Richard Liew caught up with Joanna Greaves, General Manager of Business Product and Performance at Kiwibank, to discuss the first year in market of their innovative banking proposition StartUp+ and why backing entrepreneurs is essential for New Zealand’s economic future.
Kiwibank is marking the first anniversary of its StartUp+ loan proposition, an initiative designed to change how early-stage New Zealand businesses access non-dilutive capital. Launched to address a long known gap for startups wanting to access bank lending, the milestone-based loan reflects an effort to shift new business lending criteria from historical performance to forward-looking growth potential.
Historically, mainstream banking models have relied on retrospective financial data and tangible asset collateral and security to evaluate credit risk – requirements that frequently exclude early-stage companies. In developing StartUp+, Kiwibank aimed to build an alternative that balanced traditional and embedded bank lending models with the practical constraints faced by emerging tech and innovation-led businesses.
Driving this evolution is Joanna Greaves, Kiwibank’s General Manager of Business Product and Performance. While Greaves emphasises that StartUp+ is the result of a unified institutional effort, her own non-traditional path into corporate banking brings a grounded, empathetic perspective to the leadership team.
After completing her accounting degree at Massey University, Greaves took an unexpected detour, spending a decade dairy farming and sharemilking with her husband across rural Hawke’s Bay and Canterbury. She credits that period on the land with teaching her decision-making under pressure and operational adaptability. Today Greaves also operates a side hustle selling pasture raised eggs, which she says provides a very real reminder of the challenges faced by business owners on a daily basis.
Greaves says the “lightbulb moment” for StartUp+ arrived through intense conversations with startup accelerator Ministry of Awesome, some eighteen months ago. The concept initially encountered widespread skepticism regarding whether a bank could fund pre-revenue or early-growth companies without traditional security.
To mitigate risks while maintaining accessibility, Greaves’ team analysed the specific difficulties reported by early applicants. Rather than disqualifying non-traditional operators out of hand, the bank focused on co-creating forward-looking milestones with founders, establishing a structure where cashflow projections and founder capability serve as part of the assessment criteria.
Officially launched as a pilot mid-2025 at the Electrify Aotearoa conference in Wellington, StartUp+ has since transitioned from a bold controlled pilot into a recognised ecosystem solution. The project recently entered an ambitious second phase, elevating the maximum funding threshold to $450,000. Under this collaborative framework, the initial tranche allows founders to access up to $150,000 as unsecured lending. While funding beyond that initial limit does introduce security, the model remains structured to meet requirements suitable to the business stage and serve as an alternative to early equity dilution, which frequently results in founders relinquishing substantial control for minimal capital early in their lifecycle.
For Kiwibank, Greaves says the long-term objective of the initiative aligns with broader economic goals regarding national productivity and regional development.
By establishing more accessible non-dilutive funding lines, the team aims to support more startups, which Kiwibank identifies as a primary driver of job creation and technological innovation across New Zealand.
It represents a conscious corporate effort to match the immense grit shown by local business owners who choose the harder, untrodden path. “We have some truly incredible entrepreneurial talent across New Zealand, and we are committed to changing the way banks show up for them,” Greaves says, emphasising the shared ethos driving the team forward.
“When you give founders access to capital to fuel their growth, you get to see that ambition unlocked and realise the true momentum of what these businesses can achieve for New Zealand.” – Joanna Greaves, Kiwibank.
Interview by Richard Liew
