At the risk of generalising a complex topic it's because we're innovative, have had to be because we either couldn't get or afford equipment available to businesses in other countries, so we grew up as a country having to make do.
But we aren't necessarily good at manufacturing, economies of scale and comfortable employment policy make it much less likely to work well here.
A lot of multinationals have bought up NZ companies, eventually moved their manufacturing off-shore and tried to keep a development team here. It's a fairly common series of events, but without direct exposure to the market it never seems to work, and sooner or later the design element is closed down too.
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