Heather McEwen

Xenacom CEO

Born and bred in the Waikato, Heather left New Zealand shores and tried her luck at various jobs around the world until 1983 when she returned home from the USA to start her career in IT.   After her training, she secured various corporate IT roles in New Zealand, Australia and England. 

In 1987, she began her self employed career as an independent Oracle consultant in Sydney.  Oracle, second player to Microsoft in the world of software hadn't yet reached New Zealand and by the time she returned home 3 years later her experience was sought after by such companies as Fletcher Construction.

Heather was approached by Digital Equipment in 1994 to head up a team to develop a hospital system.  A first class development team was duly formed and then split off in 1995 to form an independent company, The Foundation Group.  This company consulted to many large organisations including Oracle, Watties, Tip Top, Auckland Health Care and Air New Zealand and was disbanded in 1996 with partners pursuing individual careers. 

Long time colleague and friend Tina Reddington and Heather were recruited by Digital Equipment once again and ended up in Hamilton where they contracted to the NZ Dairy Group.  

Gavin McEwen, Heather's brother and principal of Agricultural Computer Consultants, was persuaded to join forces with Tina and Heather and Xenacom was duly formed in 1997.  Tina left Xenacom and returned to her consulting career in Auckland while Xenacom continued to grow with the purchase of Cambridge Computer Services in Nov 1998.

Heather became CEO of Xenacom in 2002 and has seen the company through various stages of growth and consolidation.

Gavin left Xenacom in 2004 to pursue a more focused career in agricultural software and business consultancy but retains an interest and a shareholding in Xenacom.

Heather was a recipient of the Outstanding Leader award from Women in Business in 2004 and was a founding member of Women in Technology.

She was also involved in the formation of Hortitech and subsequently became the Executive Director until HortiTech came under the auspices of AgriTech in 2007.

She is currently member of the Institute of Directors and is a director of 2 other small companies.

Heather lives in Cambridge and has 2 teenage sons and one fluffy cat.  She tries to keep fit by playing the odd game of squash and is adamant that time out to play golf is going to become a priority (soon ...).