Movers and shakers: Leanne Buer, Paul Littlefair and Russell Ambrose

Leanne Buer is the new country manager for Cisco New Zealand, replacing Dave Wilson, who has been promoted to a global sales leadership role with Cisco.

Wilson is moving to the Cisco headquarters in the US to lead a global team of Internet of Things specialists.

Wilson has led the transformation of the Cisco New Zealand operation since 2015. 

He has also been instrumental in supporting key community programmes such as NZ Rescue Run where Cisco raised significant funds for emergency services, and most recently with Youthline, which provides mental health services across New Zealand.

Buer joined Cisco in 2016, coming from Spark, where she was head of collaboration. She is a member of the NZ Board of Directors, and an advocate for diversity in the ICT sector.

“Customers, partners and our employees can have the utmost confidence in Leanne’s ability to drive the next chapter of our growth in New Zealand, which will see Cisco continue to be a major contributor to New Zealand’s technology-enabled future,” says Cisco ANZ vice-president Ken Boal.

Paul Littlefair has resigned from LIC and is now focusing on his director role at  ICT consultancy Acuity Partners and as co-founder of tech startup Kry10, with CEO Boyd Multerer.

Russell Ambrose joins ANZ Bank as technology strategy manager. His previous roles include chief technology officer at Airways New Zealand, general manager information technology at Vector and CIO at Genesis Energy. 

Iggy Pintado is leaving his managing director post at IDC Australia and New Zealand. Before joining IDC, he was head of marketing ANZ for SAS, and was also marketing director for the Australian Institute of Company Directors.

Colin Rebairo has been appointed as New Zealand country manager for Adobe, reporting to Scott Dawes, ANZ enterprise sales director. He brings over 20 years of experience in business transformation, as well as CX and marketing automation. 

“I am delighted to join a company that is growing exponentially due to its product capability and CXM dominance,” says Rebairo. “To join Adobe at this time and forge a team on the ground who can help New Zealand organisations fully understand the true cost-effective power of Adobe’s global leading software is extremely exciting.” 

Vertiv has appointed Cuthbert Stewart Limited (CSL) as a distributor of Vertiv Liebert Uninterruptible Power Supplies (UPS) for the New Zealand wholesale electrical, industrial and utilities sectors.

Based in Auckland, CSL acquired Energy Solution Providers earlier this year and together the companies now offer energy audits as well as technical electrical product systems to help industrial companies and facilities minimise and protect their energy usage.

CSL will distribute Vertiv’s full range of single-phase UPS products. “Vertiv offers a complete range of reliable, rugged UPS systems that are ideally suited to our industrial market and conditions,” says Philip Elliott, chief executive officer, CSL.

Melissa Di Donato has been named chief executive officer of SUSE, succeeding Nils Brauckmann, who is retiring. UK-based Di Donato will start her new role in August, and will be SUSE’s first female CEO. Prior to SUSE, Di Donato was chief operating officer and chief revenue officer at SAP. She also held senior executive positions at Salesforce.

solarcity has been awarded a research and development grant by Callaghan Innovation to help accelerate its new service, solarZero.  

solarZero is a solar-based service that will help end the nation’s reliance on fossil fuels in the electricity sector and reach the Government’s climate change targets. It is offered on a subscription basis and is envisioned to reduce the cost of electricity in year one by up to 30 per cent. 

“Through our Digital Energy Hub project we are working with companies like solarcity to create a cleaner, greener energy future,” says James Muir, Callaghan Innovation’s energy and environment business innovation advisor. “The project is designed to deliver ground breaking energy innovation and explore how digital technologies can address energy sector challenges.”  

Andrew Booth, CEO at solarcity, says the grant recognises solarcity’s efforts to implement positive change in the energy sector. 

“Solar is the fastest growing form of energy generation globally and is a key means by which we can achieve 100 per cent renewable electricity and combat climate change,” says Booth.

solarcity has partnered with Panasonic, to deliver a battery designed for New Zealand conditions. “With Callaghan Innovation’s support we will create the software and systems needed to integrate the battery into the New Zealand power system,” says Booth. 

Professor Debes Bhattacharyya of the Faculty of Engineering at the University of Auckland has found a way to use chicken feathers as a base for a fire retardant. The product  is safer than many fire retardants, cheaper to produce, and solves an international waste problem at the same time. 

He acknowledges that while the method has so far been proven in the lab, producing the keratinous fibre-based product at a large scale and ensuring it is compatible with existing manufacturing processes, will need private or public investment. 

“However, initial results are very promising and have attracted the interest of several multinational companies,” he says. 

“Our invention, whose intellectual property rights are protected, has been tested to show that it could be a direct replacement for APP, the predominant existing product.”

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