Dave Tex Smith
Dave Tex Smith is a Telefusionist and Analytical Visionary. He cofounded Looking Glass Studio and is the Producer at 42.zero.
Dave is an Entrepreneur, Technologist, and Storyteller. As a Telefusionist, Dave brings people and ideas together around projects. He has taken it as his role to work in the background, often at the edge, to bring about positive change as we transition from the industrial age to one of hyper-connected communities and distributed networks.
In 2022, Dave cofounded the Looking Glass Studio, a pro-social transmedia project.
On leaving school, Dave began his career at the Government Computer Centre where over the next five years, he went from being a trainee to the network supervisor for one of the Government’s significant networks, where he learned the power of creative thinking when applied to problem-solving.
Over the following years, Dave worked with the disabled and brain-injured in designing therapies via play. He studied neuroscience while a therapist at the National Brain Injury Centre, understanding how we think would underpin his future work.
In 1997, Dave started his first company, Fuzzy Logic Productions, an award-winning web design agency, where he was also the Creative Director until 2001. The company would later become an ISP, software development company, and ICT management company for the Central Hawkes Bay District Council.
Over this period, Dave gained a reputation as a conceptual designer of strategies and systems, working in the Public Sector, leading an “All of Government Think Tank” and working in community development in Hawkes Bay (Owning our Futures) and Tairawhiti (Bio-region/Rua Bioactives).
Dave was invited Speaker at several major conferences and summits, including the World’s first Digital Earth Summit on Sustainability in 2006 and the Primary Industries Summit in 2007.
In 2005, Dave was the Founder of Critical Mas, where he was Business Development and Innovations Manager until 2009 when he founded Webtex Solutions and was its Director until 2016.
Between 2012 and 2019, Dave was the Founder and Director of Starfish Consultancy, a company that facilitates, organizes, plans, designs, and builds solutions. These can be associated with health, housing, education, and our environment. While it is always nice to receive recognition in the form of numerous business awards, it was an invitation to be one of 3 SME Owners representing NZ Business in 2005 to be part of an All of Government Research Project that eventually led to the establishment of Starfish Consultancy.
In 2019, he joined the HAB/FAB Habitat Fabrication Company as a Strategic Developer. HAB//FAB focuses on prefabrication as a way to reduce time to delivery, provide better working conditions (thus improving health and safety), allow for higher quality control, and reduce material wastage to deliver affordable housing solutions. Research and design were conducted to produce self-contained, off-grid capable, transportable homes to quickly respond to demand for social housing.
Between 2019 and 2021, he was also the Strategy Manager at Kiwi Clean Living. Their vision is to provide simple, pragmatic solutions that meet the needs of the most vulnerable communities by way of simple, smart technologies, together with a range of support programs delivered by one of their partner organizations.
Between 2018 and 2022, Dave was the CTO at Da Vinci Cooperative, a global membership of people dedicated to turning the world system from extractive to regenerative. They help everyday people break free from toxic environments. They coach entrepreneurs, who are using their lives as a force for good. Briefly, Dave was also the Telefusionist at TouchMedia in 2021, before joining the Governance Board for an American XR Company, VergenceXR.
Alongside, Dave works with the team at Whippet Digital, an award-winning SEO and content marketing company making their mark on the Content Marketing Institute’s recommended list in New York, a first for a Kiwi agency.
Dave also sits on the Advisory Board for ARK 2030, a global regeneration project that aims to reverse global warming by restoring the 500 million hectares of ecosystems that have been destroyed by mankind since the beginning of the Industrial Revolution.
Dave has won awards in advertising, design, and business, including the IPANZ Award — The Public Services Sector top award. He has cohosted World Futures Day 2024 as a Professional Futurist.
In 2005, Dave designed and secured a Process Patent for the technology that connected the physical print world to the digital world via visual recognition. (most commonly seen today as QR codes).
Listen to Dave talking about innovation and collaboration, his digital art, building on Indigenous story-telling, turning museums inside out, and a new type of social media platform at the Sugar Loafing Arts Cast Radio Show.
He is currently working on a children’s book series. The characters and themes of his stories are focused on co-creating a world full of promise and joy. A place driven by those with a curious playful mindset, stories of adventurers, inventors, builders, and activists. The Children of the Starfish is a series of stories that combines adventure in the style of Jules Verne and HG Wells with the lyrical whimsy of Dr Zeuss.
Listen to his Interview with Adnan Belushi Live.
Visit his LinkedIn profile. Follow him on Facebook, Instagram, Threads, Pinterest, and Twitter.