Oritain Global chief executive Grant Cochrane was good-naturedly referring to Sir John Key as the pair strolled around the Otago Golf Club’s Balmacewen course yesterday.
Oritain, the globally successful forensic and data science firm, hosted a private golf day with Sir John — who officially joined its board in January — in partnership with the club, coinciding with the company’s board meeting in Dunedin this week.
It was Sir John who suggested supporting young golfers through a fundraising event, and the round of golf was followed by an evening function on the theme of Sustainable Futures, featuring a panel discussion between Mr Cochrane and Sir John, then a fundraising auction.
Sir John was joined on the green by a group of Oritain friends and affiliates, including All Black legend Richie McCaw.
Mr Cochrane quipped that a message saying Mr McCaw would return from attending the King’s coronation in London to attend Oritain’s golf day was an email he "didn’t expect to receive, ever".
Sir John, who appeared to be taking the round fairly seriously, said the golf was "going good", but the main point was to have fun and to raise money for young golfers.
Fun was one of the reasons he was attracted to the Oritain board position, he said.
Inundated with requests from companies offering governance positions, he reckoned he turned down about 99%.
Often they were "fantastic" companies but he only had a certain amount of time and he was already very busy.
Prior to being approached by Mr Cochrane, he was aware of Oritain as he was an adviser to Zespri, which had used its services, and the kiwifruit company was "hugely complimentary" about it, he said.
Founded in Dunedin in 2008, Oritain applied forensic and data science to determine product provenance of food, beverages, fibres and pharmaceuticals.
Its science could pinpoint the exact area a product or raw material came from, within metres.
It worked locally with companies such as Silver Fern Farms, Sanford, a2 Milk and Pyramid Valley wines alongside global giants as Ralph Lauren, Patagonia and Lacoste.
Sir John said, after meeting Mr Cochrane in a hotel in Auckland on a Sunday afternoon and learning more about the company, he liked its story.
He recalled having a good feeling about the company and decided joining the board would be both fun and interesting.
He believed Oritain was "on the precipice of doing something really spectacular".
It had technology that nobody else had, coupled with regulatory change and consumer demand around ESG [environmental, social and governance], the framework used to assess an organisation’s business practices and performance on various sustainability and ethical issues.
He believed there would be huge demand from consumers wanting confidence about the origin of the food or products they were purchasing and regulators ensuring companies were living up to the claims they were making.
Sir John also wanted New Zealand companies to succeed, and he had always thought Dunedin produced some "really remarkable businesses".
As the University of Otago was the heart of the city, he believed that drove the innovation, creativity and knowledge.
He could also help the company with the many connections he had made during his tenure as prime minister, and the directorship was working well.
"With anything, when you go on the board of a company, you really want to feel you ... contribute to its success, rather than making up a number," he said.
For Mr Cochrane, attracting someone like Sir John to join the board spoke to the uniqueness of what Oritain was doing.
Sir John was "incredibly commercial", understood the finance sector — an area Oritain needed to focus on — and had an incredible understanding of geopolitics, Mr Cochrane said.
He was also very humble and laid-back.
Oritain’s growth had doubled every year for the past six years.
It now had about 170 staff and offices around the world — in Washington, Switzerland, London, Auckland and Dunedin — and about 50 job positions ready to go.
Mr Cochrane had lived in Switzerland for the past five years and enjoyed both the country and being in Europe.
It was also an ideal place to be located for work, he said.
But New Zealand would always be home and it was always good to be home, usually two or three times a year.
He was also very proud of Oritain’s New Zealand connection.
While 80% of Oritain’s revenue was offshore, there was no reason to move from Dunedin.
There was a great team in its office and a great relationship with the university.
There was a "tonne" of talented young people and, for them, Oritain offered something a little different.
It was doing a lot of good, it was growing and successful, so people wanted to be part of that, and he often joked it was the world’s smallest multinational company — many of its staff travelled a lot and there were career opportunities around the world.
There were a "lot of tailwinds" for the company at the moment with regulations supporting what it did, coupled with the drive for ESG, he said.
