After taking his company on to the United States Nasdaq stock exchange, New Zealand biotech pioneer Howard Moore has come home to help kick start the local sector. Mr Moore is executive director of the new $100 million Life Science Ventures fund being set up to invest in agricultural science start-ups. He said the fund, put together jointly by Celentis - the commercial arm of AgResearch - and venture capital specialist Direct Capital, would be used to pick winners that could leverage off the nation’s $200 billion agribusiness sector and help it grow. The possibility of doing something that could benefit the whole economy was one of the attractions of the job. Despite New Zealand being a world-class agricultural producer, the sector has not given rise to many high-tech companies.
