Our investment framework
Setting investment strategies

We set investment strategies for our portfolios to specify the types of science and technology research we think New Zealand most needs to prosper.

The investment signals derived from investment strategies form the first part of our requests for proposals (RfPs) for each investment area. The RfPs invite researchers to submit research proposals that focus on these specific topics.

How we set our investment strategies

We have a team of investment managers responsible for setting our investment strategies for all Foundation investments.

This team employs a number of activities to understand and respond to the environment in which the science system operates:

• they form connections and networks with key government policy and delivery agencies, industry sectors, research organisations and end-users of research – both national and international
• they carry out horizon scanning of national and international science developments, and attend seminars, conferences and workshops
• they convene expert focus groups
• as discussed above, they receive formal and informal feedback on their investment signals (which form the first part of our Requests for Proposals, inviting researchers to submit research proposals in the specified areas).

We then use a range of processes to select proposals to invest in.