Kiwi tech firms comprise 10% of Deloitte's Asia-Pacific Fast 500 index

Fifty-one New Zealand technology companies have been included in the 2014 Deloitte Technology Fast 500 Asia Pacific index, equalling the record for Kiwi companies making the list achieved in 2009 and ahead of last year's 40 companies.

Twelve companies, including the winner of this year's Fast 50 in New Zealand, Voyager Internet, were ranked in the top 100.

The index, announced in Hong Kong today, ranks the top 500 tech businesses according to their revenue growth over the past three years.

Internet service provider Voyager Internet was ranked 23rd with 1,391 percent growth over the past three years. It was started in 2011 by Seeby Woodhouse following the expiry of his restraint of trade agreement over the sale of his former ISP Orcon. Voyager supplies domain names and web hosting services to around 25,000 customers.

The next Kiwi companies on the Fast 500 were cloud-based retail software platform Vend and men's clothing retailer I Love Ugly, which come in 30th and 31st respectively. Touchcast was at 46, Sush Mobile 52, Anagenix 53, Volpara Solutions 54, Resolve Technology 59, Leapthought 79, Mesynthes 85, Pure SEO 91 and Unleashed Software at 93.

Deloitte partner Darren Johnson said the 51 companies from New Zealand out-performed regional heavyweights South Korea (47) and Japan (45) on the index. China had the most at 100 and Australia had 74.

"The growing Kiwi representation, and the fact that New Zealand companies now account for over 10 percent of the entire Asia Pacific index, is clear evidence that our technology companies can thrive on the world stage," he said.

For the first time a South Korean company has taken out the top ranking on the index. South Korean-based Daum Kakao Corp, which is behind the popular instant messaging application KakaoTalk, had annual growth of 11,618 per cent.

Revenue growth across the index averaged 405 percent this year, up from last year's 356 percent.