Our people

John joins the Spark Health whānau following his role as Chief Network Officer at Tend Health. John brings a broad depth of experience from across both public and private sectors where he has held senior roles across a range of organisations, including the Health Funding Authority, Ministry of Health and Primary Care organisations. John holds a BLS and MBA from the university of Waikato and is a member of the St Peters board.

Our tech 'groupie', Kristian likes figuring out the more technical aspects of a solution – much to the dismay of the pre-sales team! He heads up our national sales team, but equally loves working alongside clients to solve issues or challenges to help them transform their businesses with cloud technologies. Kristian has worked within the Spark Group for a long time – most recently with Revera, managing a sales team supporting the health sector in the Auckland region. He is passionate about the opportunities in healthcare with some of the new technologies on the horizon, particularly in wearable tech. His favourite gadget at the moment is the Jabra Elite Sport ear buds with built in heart rate monitoring and has been enjoying using Google Fit.

Amy is the 'go to' member of the Spark Health whānau and hasn't yet been unable to solve a problem or find an answer to a question. Amy has worked in the IT and Telecommunications industry for 6 years. She has jumped into the Spark Health journey with two feet helping to prepare its launch and being part of the brand and marketing journey. A lover of the outdoors you might find her out surfing, swimming or diving anywhere in New Zealand. Even though she is a self proclaimed, 'non tecchy' person her favourite app is Spotify and kicks off the day with music, water and sunshine.

Bros is the knowledge base of Spark and now Spark Health. Bros has been with Spark for 24 years and has worked on the health portfolio in some form over that time. Bros is passionate about making a difference to the well-being of New Zealanders and will be a valued and trusted partner in finding the right connectivity solutions for your team, championing your cause until you have what you need to work from wherever you are, whenever you need to.

The MacGyver theme tune could be playing in the backdrop as we introduce Regan. Regan has applied his engineering background and experience across the health sector as our Principal Solutions Architect. Regan is the go for anything relating to technology and solutions as well as incident escalation for root cause analysis. YouTube and YouTube Music are his all-time favorite apps, so much so that when asked which he would rather go a day without, internet or without food, he chose food!

Josh, a former yachtie, has a wide range of experience including running vDaaS company 2Onions and consulting for Deloitte where he worked across several health care organisations. Josh is most excited about seeing how far we can push the boat out on transforming the NZ health sector. He joins the whānau leading out our digital health products Tahi and Kete Waiora. Encouraged by his dog, rain or shine Josh starts his day with a walk, some fresh air and some time to gather his thoughts before he gets to the favourite part of his daily routine which, like a lot of the team, is coffee! ☕

Dan is a Solution Architect with experience across architecture, pre-sales and consulting within the Spark Business Group (Revera and Leaven). You could say Dan’s the man when it comes to moving customers to the Cloud and Digital Transformation. Dan is a big believer of everything in moderation. For fitness and exercise he suggests you find something you enjoy doing and stick with it, for Dan that means riding his bike to work and catching the odd wave on the weekend with his son.

A Solutions Architect, specialising in Cloud & Physical Infrastructure with a focus on Digital Hospitals, it’s fair to say that Matt is keen for a challenge and happy to throw himself into just about anything… anything except trying to fix an Android phone. Matt has experience across multiple industries, and it has surprised him how transferable the skills he’s gained have been, including those he picked up while working in the media industry. A keen fisherman, coffee lover and cyclist, Matt’s motto is "ride bikes, it will save your knees”.

James relishes a challenge to bring the disparate together. He’s worked in the sector on and off since 1998. His specialty is integrating systems making him the perfect fit for our whānau as Integration Product Consultant. Ready to hit the ground running with Tahi – providing New Zealand healthcare a trusted integration platform to share data easily, and securely. James believes in leveraging technology to save time, he loves apps like Strava that integrate into his daily life to keep him honest— a virtual coach that pushes him daily.

Wiri has recently joined the Spark Health whānau as a Digital Consultant. He’s moved from EY Technology Consulting where he worked as an Advisor for data and digital for the Health and Disability Reform 2021 Transition Unit, and was also involved in the development of Te Pae Tata / NZ Health Plan. Wiri is passionate about accelerating Māori success, and is a firm believer that data and digital can play a crucial role in overcoming inequities in health outcomes - while recognising there is a need to progress beyond equity… towards excellence. His wellbeing tip: make time for yourself, even just 10 minutes to exercise, walk, talk, or just breathe fresh air.

Apart from being the only one in the team other than Kristian and Clare to favour Samsung over Apple, Jaco has over 21 years’ experience in IT with exposure to a wide variety of environments. He is passionate about working alongside each client to support them to achieve their goals with clear strategies, combined with analysis to address any challenges in the digital transformation journey.

You can’t hold Dion back from an opportunity to find a technology solution to help businesses work smarter. Dion has worked in ICT sales and account management for over 20 years and with Spark for twelve. In that time, he managed a broad range of customers including DHB, PHO’s and suppliers to the health sector. He is excited about now being 100% dedicated to serving the health sector. Dion will work alongside you to get a detailed understanding of your organisation and your aspirations for the future to help diagnose a opportunities that make a real difference.

You won’t miss Jeff as he will always have a smile when you see him coming. Jeff has worked with Spark for four and a half years following a role working as IT manager for ten years at OceanaGold. He is a wealth of knowledge having a degree in Information Science and an MBA and is skilled at researching and translating a solution to a specific industry need. If you want him to hang around just start talking about NBA Basketball.

Bryan, one of the client directors for the upper South Island has been supporting the health sector for 6 years as part of the CCL team, a subsidiary of Spark. He is excited about the potential of cloud transformation for health providers, to make their lives easier and to improve healthcare for New Zealanders. A strong change leader he will help you to drive to successful outcomes to achieve and exceed your goals. He stays calm under pressure, having worked as an implementation manager within Spark’s Earthquake recovery team to establish sites with operation and project managers.

Karla is truly passionate about health. After spending her entire career working in Medical Devices within the health sector, (and winning sales person of the year on multiple occasions), she has seen the growing need to transform and connect the industry and strongly believes that can be achieved by connecting the silos in the health sector through the power of technology. She is thrilled to create little wins for her clients and runs at life at 110% so there are a lot of them! When she is not at work Karla might be found on the sideline of the field cheering on her two girls at their respective sports. Although she isn't all go and not averse to a cheeky glass of wine here and there.

Jill Hobbs is the person to get the job done. With seven years experience working in Spark, she has spent most of that time looking after clients in the health sector. Jill has enjoyed the challenge of working on the ‘acceleration’ of projects which COVID-19 has initiated and what that may enable in the future. She relishes meeting and helping people in health and will make sure you have the support, tools and resources you need to achieve your objectives.

Raymond’s favourite thing about his career is meeting new and different people, understanding their business and what they do. Personally and professionally, Raymond always has a listening ear and is keen to chat about anything. This is one of the things that make him a great Client Lead. When not at work you may find Raymond spending time with family, learning how to navigate around NZ’s ocean (Gulf Harbour mainly) or using his favourite International Chess Tournament app.

It's safe to say that Ben has landed in the right team as one of his favourite things about his career is having the opportunity to help organisations and people through the power of technology. Ben is a BDM with a breadth of knowledge, however a common misconception about Ben and his role (a lot of our team get this), is that he can fix your broken phone or computer. Ben’s favourite app at the moment is his Dexcom G6 app, it links in to his wearable glucose monitor and makes his type 1 diabetes a lot easier to manage. His top tip for wellbeing – “Sometimes the first step in the journey is the hardest, make the most of the momentum that first step gives you”.

Courtney is the Spark Health Taskmaster! As the new Sales Associate, Courtney is currently working on some diverse projects to create greater autonomy for the Spark Health whānau. Always willing to help, she is the go-to for data integrity and reporting insights. Courtney keeps our team on task and helps make our vision come to life. Courtney is passionate about self-development, both personal and professional, striving for growth, evolution, learning and achievement. Spotify is her go to app, listening to motivational music or an educational podcast, her motto “nothing that is worth it is easy.”