Electrify Aotearoa is almost here and promises to be better than ever
Plus: A chance for one lucky Caffeinator to nab a free pass to the conference.
Good morning Caffeinators,
Instead of our usual sneak peek at next week for a Friday, I thought we’d bring you a special bonus interview with an absolute legend - Electrify Chair Marian Johnson
Caffeine is proud to partner with our friends over at Ministry of Awesome for this year’s Electrify Aotearoa conference.
We also have a free pass to Day Two of the conference to give away to one lucky Caffeinator. Just drop us a line at hello@caffeindaily.co with why you want to go and we’ll announce a winner in the coming weeks.
Have a great weekend, look after each other and we’ll see you next week.
Finn and the CAFFEINE team
Electrify Aotearoa is almost here and promises to be better than ever
It’s one of the highlights of the startup calendar and this year it’s back and bigger than ever.
On 24–25 June 2025 founders, investors and operators will pack Wellington’s historic St James Theatre for the fourth edition of Electrify Aotearoa, the summit dedicated to super-charging New Zealand’s most ambitious women and non-binary founders.
“The minute you have a critical mass of visible women founders, the whole archetype of ‘startup founder’ means ‘guy in a grey hoodie’ begins to crumble,” says Marian Johnson MNZM, Chair of Electrify and former Ministry of Awesome Chief Executive.
“When you think ‘founder’ you should picture a woman just as quickly as a man. Once that mental switch flips, a lot of other barriers disappear.”
While those barriers are weakening, they’re still very much present.
According to Startup Genome, a consultancy which analyses global start-up ecosystems, just 26 percent of founders in New Zealand are women and about 7 percent of venture capital goes to them.
Johnson argues the issue is compounded by venture capital’s lingering “10×” software bias, prioritising the kind of ultra high growth models typical of SaaS.
“If many of those high-growth playbooks were written by software engineers, and most software engineers have historically been men, you’re going to see fewer women at the table, especially if they’re building products outside straight-SaaS,” Johnson explains.
Add a global backlash against anything labelled “DEI” and an austere fiscal mood at home, and the hurdles look high.
But Johnson refuses fatalism, pointing to the huge exits from female founded companies we've seen in recent months - whether it’s Janine Grainger’s Easy Crypto or Alliv Samson’s Kami.
But building those kinds of exits starts with building your network. Startup Genome’s data also shows that founders tied into a border founder ecosystem are 26% more likely to succeed.
In other words: if you have other founders around you, you're going to go far.
“This is an opportunity for women founders to meet all of the other founders around them and to get those people at their side that are critical for them, " explains Johnson.
“When a founder has other founder mentors and friends and a community, they have somebody that they can pass their information to who's slightly behind them, somebody who's slightly ahead of them. It's always going to lead them to the best possible outcome.”
Previous Electrify editions were one-day sprints. This year the team has split the summit into two half-days to better reflect the needs of attending founders. They can fly in, learn, network and be back at the laptop with minimal childcare or payroll disruption.
Day 1: Practical & Interactive Workshops
Dive into intensive, hands-on workshops delivered by seasoned founders and operators who’ve successfully grown and scaled startups. Gain practical advice you can apply immediately.
Afterall, founders don’t want generic theory, they want ‘here’s how to actually raise a seed round.’ The sessions this year will be delivered by someone who’s shipped a product, closed customers or banked an exit. Real advice from real founders and operators.
Day 2: Inspirational Speakers & Networking
Be inspired by the trailblazing Kiwi entrepreneurs. Hear their stories of triumphs, challenges, and lessons that can fuel your entrepreneurial journey here in Aotearoa.
Where Day One drills skills, Day Two is a story arc told entirely by founders, right from the early stage through to successful exits.
“We've started with ‘What are your challenges at the beginning? And so a founder, somebody who is at that stage is the person who's presenting. And it goes all the way through to first customers, then hiring people, and then scaling. Then the final topic is exiting, and Alliv Samson who is going to deliver that one,” Johnson explains.
Of course, the overall goal of Electrify isn’t just to grow the startup ecosystem but to benefit the whole country. New Zealand’s startup sector punches above its weight, but still trails global peers on venture investment and scale-ups per capita.
Female founders could be the country’s biggest under-leveraged asset. Afterall, cutting half the population out of the founder pool is like running a marathon with one leg.
“If we want to grow our economy faster, we need all the engines firing, not just the usual suspects,” says Johnson.
Johnson’s ask of the wider ecosystem, including the male founders who want to be a part of change but aren’t sure how, is disarmingly simple: “Just turn up.”
Electrify isn’t about asking anyone to surrender their seat, just building a bigger table.
Four years on, it’s a flagship on the startup calendar and the launch pad for companies that will rewrite the narrative of who builds New Zealand’s next unicorns.
Need-to-know
When: 24 – 25 June 2025 (two half-days)
Where: St James Theatre, Wellington
Tickets & programme: electrifyaotearoa.co.nz
Why go: If you've read this far, you already know why.
That’s it for today, thanks for reading. Want to get in touch with a news tip, bit of feedback or just to chat? Email hello@caffeinedaily.co. Look after yourselves this weekend and we’ll see you Monday.