Programmes that have closed or moved — Callaghan Innovation’s disestablishment, the paused Endeavour open round, the closed Provincial Growth Fund — so you don’t plan around stale schemes.

dgm is an independent osFoundry integration partner — not affiliated with the company that makes osFoundry, and dgm has not yet completed any client integrations. This article describes services dgm offers, not past results.

Several New Zealand programmes have closed or moved, and planning around stale schemes is a real risk. The biggest is Callaghan Innovation’s disestablishment; others include the paused Endeavour open round and the closed Provincial Growth Fund.

Key points

  • Callaghan Innovation is being disestablished; functions moved to MBIE and new PROs
  • The Endeavour Fund’s open contestable round was paused (2026 = extensions); a Transition Research Fund follows
  • The Provincial Growth Fund is fully allocated and closed to new applications
  • Always confirm a scheme is live on its official .govt.nz page

How New Zealand support actually works

No New Zealand grant ‘buys you an AI tool’. The real levers are tax and capability support, and they go to the investing business — not to an integrator. The main one is the R&D Tax Incentive (RDTI): a 15% tax credit on eligible R&D expenditure (generally a minimum of about NZ$50,000 of eligible spend per year, up to a NZ$120 million cap), now administered jointly by MBIE and Inland Revenue; software and AI development can qualify, but only where the work resolves genuine scientific or technological uncertainty — being merely complex is not enough. Important and easy to get wrong: Callaghan Innovation is being disestablished. The government announced this in January 2025 and the agency is winding up through 2026; its grant and RDTI-support functions have moved into MBIE (accessed via funds.business.govt.nz / its Innovation Services) and its science functions into new Public Research Organisations — so any source that still calls Callaghan a live grant agency is out of date. Other relevant programmes include NZTE’s International Growth Fund (gated co-investment for established exporters), the Regional Business Partner (RBP) Management Capability voucher (co-funds registered training/coaching up to about NZ$5,000, 50%), and a time-limited Small Business AI Advisory Pilot (up to NZ$15,000, 50%, delivered through the RBP Network, running 19 January–30 June 2026 — it may have closed by the time you read this). dgm is not a registered, approved or accredited provider for any of these schemes. Rates, caps and the open/closed status of each programme change often — always check the official .govt.nz page.

A note on AI and tooling

No New Zealand scheme pays for an AI platform directly. What you can do is build cost-effectively on a model-agnostic platform like osFoundry — usage-based, BYOK, self-hostable — and, where genuine R&D is involved, consider the RDTI on that work. dgm can help scope a realistic first project.

How dgm can help

dgm is an independent integration partner that helps New Zealand organisations put osFoundry to work — from choosing a worthwhile first use case through to the hands-on build and connecting it to the systems you already run. dgm is not affiliated with the company that makes osFoundry, and it has not yet completed any client integrations, so what is described here is the service dgm offers, not past results. If you want help scoping a realistic first project, dgm can work through it with you.

This article is general information only and is not legal, tax or investment advice. Rates, caps and programme status change — confirm the current position with the relevant official body or a licensed adviser before you act.