A new visa called the Global Impact Visa (“GIV”) aims to attract highly talented, successful and well connected entrepreneurs to establish ventures in New Zealand.
The key benefit of the GIV is that it offers flexibility to attract innovative global entrepreneurs, investors and start up teams who are not covered under the existing investor and entrepreneur visa categories.
The Cabinet Paper was prepared by the Minister of Business Innovation & Employment during April 2016 (“Cabinet Paper”), and the GIV policy is designed to target certain types of investors and entrepreneurs including:
Young entrepreneurs who are driven to take more risks in innovative business opportunities but lack years of business experience or capital required under the existing investor or entrepreneur policies.
Start-up teams who can bring scalable ventures with initial investment to launch from New Zealand but their value as a team cannot be assessed to meet the requirements under the current entrepreneur policy.
More experienced “global entrepreneurs”, who can bring experience, capital and international business networks but who can neither liquidate assets to meet investor policy, nor commit to spending two years in New Zealand fulltime for one business, as required under entrepreneur policy.
The Cabinet Paper also explains that work visas and resident visas will be offered under the GIV policy and it will operate as a four-year pilot with a limit of 400 visas being issued over the duration of the pilot scheme.
There are two stages for the application process for the GIV which include:
Submit an application and be accepted into, the Edmund Hillary Fellowship which is the programme designed to give entrepreneurs, start-up teams and investors a platform to grow their ventures.
Apply for a GIV.
The GIV selection process requires applicants to first obtain entry into the Edmund Hillary Fellowship programme. Once a candidate has been nominated for acceptance into the Edmund Hillary Fellowship they are able to apply for a Global Impact Visa.
The selection criteria for the GIV is conditional on meeting a number of criteria. Applicants who have been selected will be assessed on the basis of their acceptance into the Edmund Hillary Fellowship, English language, health and character and having sufficient funds to support themselves.
If you have any general questions regarding the Global Impact Visa or the selection criteria
please contact a member of the Immigration team at Sharp Tudhope.