TOM KELK
2013: Kelk was the bass guitarist and drummer for the band, Albion Place, and had represented Otago in football and volleyball. He hoped to become a professional musician but was also thinking about studying physiotherapy.
2023: After continuing to have success with Albion Place, Kelk joined indie-rock band Mild Orange. The band’s first single, Stranger, received tens of thousands of Spotify streams in its first few days and its debut album, Foreplay, was also well received. As the band members graduated from the University of Otago (Kelk with a bachelor of applied science), they decided to pursue music fulltime.
Since then, they have released two more albums, toured New Zealand, Australia, Europe and the US and have relocated to London.
- In it for the long haul: Tom Kelk’s band has turned streaming success into live opportunities
ED DAVIES
2013: A career in business beckoned for Davies, the winner of the Otago Mathletics competition who also captained the school’s first XV rugby team and was among the top South Island secondary school 800m runners.
2023: Davies is a venture capital investor at King River Capital in New York, a firm that invests in early to growth-stage softwarebusinesses in North America and Australia. As a principal on the investment team, he helps source new investments and supports portfolio companies as they grow. His focus areas are AI, fintech, digital health and blockchain/crypto. He has run the New York Marathon and in 2018 completed the Marathon des Sables, a six-day, 250km ultra-marathon in the Sahara Desert.
