Fisher and Paykel
John Bongard


Long a corporate institution in New Zealand , appliance maker Fisher and Paykel is now well-established in Australia and expanding into Europe and the United States. CEO John Bongard describes how he approaches his trans-Tasman management task, and how the company nurtures its highly regarded innovation culture.

ceoforum.com.au: What do you see at the key challenges in managing across the Australian and New Zealand markets?

John Bongard: We see Australia and New Zealand as being our home market, so we generally look at a single Australasian market. Nevertheless, they are certainly not the same from a management point of view. One of the lessons we learnt early on was not to send over too many Kiwi managers unfamiliar with the Australian market and expect them to successfully run an Australian business. Personally, I think this is a mistake that too many New Zealand companies make when they are looking to expand into Australia.

ceoforum.com.au: What are the differences that can trip people up between the two business environments?

JB: Size, of course, is one key difference, both in revenue terms and geography. One consequence of this, for example, is that we have reasonably autonomous business units in each of the states, reporting back to our Australian head of sales and marketing. Having these autonomous business units is one thing I think that has worked very well for us in Australia.

You also need a different business infrastructure in Australia . It's a much more expensive market to operate in, the sheer size makes the logistics more complex, and the working capital requirements are much greater. This makes for a very different experience running the business.

One thing that is pretty much the same between the two mark

Long a corporate institution in New Zealand , appliance maker Fisher and Paykel is now well-established in Australia and expanding into Europe and the United States. CEO John Bongard describes how he approaches his trans-Tasman management task, and how the company nurtures its highly regarded innovation culture.

ceoforum.com.au: What do you see at the key challenges in managing across the Australian and New Zealand markets?

John Bongard: We see Australia and New Zealand as being our home market, so we generally look at a single Australasian market. Nevertheless, they are certainly not the same from a management point of view. One of the lessons we learnt early on was not to send over too many Kiwi managers unfamiliar with the Australian market and expect them to successfully run an Australian business. Personally, I think this is a mistake that too many New Zealand companies make when they are looking to expand into Australia.

ceoforum.com.au: What are the differences that can trip people up between the two business environments?

JB: Size, of course, is one key difference, both in revenue terms and geography. One consequence of this, for example, is that we have reasonably autonomous business units in each of the states, reporting back to our Australian head of sales and marketing. Having these autonomous business units is one thing I think that has worked very well for us in Australia.

You also need a different business infrastructure in Australia . It's a much more expensive market to operate in, the sheer size makes the logistics more complex, and the working capital requirements are much greater. This makes for a very different experience running the business.

One thing that is pretty much the same between the two mark"