Health Technology Sector

Bring your skills and experience to New Zealand and open yourself to a huge array of personal and professional opportunities.  Here you’ll be able to combine career satisfaction with a full and varied social life.

Imagine, within half an hour of finishing a day’s duties, you can be on a beach. Or up a mountain. Or tramping through fresh, clean beautiful bush. On the other hand, you could just be chilling out at a relaxed café or restaurant, meeting new friends and enjoying the view.

Professionally, you’ll find New Zealand’s health technology sector highly developed, with Kiwi-developed medical devices now marketed to the world.  This maturing industry has – for nearly 50 years – played a crucial role in advancing the health of New Zealand, supplying Kiwi healthcare providers and their patients with the newest and best equipment and health IT solutions available globally.  All of which is earning New Zealand a reputation as an emerging breeding ground of health technology innovation and excellence.    To name a few:  Fisher and Paykel Healthcare (for respiratory devices and treatments for obstructive sleep apnoea), Dynamic Controls (for electronic wheelchairs and scooters), Orion Health (Healthcare integration technology) and Atlantis Healthcare (evidenced based patient compliance programs) -- all world leaders in their respective fields.

As someone with the skills that this sector needs to continue its amazing growth, you have several choices of visa:

• Skilled Migrant Category, a resident visa that allows you to work and live in New Zealand
• Work to Residence, a two year work visa, which allows you to work towards qualifying for a resident visa
• Essential Skills, a temporary work visa, which allows you to work in New Zealand if you have a job offer from a New Zealand employer and the role cannot be filled by a New Zealander
   

Health Technology opportunities in New Zealand

More than 6000 people are employed across more than 200 companies, with plans to recruit hundreds more over the next year.  Jobs are typically highly skilled and highly paid.

The domestic health technology industry contributes $1.4 billion in revenue each year – and growing – to New Zealand’s economy.   Health technologies are a heavily innovation-intensive sector.  R&D expenditure in this sector here is equal to about 10% of revenue – twice that of many other technology businesses. The industry exports over 80% of the devices and technology solutions developed in New Zealand.

FAQs

What’s the health technology sector like in New Zealand?

Health Technologies make an essential contribution to New Zealand – both for the economy and for the public, delivering patients with improved quality of care and quality of life.

This is a sector with a particularly bright future.  The product development and manufacturing in health technologies has grown exponentially in the last ten years, and revenue is expected to grow by more than 100% by 2015.  Kiwi health technology devices are marketed to the world, key markets for the $800 million in export earnings including the US, Europe, Asia and Australia.  And employment in local manufacturing is expected to increase by 50% by 2015.

For more information, check out the Medical Technology Association and New Zealand Health Technologies.

How easy is it to get work in this sector in New Zealand?

Many of the skills needed in this sector – from software engineers to Quality Systems professionals, engineers (mechanical and operational) to product developers, laboratory professionals to bio engineers – are listed on the Essentials Skills in Demand list and employers throughout the country are constantly looking internationally for experienced and talented professional.

Research where your skills will best fit and which employers are looking for your expertise.  The HR departments will often assist you in getting the necessary paperwork needed for your work visa applications.  Together you’ll be able to apply to Immigration for an appropriate work or resident visa.

For more information about employers within this sector, click here.

What will my salary be in New Zealand?

Due to the high-tech nature of the industry, jobs are typically highly skilled and highly paid.  The average salary for the industry is similar to that in IT, law and engineering sectors.

Salaries are varied dependent on your area of specialisation and number of years of experience.

Regardless of the current exchange rate, you’ll find your income is relative to the cost of living in New Zealand. To give you an idea of the price of standard items click here.

Tax is deducted from your salary or wages with each pay. You’ll be taxed according to your income as follows:

• Up to $48,000 per annum 17.5%
• $48,001 - $70,000 per annum 30.0%
• Over $70,000 per annum 33.0%