Brett Calton

Brett is at his best when he's untangling something complicated and getting people moving in the same direction. He's spent more than 20 years leading change, both in government and as the co-founder of a tech start-up.

At Callaghan Innovation he was in the executive leadership team and ran the country's national support for start-ups and growing firms. He later co-founded Nolia, which works with global clients to speed up funding and procurement decision making and compliance.

Brett cares about making technology genuinely useful, and being straight with clients about what will and won't work.

Examples of Brett’s work

• As part of Callaghan Innovation's executive team, Brett ran New Zealand's national support for start-ups and growing firms, with more than $100 million in grants in his care each year. He also helped drive Callaghan’s adoption and governance of AI.
• Brett ran design-led innovation programmes at Creative HQ for government clients, including the Department of Internal Affairs and the Ministry of Social Development, and led a cross-agency project in Manila that fed into the Philippines' Ease of Doing Business reforms.
• He co-founded Nolia, an AI company that helps governments across the north Pacific and south-east Asia run their procurement and funding, and worked with the World Bank to make those processes faster.