All Blacks Roger Tuivasa-Sheck and Ardie Savea quit under-fire small business network We Are Indigo
Friday, 18 November 2022
All Blacks Roger Tuivasa-Sheck and Ardie Savea have transferred their shares in under fire small business network We Are Indigo, ending their association with the company.
We Are Indigo and its subsidiary Manaaki are business networks offering advice and training to Māori and Pasifika small businesses.
Manaaki has been the centre of a rancorous dispute with the Government’s innovation agency, Callaghan Innovation.
The dispute – parts of which have played out on the LinkedIn social media platform – included allegations of bullying and small businesses being taken advantage of, and questions about the spending of government funding.
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On Thursday, documents from the Companies Office showed Tuivasa-Sheck’s holding company, RTS 1 Ltd and Savea’s holding company, Dakotaqueen Ltd, had transferred their shares in We Are Indigo to other shareholders in the company.
The pair each owned 1000 shares in the business, representing about 0.74% of the company.
We Are Indigo director Andy Hamilton said the players were no longer shareholders because of the media attention on the business.
“These are very high profile people, and we didn’t want to drag them into this,” Hamilton said.
The players were unhappy with the media bringing up their names each time Indigo was mentioned, and the business worked with them to transfer their shares, he said.
Representatives for Tuivasa-Sheck and Savea did not respond to requests for comment.
We Are Indigo and Manaaki were founded by former Xero executive Pat MacFie, former boxer Monty Betham, and Hamilton who was a former Icehouse chief executive.
Manaaki had a high profile, including for its work with Māori and Pasifika business start-ups.
But some prominent businesspeople, including Māori entrepreneurs Robett Hollis and Sir Ian Taylor accused Manaaki of misusing government funds and mistreating small businesses.
Both Hollis and Taylor said they had based their accusations on a report commissioned by Callaghan Innovation about Manaaki.
But Manaaki disputed the validity of the report, and claimed Callaghan was biased against the business.
Callaghan Innovation hired private investigator John Borland to review businesses that had applied for funding.
A Callaghan spokesperson said “we were becoming increasingly aware of allegations of bullying” by some in the founder and startup system.
Borland’s report, which Callaghan has not made public, was understood to be critical of Manaaki’s behaviour.
Manaaki claimed the report, and subsequent accusations from Hollis, had resulted in $5m of lost funding and contracts.
It has pointed the finger back at Callaghan, claiming Borland had a conflict of interest which should have disqualified him from producing the report, including personal ties to Hollis.
MacFie said the allegations against Manaaki were untrue, and had caused financial and mental strain for those running the business.
He said the issues had been resolved by Manaaki, but argued Hollis was using his influence to blow them out of proportion, to try to bring down the business.
Borland’s report did not paint Manaaki in a good light, but the company had not been given the opportunity to fact-check or respond to claims in it, he said.
Callaghan said it received multiple Official Information Act requests seeking the detail of the report, but has not released the entire report.