Tait and UC announced Supreme Winner at the 2014 KiwiNet Research Commercialisation Awards
Tait Communications' and the University of Canterbury's (UC) Wireless Network Partnership has been named winner of the BNZ Supreme Award at the 2014 KiwiNet Research Commercialisation awards ceremony held last night in Auckland.
Tait and UC also took home the Minter Ellison Rudd Watts Research and Business Partnership Award, which recognizes the relationship between a research organisation and business that delivers significant commercial value for New Zealand.
Tait's Chief Marketing Officer, James Kyd, accepted the award on behalf of Tait alongside the University of Canterbury's, Fred Samandari.
Mr Kyd said: "Our partnership with UC and the Wireless Research Centre (WRC) has yielded significant commercial results for Tait across many solutions we are selling today. The partnership includes outstanding work enhancing the performance of Long-term Evolution (LTE or 4G) broadband to support the highly demanding application needs of our global public safety, utility and extractive industry clients."
Mr Kyd adds: "We are currently implementing our first LTE commercial trial and we're positive that it will open up new export markets for Tait and put us ahead of our competition in what we can deliver."
Tait's Chief Technology Officer, Trevor Laughton, was instrumental in formalizing the company's relationship with UC with the establishment of the WRC in 2007.
Mr Laughton says that investment in research and development has always been central to Tait's ethos and that collaboration with UC delivers better research results for the company.
"Our collaborative R&D efforts with UC deliver more innovative results than we could achieve on our own. Our close connection with the University also helps us to develop skills and interest in wireless communication ensuring the future of the industry remains strong in New Zealand."
Mr Laughton adds, "We provide guidance and oversight to WRC about what's important to our clients but at the same time WRC researchers have freedom to pursue the projects that inspire them."
The Tait Foundation, the charitable trust set up by the company's founder, Sir Angus Tait, has donated $2.2 million in cash and committed additional funding of around $500,000 a year for the next two years to the WRC.
Tait Communications invests around 12% of revenue, above and beyond the WRC funding, into research and development.
Tait is a New Zealand-owned exporting success story in an intensely competitive global industry with annual turnover in excess of US$170M.
