Silicon Valley accelerator Plug and Play and Wharf42, the company formed in 2012 to connect rising Kiwi tech startups to the California innovation hotbed, have extended their partnership to launch a new incubator carrying both organisations’ names.

The Wharf42 Plug and Play Technology Incubator will work with New Zealand universities, crown research institutes and private sector entrepreneurs to identify IP-based ideas or technology that could benefit from incubation designed to lead to global commercialisation, the partners say.

The incubator will have offices in Tauranga and California, while founder and CEO of Plug and Play, Saeed Amidi, has joined the Wharf42 Advisory Board.

Wharf42’s co-founder is Peter Wren-Hilton, who also founded software company Pingar, which has offices in the US.

“By joining forces with Plug and Play, Wharf42 will provide access to incubation best practice, an established network of global corporate partners and significant angel and venture funding opportunities in both New Zealand and Silicon Valley,” Wren-Hilton says.

Plug and Play’s global network includes over 300 tech startups, 180 investors and university and corporate partners. It has launched programmes and activities in Singapore, Canada, Spain, Russia and Germany since it started in 2006 and raised more than US$1 billion in funding.