Source: University of Auckland (UoA)
FRIDAY, AUGUST 28, 2026
Retail crime costs New Zealand retailers billions of dollars a year, but one homegrown company has become a worldwide force in fighting it.
More than a decade ago, Auror was an early-stage venture competing in the University of Auckland’s entrepreneurship contest, the Velocity $100K Challenge. Its second-place finish gave co-founders Phil Thomson, James Corbett and Tom Batterbury money to keep building their idea and, Thomson says, the confidence to pursue it.
Now Thomson is donating $30,000 to the University’s Centre for Innovation and Entrepreneurship (CIE), with $10,000 gifted each year for the next three years, to help emerging entrepreneurs take their ideas further.
“Fifteen years ago, we won second place in Velocity, and that prize money is what let us keep building for another year, and it’s genuinely part of why Auror exists today,” says Thomson.
“Beyond the money, it gave us the confidence to quit our jobs and go all in on the idea. That kind of early belief is rare, and it’s easy to forget how much it matters once you’re years down the track.
“This donation isn’t really about looking back, though. It’s about the founders coming up right now who are exactly where we were: full of conviction, short on proof points, and needing someone to bet on them anyway.
“CIE has spent two decades doing exactly that for Kiwi companies, and donating $30,000 is a way of giving back and keeping that door open for the next generation of founders who will continue to build the future of New Zealand.”
CIE supports University of Auckland alumni, students and staff to develop entrepreneurial skills, test ideas and turn promising concepts into ventures with real-world impact.
Thomson’s contribution will help give more emerging entrepreneurs access to that early-stage support. CIE director Darsel Keane says, “Supporting founders at this stage matters because it helps turn good ideas into real ventures.”
Since its early days at CIE, Auror grown into a major retail crime intelligence company, using technology to connect reports of retail crime and identify patterns, repeat offenders and organised crime, while helping retailers collaborate with law enforcement. Its customers have included Walmart, Woolworths and Coles.