Re-platforming a national memory: Storage, culture, cloud, and AI

National digital memory institutions are being reshaped by the same forces affecting eResearch infrastructure: explosive data growth, finite budgets, cloud platform churn, and rising expectations for access and reuse in the age of AI. This talk traces how the National Library of New Zealand and Archives New Zealand are responding through organisational change, storage modernisation, and strategic re-platforming to the cloud. It highlights where cloud-native solutions are sufficient and where preservation, cultural, or sovereignty requirements demand custom approaches. The talk concludes by examining how AI introduces both new risks and new opportunities for access, analysis, and stewardship — and what this may mean for the future of national-scale memory.ABOUT THE AUTHORAndrea Goethals is Manager of Digital Preservation at the National Library of New Zealand and Archives New Zealand, where she leads work to ensure the long-term preservation and resilience of national digital collections and government records. She leads a team of specialists with expertise in digital preservation, web archiving, software development and data analysis. Andrea currently chairs the International Internet Preservation Consortium (IIPC) Executive Board and was Conference Chair for iPRES 2025. Previously, she developed digital preservation repositories for large US academic libraries and co-authored digital preservation standards and guidelines used internationally. -----For more information about the eResearch NZ / eRangahau Aotearoa conference, visit: https://eresearchnz.co.nz/