She said it compared with 116 applications and $70m of investment over the two-and-a-half years under the previous settings.<\/p>\n
\u201cI am delighted that our new visa settings are helping to open up possibility and opportunity for investment<\/a>,\u201d Stanford said.<\/p>\n \u201cThese investors bring not just capital, but global experience, expertise, and networks. I have had the pleasure of meeting some of these investors over the last year and I have seen first-hand their love for, and commitment to, New Zealand.\u201d<\/p>\n She made the announcement at Hectre, an AI start-up focused on orchard management and fruit quality.<\/p>\n Hectre \u2013 founded in 2017 \u2013 had secured three investors in the most recent round and was now exporting into 22 countries, she said.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s investment like this that grows companies like these … that\u2019s what is so exciting about today.\u201d<\/p>\n The Government had made minor changes to the visa, she said, including around infrastructure investment, which had led to three new funds being approved by Invest NZ.<\/p>\n She said New Zealand was \u201cperfectly placed at the bottom of the world\u201d as a haven for stable investment from the likes of the US, Germany, Southeast Asia and China in a world facing increased uncertainty \u2013 particularly considering Donald Trump\u2019s tariffs.<\/p>\n The ability for the investors to buy a house had not resulted in \u201cmassive peaks\u201d in the scheme\u2019s growth, she said, and the Government was not planning to lower the investment thresholds.<\/p>\n With net migration now the lowest since 2013, Stanford said that was a stabilisation<\/a>.<\/p>\n \u201cRemember the commentators saying it\u2019s going to be in the net negative \u2013 I never thought that would be the case but it has stabilised over the last few months, it\u2019s remained much the same and we\u2019re just starting to see a slight uptick, so I\u2019m confident that as the economy improves those net migration figures will get back to that 20-year average.\u201d<\/p>\n She said the migration figures were largely driven by the economy and would pick up as the economy grew.<\/p>\n