be a good a good move, right.
Speaker 3 (21:30):
You almost to me sound like you had it in
the seventies where we had the mayor of the city
was really caring about the city and not caring about
anything else but the city. But JD, that seems to
be a thing in the past, isn't it. It's like
it's almost like now the mayor has become like a
career move.
Speaker 4 (21:47):
Yeah, it's pretty depressing to watch overall.
Speaker 3 (21:51):
I mean, she of you.
Speaker 4 (21:52):
We can't we can't get much worse than we have now,
you know. And I don't like the political you know,
I thought we banned gang patches, you know, we shouldn't
have them in our council. So it's concerning and I
share your you as well. On like Andrew like to
a degree, somebody with some competence that would be a
tick in the right box. But at the same time,
(22:12):
and I'm not trying to play favorites here, but look
at somebody like Carl, right, Carl has actually built a
chain of businesses here in Wellington. He took the risk,
he put his money on the line to do that.
He has fed Wellington, you know, he has cared for Wellington.
He's only been successful by providing things that Wealentonians want.
That is not something that career politicians can ever point to.
(22:34):
And so when we see things like, oh, we're going
to appoint you know, a kid out of university with
no life experience, you know when he was running for
counselor that's sort of we're getting the outcomes for the
decisions we make. And you know, that's the bit that
I find most depressing is you keep hearing them say, oh,
well it's forty years of under investment. Well, you know,
in forty years time, they're going to say, why the
(22:56):
hell did you spend you know, almost four hundred million
dollars strengthening one building. You know, absolutely moronic spending of
the of the rate payers money. Just just an absolute
clown car of a counsel At the moment.
Speaker 2 (23:09):
Nick and I ask you a question. Do you love Ellington?
Speaker 3 (23:13):
Of course I do.
Speaker 2 (23:14):
Would you like to see Ellington thrave again?
Speaker 3 (23:19):
Of course we all do.
Speaker 2 (23:21):
I reckon you're the best game.
Speaker 3 (23:24):
Up for that covered You've got to give me a
warning and that was covered well.
Speaker 4 (23:29):
The big concern I have is that there's a lot
of conversations going on where people are pretty had it right.
And my concern is, what if we have too many
people that are competent that come up. It just splits
the vote a little bit too much and then we
end up with the same pack of dogs we have now.
Speaker 3 (23:43):
You know what, if you really want me to be
honest amongst it, I think right now, even putting Andrew
Little's name in that hat, I think still think Tory
Faro is the favorite.
Speaker 2 (23:54):
Get I doubt that she's not going to win again.
Speaker 3 (23:59):
You don't think.
Speaker 4 (24:02):
Honestly if if she if she wins again, geez, like
you know that, I can't fathom it.
Speaker 3 (24:10):
We're in the middle of the business panel with jug
nig girl. Gosh, can I get your name right?
Speaker 2 (24:18):
Yes? You did it absolutely?
Speaker 3 (24:19):
You know I didn't. I got it wrong. You know
I didn't know.
Speaker 2 (24:21):
Yeah, you've got it right.
Speaker 3 (24:23):
Eventually, it's the putting right that counts. We grew up
with that absolutely and JD trust JD. I'm going to
ask you from Reagan. I'm going to ask you about
the budget that's coming up. Finance Minister Nikola Willis will
deliver this year's budget next month. Now, you're an it
intelligent person. I won't call you a geek price you
(24:44):
know what are you hoping for? What are you expecting?
Do you actually like our finance minister. You think she's
got us on the right track.
Speaker 4 (24:52):
Look, I've met Nikola a few times and I'm generally
a fan. My bigger concern at the moment with the
current government is that they're not being bold enough, you know,
and I've given that feedback on the occasional times where
I meet meet with various ministers. Is that I'm concerned
that we are going through another government that isn't doing
(25:13):
enough to make a change, and those changes need to
be How do we really drive actual business investment? As
I say, a lot of Kiwis have some sort of
issue against business, but business is actually how we provide
for each other and build wealth as a country. We
want to get more exporting businesses. What are the incentives
we're putting in place here, Because fundamentally it's all well
(25:34):
and good selling amongst ourselves, but we've got to bring
money into the country. We've got to close out you know,
moves around, but close our own trade deficit, you know,
be selling more to the world. So what are going
to be the things that actually incentivize that that aren't
just hey, we've allocated more budget for a ferry or
you know, We're going to put more money into changing
road signs. We need capital investment to be occurring.
Speaker 3 (25:55):
Now you've got me again on a couple of things.
We are a country built on small businesses that grow
to medium businesses that grow to big businesses. You have
a feeling, which I certainly do, that this government's really
aiming at the real, real top end in the small
business of people like yourself, which I still you know,
(26:16):
I don't want to disrespect your business, but twenty people
or one hundred people or two hundred people still a
small business, isn't it.
Speaker 2 (26:22):
You know?
Speaker 3 (26:22):
Well, are they looking after you? Well, I'd flip it around.
Speaker 2 (26:26):
See.
Speaker 4 (26:26):
This is where it's interesting because our business headcount does
not equal revenue, and I think we need more businesses
where it's not just about keeping people busy in the company.
It should be that we scale products. So, for example,
if we doubled our customer base today, I wouldn't need
to employ another team member. I'm not open to tariffs.
I export all around the world. Takes me five milliseconds
(26:49):
to get to market. That's the speed of light to
anywhere in the world. Right, So that's the future of
business US. I've long said and this turn into too
long of a conversation. But why our primary export from
the bottom of the earth has to sit on boats
is ridiculous and I often heard from people in government saying, well,
we don't like to pick winners. Well, if we want
to be a green country where we can send electrons
(27:11):
around the world and milliseconds, where you don't get held
up by tariffs, where you can basically build a great
product and people will adopt it, we should have been
pushing harder on tech many many years ago to try
and grow the country because that is the easiest path
to exports. Wow for us, and we have the talent.
We do have talent in New Zealand. Well, we've been
a bit negative about Wellington. You said talent repellent were
(27:33):
not Wellington. But as a country, you know, my experience
is there is very little difference between say the folks
here and the folks in America that you can employ.
The capability is here. It's just that we're not using
enough of it. We're not lifting the country up and
incentivizing it.
Speaker 2 (27:49):
Right, So how good the government help in that area?
Speaker 4 (27:54):
Well, they do have a range of programs that are available,
so you know, one of the things I always acknowledge
is that and I know that they're shutting down Callahan Innovation,
but the government does actually provide a range of different
incentive programs through NCTA and the former Callahan stuff that
do help tech. I actually would make the argument that
I think tech has had a reasonable amount of help.
I also think, you know, hearing your neck on the negativity,
(28:17):
one thing we didn't really acknowledge post COVID was that
our fiber network here is fantastic. We had no issues
with the Internet when everybody suddenly had to go and
work from home, and that was a great government investment
and initiative that was sort of public private you know,
things like that. So it's really about thinking about how
can we build stronger relationships with countries overseas, making sure
(28:39):
that we don't end up tangled in any of these
sorts of things. As they're good VISA programs, Could we
get better ways to employ people, you know and bring
them in those sorts of things would help, probably more
so than money.
Speaker 3 (28:50):
Can I just use that as a segue to get
into Jugna on something. Now, I know that you know
you're obviously very connected to in there, and you would
have been watching with bita breath with the Prime Minister
going over there. Your family would have been having connections
with you when they saw the publicy is it's way topic?
But is doing business with India as easy as we've
been led to believe or do you think anything will
(29:12):
come out of the idea of us doing more with India?
I mean, you know one point three billion population or whatever,
your population of India is huge. Do you think that's possible?
Speaker 2 (29:22):
Absolutely? Prime Minister Maudie Is We used to be Chief
Minister of Gujarat. When he was Gujarat was the leading
state of India, and now he's the Prime Minister and
he's put India on the map. And so Prime Minister
(29:43):
lux was there in India meeting and I'm sure that
we are going to have a good relationship with India,
New Zealand and India and there's going to be a
lot of business going to and fro. So I'm very
optimistic about that.
Speaker 3 (30:00):
Yes, okay, right. I was just explaining to my guests
my daily routine because one of them do I just
asked me if I have get up early in the morning. Yes,
to know I had to get up my alarm goes
off at four point thirty in the morning. Anyway, right,
what this very special deprety Prime Minister of India's arriving
and you've been told to go and pick him up
at Wellington Airport and show off Wellington for what do
(30:21):
you do with them?
Speaker 2 (30:24):
Deputy pregnans to a very important person, obviously, so I
would take firstly drive him up to Oha, up to
the Mountwak lookout. I think Wellington is a beautiful, beautiful
city and you get the best view from Mount wik lookout.
(30:47):
And then I would take him to the Basin Reserve,
which I think is the best cricket ground for test
cricket yep anyway in the world. And to eat. Obviously,
I think the deputy person from India would be looking
for some good Indian food. I feel reluctant to go
(31:10):
to my restaurant. You can say, but because my attention
would be on the operation rather than your guess, rather
than the guest or The answer is Hummingbird, I feel
is a great restaurant.
Speaker 3 (31:30):
Oh, you don't have to say that, No, I'll not.
Speaker 2 (31:33):
I'm coming to that. Why. Nick John Coleman, who started Hummingbird,
was one of the best front of house people have
ever met.
Speaker 3 (31:44):
Right, Okay, I've got to move on out to JD
because I run out of time. But thank you JD.
Where were you going to take that? Guess you've only
got like twenty.
Speaker 4 (31:52):
Six No, so I still you're coming earlier. I think
the driving around the water like you said, around even
Spain and all of that, see all of that. I'd
park up down the waterfront if you can find one,
and then take a walk up Cuba Street, have a
nice dinner at al Matator Moro.
Speaker 2 (32:06):
I always really like this.
Speaker 4 (32:07):
If you go there, try the Chimney Turro sorry, the
Turos for dessert. They're the softest ones in town. And
maybe then retire to Noble Rot for a drink and
some cheese.
Speaker 3 (32:16):
Right, what a great, What a great? That would be
a lovely pet. Thank you both so much, Reygun founder
John Daniel known as j D Trusk and Jugdu Little
India owner Jugdu Girl. Thank you for coming and sharing
your thoughts and steering your wonders of Wellington business.
Speaker 1 (32:31):
For more from Wellington Mornings with Nick Mills, listen live
to news talks It'd be Wellington from nine am weekdays,
or follow the podcast on iHeartRadio,
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