How Rod Drury Built Xero From A ‘Small Set Of Rocks In The South Pacific’ Into A Global Player

“We got the book Accounting for Dummies — because many of our very first programming team hadn’t really been exposed to [accounting]. With his crisp New Zealand accent and radio announcer-like enunciation, he is engaging both on stage and in one-on-one conversations. “That stuck with me for many, many years… The magic of getting accounting and software together is really important.”

Xero Beautiful Business Fund now open for entries

Our vision is to be a globally admired company that makes life easier for millions of people around the world. We get such a kick when people let us know they now find accounting fun. Great businesses are started every day when people act upon an opportunity. Rod Drury is one of New Zealand’s most successful and best known entrepreneurs, we talk to him about the story behind the Xero, the future, and what makes him tick.

• Having started life supported by a thousand retail investors, the company would later take money from some surprising backers, including the founder of a competing company.
• There was a collective acknowledgement that small businesses also needed to create jobs to make a real impact on youth unemployment.
• Doing financial systems implementation at EY, you always think, “I could do this better,” especially being a programmer.
• Xero provides training and education to small business owners, accountants, book-keepers, financial staff, CFOs and partners as it believes that they are the cornerstone of the Company’s existence.

It’s been an exciting year for the trails with the opening of the Wharehuanui…

“I think we were legally working there. I’m not entirely sure whether you were allowed to start a business out of an apartment.” The tiny flat was soon filled with cheap office furniture, and eventually accommodated 14 staff. The entire team was coming and going all hours xero founder to get Accounting 2.0 off the ground — much to the bemusement of the other residents in the complex. As the technical framework took shape in that dining room, Walker hired three software engineers and three designers – and the new team needed a place to work.

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Sukhinder’s appointment follows a rigorous global recruitment process where we considered a number of exceptional candidates. I’m pleased to let you know that today we announced the appointment of Sukhinder Singh Cassidy as Xero’s new CEO, on 1 February 2023. Sukhinder will succeed Steve Vamos who after serving almost five years as CEO, is retiring from the role and plans to return to his previous portfolio in business coaching and leadership development as an advisor, director and investor. “Rod has been a vital member of our board, and I want to acknowledge his visionary leadership to drive the substantial growth of the business,” said Chair David Thodey.

Welcome to Queenstown TRAC! Founded by Rod Drury and spearheaded by newly appointed CEO Annie Ford.

“The internet was a bit of a challenge there, but there was this thing called Café Net, which was you bought $50 for prepaid internet and you [could] get it if you were in a café,” said Catherine Walker. “It was a studio apartment. Not even a galley, but a little kitchen, a bathroom and that was it… It was really small. It was grey. It had grey carpet. Grey walls. Very simple, small apartment, about 50 metres square,” Walker recalls. It features a recreation of Craig Walker’s dining room from 2006, where Xero started. Drury went on to complete a computing degree at Victoria University in Wellington, specialising in accounting and information systems.

“Now companies had done their migration to the cloud, I was thinking about the next type of customer interaction. “I didn’t want to do too much software, but Atomic was something I’m passionate about. It was a project I didn’t have time to do at Xero, but I wanted to,” Drury said. Help us have a productive first consultation by providing some additional information. Post your jobs & get access to millions of ambitious, well-educated talents that are going the extra mile.

With not much funds, renting a residential flat wasn’t the only penny-pinching measure in the early days. At this stage, Drury was still busy with his other ventures – he was a director at TradeMe and worked as a sales evangelist for Quest Software, the company that bought out his AfterMail business. He would occasionally poke his head into 404 to check on progress. Remarkably, the number of the apartment was 404 – the error code for a “page not found” returned on web browsers. A terrible omen for a software-as-a-service company, if you were the superstitious type.

“I remember there were a couple of MPs [members of parliament] that lived in the building… and we’d be having these business meetings, and people coming up into this residential apartment building.” In 1999, straight out of university, he had worked at Glazier Systems, a software development and consulting company founded by Drury. At first, Walker didn’t have much to do with the boss, but that all changed in his second year. Rod Drury had already successfully started two companies and exited them for gains of millions of dollars.