Short answer: we don’t know. Garage Hive has announced nothing, and until they do, anyone claiming certainty is guessing. But while researching the NZ workshop software market we found a paper trail that workshop owners deciding on software this year should probably see. Here it is, with sources and dates, so you can draw your own conclusions.
Where we sit: Hoist builds workshop management software in New Zealand, so we’re not a neutral observer and you should read this knowing that. Every claim below is sourced to a public record or a vendor’s own published material, with dates, so you can check each one yourself.
The evidence, item by item
1. A New Zealand company exists. GARAGE HIVE NZ LIMITED was incorporated on 24 July 2026, according to the NZ Companies Office register. It’s 100 percent owned by the UK parent, and its director is Raimonds (Ray) Dilsons, who is also the Managing Director of Garage Hive in the UK. What does that mean? We can only speculate. Distributor and reseller arrangements usually put a local partner’s name on the local paperwork. Seeing the parent company’s own MD on the NZ board instead at least raises the question of whether they plan to run this market themselves. Or it could be routine housekeeping, a trademark placeholder, a just-in-case registration. Companies do that too.
2. The NZ domain is live on their corporate infrastructure. garagehive.co.nz has no website yet, but its email runs on Microsoft 365 infrastructure configured the same way as Garage Hive’s UK, Irish and US domains. For what it’s worth, when the same company operates through a partner elsewhere (South Africa, for example), the setup looks different. Does that mean NZ would be run directly from the UK? We don’t know. It’s just an odd amount of plumbing for a market you have no plans for. Checked 10 August 2026.
3. New Zealand appears to be ahead of Australia in the queue. A Garage Hive company (Garage Hive MSP, SIA, per the .au WHOIS record) holds garagehive.com.au under trademark owner eligibility, but as of 10 August 2026 that domain is parked with no email infrastructure behind it. The NZ domain has working infrastructure; the AU one does not. If (and it remains an if) an expansion is coming, the record hints New Zealand would come first. That’s our reading of the DNS records, not anything Garage Hive has said.
Who is Garage Hive?
A UK workshop management vendor with a strong product and a good reputation in its home market. It’s built on Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business Central, which gives it accounting depth most workshop tools don’t have, and its UK growth has leaned on clever distribution: branded parts lookup tools and booking pages it hosts for its customers. It has earned its UK position.
It’s also, by NZ standards, expensive. Garage Hive’s UK pricing page lists "from 145 pounds per month" on a one-month rolling contract (the page doesn’t say how many users that covers), which converts to roughly NZ$310 at August 2026 exchange rates. No NZ pricing has been published anywhere we can find. For context, published NZ workshop software pricing currently runs from about $80 to $150 a month.
Our take
If Garage Hive is indeed heading here, we think it validates something we’ve believed for a while: NZ workshops are underserved by software, and the market is worth real investment. We’d rather compete with a good UK product on price, local depth and local support than pretend the possibility away. We’ve also published an early Garage Hive vs Hoist comparison, built from its UK material, that we’ll keep updated alongside this page. And if we’ve read the record wrong and nothing comes of it, this page will say so. Either way it will be updated as the public record changes.
The takeaway
A NZ company named after Garage Hive exists (registered 24 July 2026), its director is the UK managing director, and NZ email infrastructure is already live, all without any public announcement. Maybe that adds up to a launch, maybe it doesn’t. If you’re choosing workshop software this year, it’s worth knowing a premium-priced UK player may be about to arrive, and worth asking any vendor, including us, the hard questions about price, WoF workflows and support before you sign.
One practical step: get any price lock in writing. Hoist’s is $140 + GST a month, 3 users included, $10 a month per extra user; the Whoever you pick, ask for the equivalent.