Technology innovation is coming thick and fast in Auckland as more start-ups eye the lucrative international marketplace.

The city's innovation ecosystem has suddenly expanded. Grid AKL, the innovation hub established in Wynyard Quarter by Auckland Tourism, Events and Economic Development (Ateed), is operating at full capacity; Lightning Lab has moved into the Grid to fast-track the brightest early-stage digital companies; and a new specialist incubator Astrolab wants to turn university and Crown Research Institute research and intellectual property (IP) into commercial reality.

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