Flying in Higher Realms: An Exploratory Study of New Zealand’s Super Angel Investors

Abstract

While a large choir of traditional angel investors readily support New Zealand’s innovation ecosystem with their financial capital, a select group of angels, colloquially dubbed as the ‘super angels’, are recognised as its ‘powerhouse’ champions. These investors substantially contribute not only their money, but also their time, expertise, and connections towards both their portfolio companies and angel groups. For decades, scholars have focused on understanding the often invisible solo angel investor. However, the evolutionary formalisation of the angel market has seen angels increasingly invest collectively within visible, organised angel groups. This recent shift challenges traditional angel investor profiles and obscures the characteristics and dynamics of those within these groups, questioning the relevance of existing angel research to the emergence of the super angel within this context. This thesis explores, within New Zealand angel groups, how the phenomenon of the super angel is characterised and understands how this profile informs the enablers and barriers to the super angel journey alongside the interventions or incentives to foster a thriving next generation of super angels. Through 24 semi-structured interviews with referred super angels, emerging super angels, and network managers across seven formal Angel Association New Zealand (AANZ) groups and reflexive thematic analysis, this work produced eleven salient and connected themes and proposes four models. The analysis distinguishes the super angel profile by a unique balance of internally-cultivated and externally-recognised characteristics cultivated over time. However, this work recognises heterogeneity in the super angel population and introduces a typology of super angels based on the manifestation of their influence, or mana. The journey to becoming a super angel appears gradual and organic, shaped by an interplay of influences related to the individual angel, their angel group and the wider New Zealand ecosystem. This research proposes a model of the super angel’s (paradoxical) life cycle, and relatedly finds that a super angel’s cultivation of mana requires a mutually reinforcing interweb of internal and external actions. These findings contribute to the nascent body of angel group and super angel literature, with important implications for AANZ angel groups to identify and incentivise their super angel pipeline.