Digital Irish Podcast

Welcome to Season 2 of the Digital Irish Podcast. A seasoned entrepreneur, Pat Phelan has built and sold a number of companies in the telecoms and software space, including Trustev and Cubic Telecom.   He is also recognized as one of Europe's most influential software innovators. He is also a serial investor in, and advisor to, a number of organisations.

What is the future of education in a virtual world? Mike Feerick , CEO of Alison , has a unique insight into how this $5 Trillion industry is about to turn on its head. Companies like Alison, who offer free enrollment to thousands of online courses that have produced over 3 million graduates are challenging the status quo of traditional education.  Much like technology transformed the music I...

Misinformation is the cultural virus of our modern era. It is dismantling global relations, effecting public discourse, and creating uncertainty at a time when we need trusted voices to keep us informed. Mark Little , with his most recent start-up, Kinzen , is bringing a journalistic solution to the problem of misinformation. In fact, he sees this as an obligation that is driven by real purpose. I...

Paul Byrne is by all accounts a builder of companies. Between 2007-2016 Paul built and sold three companies and during this time he developed a playbook to scale businesses successfully. In 2016 he planned on going into semi-retirement to help startups apply some of the concepts from his playbook. That work led him to CurrencyFair, where his initial one-day per week advisory role quickly transitio...

Ronan Dunne shares his progressive views on the role of the CEO and why he believes that the leadership playbook of the past is no longer relevant to today's workplace.  Join us for an enlightening conversation with one of the leading Irish Corporate innovators who has had enormous success in the Telecommunications industry both in the UK and the US. Ronan Dunne is the CEO of the largest mobi...

Growing up in a third-generation family business Samuel Dennigan was expected to follow in his father's and grandfather's footsteps. Sam Dennigan & Co. is one of Ireland's leading fresh produce distributors, but after working in the business for over ten years Samuel decided that he needed to go it alone and create his own legacy.  He wanted to revolutionize the frozen food industry and u...

Mary McKenna is an Irish technology entrepreneur and angel investor.  In this interview, we chat about the many chapters in Mary's career that have made her an in-demand Startup advisor around the world. We also discuss the amazing opportunities that can present themselves when you default to saying 'yes' rather than 'no.' Mary co-founded online learning company Learning Pool in Derry in 2006 and...

Cian Cotter is the Managing Partner of Insight Partners , the growth-stage private equity firm based in New York City. Insight Partners recently raised a fund of $9.5 Billion in software businesses. During Cian's time at Insight Partners, he has become a specialist in helping prepare companies to go public. We had an opportunity to discuss his thoughts on companies going public as well as the Star...

The Bells Labs is the birthplace of world-changing innovations. The transistor, cellular phones, solar cells and the laser are just a few of the innovations that have been created at the Bell Labs in the past 95 years. Bell Labs has always been attached to a large communications company and in 2015 Nokia acquired the Bell Labs when they purchased Alcatel-Lucent.  Our guest Domhnaill Hernon is...

Our first live podcast recording features Nigel Eccles , previously the CEO of FanDuel and currently the CEO of FlickChat .  In this live interview with Rachel Quigley , Nigel explains how it seemed like a total mismatch that the founders of FanDuel would be successful. They were based in Edinburgh and had no interest in sports - yet they would go on to build what was at one point the largest...

In 2017, The Economist wrote the headline 'The world's most valuable resource is no longer oil, but data.' We are living in a data-driven world and the reliance on data in all forms of commerce is continuing to expand. This episode is all about data and its enduring impact on our lives and businesses. Cillian Kieran , Founder & CEO of Ethyca is on a mission to create trust in the internet and...

Ciarán Hynes is the Co-founder and Managing Partner of Cosimo Ventures , a deep-tech investment firm with offices in Dublin, Boston, and New York. Cosimo Ventures is focused on technologies that disrupt global markets but Ciarán has an extremely varied background and not what you would typically associate with a venture capitalist. He hurled for Dublin seniors before working with CIE Tours in some...

Katie Molony is the Co-CEO of Irish Studio , the leading Irish digital media company in North America, providing the worldwide Irish diaspora with daily news, politics and current affairs.  Prior to joining Irish Studio Katie was the CEO of Maximum Media which is now Ireland's leading digital publishing company with leading brands like Joe, SportsJoe, and Her.  When Katie joined Maximum...

Ronan Healy is the CEO of Catapult , an events production agency with offices in Dublin, New York, and LA. Ronan launched the company in 1999 in Dublin and over the past 20 years has built an agency that is recognized for its creativity. Captapult have produced iconic events around the world; from Web Summit to Arthur's Day, Elon Musk's Hyperloop One Exhibit, The Festival of Speed, and recently Sm...

Harry Moseley has worked for some of the most respected financial services and consulting companies in the world. He was the CIO (Chief Information Officer) of KPMG and Blackstone before joining Zoom as their first CIO in 2017.  Zoom is a video conferencing platform with a mission to make video communications frictionless.  Zoom is a unique company amongst its Silicon Valley counterparts...

At a time when the Irish economy was at it's lowest point Daire Hickey along with his two co-founders managed to draw some of the largest names in Silicon Valley and the world's business media attention to Dublin for a gathering of tech entrepreneurs called Web Summit. That gathering would grow into the largest tech conference in Europe and become labelled as the 'Davos for Geeks'. In 2017 Daire l...