Book Awards Get New Sponsor
And perhaps not surprisingly, in these real estate obsessed times, the new sponsor is a property developer, Ockham Residential. While some may lament the passing of the good old days when sponsors were the more bookish Montana, it seems Ockham are going to be a good fit. They even admit to having ambitions ‘beyond just profitability’, surely a swear word in the property development community, but as co-founder and director Mark Todd says:
“We set up the Ockham Foundation, an education focussed charity, concurrently with our commercial development company. Right from the start, we knew we wanted to operate a business that had ambitions wider than profitability. Original thinking and critical thought are two key elements of public discourse we wished to promote by way of education.
“Currently we are working with the University of Auckland to fund First Foundation Scholars studying science and we are funding two postgraduate scholarships in Statistics. We recently funded an outdoor classroom and nature trail at Grey Lynn Primary School.
“Partnering with the New Zealand Book Awards in their pursuit of critical thought, creativity and literary excellence is a great fit for us.”
The next award ceremony will be in May 2016 with the winners announced during the Auckland Writers Festival.