IDA Innovation Review Summer 2019 by Ashville Media Group

SUMME R 20 19

IREL AND RE VIE W

FE ATURING

The Big Picture

Ireland’s TV, film and animation industry is garnering international acclaim

The future work OF

From globalisation to the gig economy, AI to automation

PLUS

Runway Report INSIGHTS FROM ZALANDO’S SEAN MULLANEY

The Anniversary Issue As IDA Ireland turns 70, we celebrate multinational milestones

IN A S S OCI AT ION W I T H

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CONTENTS Summer 2019

S u m m e r 2 0 19

Meet the team IDA Ireland Head of Marketing Communications Caitriona O’Kennedy

70 years of success

IDA Ireland celebrates seven decades of expansion, innovation and investment

I n s i d e Z a l a n d o ’s F a s h i o n I n s i g h t s C e n t r e

“THE IRISH ENGINEERING A N D D ATA S C I E N C E M A R K E T I S GROWING, SO THERE IS A DEEP W E L L O F TA L E N T I N I R E L A N D T H AT W E C A N TA P I N T O .”

Ashville Media Group Editor Tara Corristine Art Director Áine Duffy Creative Director Jane Matthews Managing Director Gerry Tynan

20 Collaboration Nation A spirit of partnership in the Shannon region is driving advances in connected cars

Chairman Diarmaid Lennon

Published by Ashville Media, Unit 55 Park West Road, Park West Industrial Estate, Dublin 12, D12 X9F9. Tel: (01) 432 2200 ISSN: 0332-4400 All rights reserved. Every care has been taken to ensure that the information contained in this magazine is accurate. The publishers cannot, however, accept responsibility for errors or omissions. Reproduction by any means in whole or in part without the permission of the publisher is prohibited. © Ashville Media Group 2018.

Smart Moves A first look at IDA Ireland’s Advanced Manufacturing Centre

Digital Dublin The Smart Docklands initiative is ensuring the capital stays ahead of the curve

Top of the Class The Irish colleges and universities leading the way in education, inclusion and experience

Lights, Camera, Action Meet the multi award-winning Irish studios

Building Greatness Ireland’s modern mindful approach to architecture

To p Measures THE IRISH CRAFT DISTILLERS MAKING INTERNATIONAL STRIDES

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NEWS Summer 2019

NEWS VIEWS and

A first look at new job announcements, research projects, global rankings and ongoing innovation in Ireland.

Wa n t t o know more? Visit the newsroom at idaireland.com for expansions, announcements and investments.

Ron Taylor Centre at Allergan’s Westport campus

IDA IRELAND: ON TARGET A very strong start to the year means IDA Ireland’s 20152019 Winning strategy looks set to deliver across all targets. During the first half of the year, 140 projects were won and 13,500 jobs were approved, a figure that is up 19 per cent on the same time period last year. Over a third of those roles were created outside of Dublin, a 15 per cent increase on 2018. Technology, financial services and life sciences sectors performed particularly well in the first six months, with Valeo in county Galway investing €44 million in its R&D programme, and J&J Visioncare creating 100 new roles at its facility in Limerick.

Economy Competitiveness

Ireland’s economy is the 7th most competitive in the world according to the 2019 IMD rankings. 2

EXPA NSION DR I V E

@ILCDover “Proud of our new state-of-the-art manufacturing facility in Blarney, Ireland! With over 10,000 square feet of clean room capacity, our new facility will ensure we can stay on top of growing demands for our high-quality products used in manufacturing life saving therapies.”

Allergan has announced a €65m capital investment programme to facilitate the continued expansion of the company’s state-of-the art laboratories and manufacturing campuses at Westport in county Mayo and Clonshaugh in north Dublin. The life-science company is headquartered in Ireland, operating four facilities here, and the Westport campus is the largest and most complex in its global network. Encompassing a pharmaceuticals facility, two biologics plants and an ocular implant facility, it is responsible for the worldwide supply of flagship product, Botox. Investment at the Clonshaugh facility will focus on expanding specialised manufacturing capability for new product development and the launch of new solid dose products currently in development. This facility plays a pivotal role in the delivery of Allergan’s ‘Open Science’ strategy by providing the critical small-scale pilot and manufacturing capability for its important oral solid dosage product pipeline. allergan.ie

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NEWS Summer 2019

Engineers and tech developers are sought for Rent the Runway, the company that allows consumers rent rather than buy their clothing. The US firm has selected Galway for its first international technology office. renttherunway.com

Wa n t t o know more? Visit the newsroom at idaireland.com for expansions, announcements and investments.

Recruitment Drive The world’s largest job site, Indeed, is adding another 600 new staff to its Dublin-based EMEA headquarters in Capital Dock. Indeed opened its Dublin office in 2012 and currently employs over 1,000 people. Recruitment has already started for the new roles across marketing, finance, strategy, operations, sales, client services, HR and business development, and employees are offered a range of benefits including health insurance for themselves and their families, flexible annual leave, catered meals and complimentary wellness programmes and fitness classes. ie.indeed.com

@GrowInCork “We are delighted to support the launch of #CyberIreland today in #Cork. #Cybersecurity is one of Cork’s fastest-growing sectors with major companies like #Intel, #IBM, #Trendmicro & #JohnsonControls #FireEye choosing cork [sic] for its capability & capacity in this sector #cyber #tech”

EAST COAST BOU ND

GrandPad, the makers of the first tablet-based solution designed for older people, has chosen Gorey in county Wexford as its headquarters. Focused on reducing loneliness and improving connectivity, GrandPad uses large, clearly labeled icons for video and voice calls, photos, email, games, news and weather. According to the Irish Longitudinal Study on Ageing, an estimated 400,000 people in Ireland are lonely and technology can play an important role by allowing older people to stay connected and live independently at home. grandpad.net

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NEWS Summer 2019

Wa n t t o know more? Visit the newsroom at idaireland.com for expansions, announcements and investments.

S e cu re Statu s DECISION HQ One of the world’s largest public Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) companies opened its new international headquarters in Grand Canal Dock, Dublin in April. LogMeIn is a market leader in unified communications and collaboration, identity and access management, and customer engagement and support solutions, and serves millions of customers through its products LastPass, GoToConnect, GoToRooms and Bold360. LogMeIn first opened a Dublin office in 2012 and the new 40,000 sq. ft. facility will allow the company to establish a management decision-making centre in Europe, with plans to recruit an additional 200 high level positions. The new offices in the Reflector building will include broadcast studios with state-of-the-art audio-visual facilities, a gym, library and gaming areas, and the firm was recognised as one of Dublin’s best employers according to Great Places to Work 2019. logmein.com

Good Countr y Index

Ireland ranks second due to its global contribution to international peace and security, prosperity and equality, health and wellbeing and culture categories.

@ I r i s h Ti m e s B i z

Threat vulnerability analysis, security event monitoring, and network and systems security are just some of the roles to be created at JRI America’s new Security Operations Centre (SOC) in Kerry. The company, which has been in Ireland since 2011, plans to expand its Tralee Technology Centre, creating 100 new jobs. The Tralee SOC will work closely with the group’s existing SOC in Japan to monitor, assess, mitigate and investigate cybersecurity threats and incidents on behalf of the group’s global operations. jri-america.com

Intel gets green light for $4bn development at Leixlip

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Innovation Centre

Wa n t t o know more?

DePuy Synthes announced a significant investment in ground-breaking research and development projects at the company’s Innovation Centre in Loughbeg, Ringaskiddy, county Cork earlier this year.

@DiageoIreland Diageo Ireland is today announcing that from 1 July, 26 weeks fully paid parental leave will be offered to all Diageo employees, regardless of gender, sexual orientation, or how people become parents – via birth, adoption or surrogacy.

Visit the newsroom at idaireland.com for expansions, announcements and investments.

Tech Talent Selected for its engineering and product talent and its proven track record as a hub for scaling technology companies, Reddit has chosen Dublin for its first international office. The social news website plans to build out its Anti-Evil, Security, Community, and Engineering teams, and will work on core product development, site and

BAT T E RY CHARGI NG

RIGHT: Professor Valeria Nicolosi, AMBER lead Investigator on the project

user account security, and engineering solutions to detect and prevent policy-breaking content. According to Reddit CTO, Chris Slowe: “As our first international office, we chose Dublin to tap into the tech talent pool and extend our efforts focused on the health of the platform and user experience.” reddit.com

In February of this year, researchers from the centre for Advanced Materials and BioEngineering at Trinity College Dublin revealed that they have developed a new material which has the potential to improve the lifetime of rechargeable batteries in everyday electronics, such as smartphones. The ink-based nanomaterial, called MXenes, will potentially enhance both the lifetime and energy storage capabilities, and there are environmental impacts too, as it could increase the real-time range of electric cars to upwards of 500km. ambercentre.ie

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years of Seventy years of WORDS BY Ta ra C o rri st i n e

WORDS BY Ta ra C o rri st i n e

Over Over the the course course ofof seven seven decades, decades, IDA IDA Ireland Ireland has has successfully successfully attracted attracted foreign foreign direct direct investment investment projects projects that that have have contributed contributed significantly significantly toto our our economy, economy, culture culture and and society. society. AsAs we we celebrate celebrate IDA IDA Irelandâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Irelandâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s anniversary, anniversary, we we meet meet multinationals marking theirtheir own own IrishIrish milestones. somethe of the multinationals marking milestones.

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F R O M H U M B L E B E G I N N I N G S I N T H E E A R LY Y E A R S OF THE IRISH REPUBLIC, TO A MODERN DYNAMIC AGENCY WITH 30 OFFICES AROUND THE WORLD, I D A I R E L A N D H A S P L AY E D A F U N D A M E N TA L R O L E IN THE COUNTRY’S ECONOMIC SUCCESS. HERE, W E L O O K AT T H E O R I G I N S O F T H E A G E N C Y A N D I T S E V O L U T I O N O V E R T H E PA S T 7 0 Y E A R S .

1956

1949

The Industrial Development Authority was founded to ‘stimulate, support and develop export-led business and enterprise in Ireland’

1978

EPTR was replaced with a special 10% rate of Corporation Profit Tax for all manufacturing industry from 1981-2000

2003

Google opened its first office in Dublin, paving the way for internet-based companies

Irish Government strategy moved to maximise foreign investment and the Exports Profits Tax Relief (EPTR) was introduced

1958

IDA Ireland established a presence in New York, and a formal office followed in 1966

1973 1969

The Industrial Development Act provided for the Industrial Development Authority, a single new independent state agency

1981

1972

1987

The Financial Services Act established the International Financial Services Centres in Dublin, a hub for firms involved in international finance

IDA Ireland was given the power to provide employment grants

1989

Intel established its European base in Leixlip, county Kildare

1998

An agreement was reached with the EC on universal 12.5% corporation tax from 2003 onwards

2019

2008 FDI in Ireland proved resilient with investment increasing by foreign-based companies

34,000 new jobs had been created by FDI companies

Ireland joined the European Economic Community (EEC). IDA Ireland had presented to 2,600 companies

2015

Winning: Foreign Direct Investment 2015 - 2019 strategy was launched with the aim of creating 80,000 new jobs in client companies and winning over 900 new investments for Ireland

The agency is on track to deliver on the targets set in 2015, with 13,500 jobs approved and 140 projects won in the first half of the year

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70 years of success

Since it’s foundation in 1949 , the mission of IDA Ireland has remained constant: to promote the growth and development of industry in Ireland.

IDA Ireland, formed as part of the Department of Industry and Commerce, understood that foreign investment, industrialisation and exports were key to re-energising the country’s fortunes. Strategies employed in pursuit of this goal included removing restrictions on foreign capital and introducing competitive corporation taxation for exporting companies. These policies became, as Padraic White, managing director of IDA Ireland from 1981-1990, put it, their “most distinctive investment incentive, and over time its most powerful single weapon in the international industrial promotion battle”. The First Programme for Economic Expansion established in 1958 heralded a new era of cohesion and forward-thinking economic strategy and in the decade that followed, IDA Ireland negotiated new projects or major expansions with 450 foreign companies. By 1972, 34,000 new jobs had been created. The organisation entered a dynamic phase of growth when it acquired control over its own international operations following the introduction of the Industrial Development Act in 1969. In 1971, the agency made presentations to 105 different companies; within two years, that number had increased to 2,600. By 1979, the number of foreign offices had tripled to 18. IDA Ireland was hard at work across the world promoting its educated workforce and businessfriendly tax incentives, with the added benefit of access to the common market. From the mid-1970s onwards, IDA Ireland’s strategy focused on attracting pharmaceutical and electronics manufacturers, two sectors 8

pinpointed as having significant growth potential in global terms. The first wave was components manufacturing, and later R&D and higher value work followed. As the decade came to a close, the organisation had attracted client company investment of £2.7b and created 192,000 jobs. By 1982, 130 of the world’s leading electronics companies had manufacturing facilities located in Ireland. IDA Ireland’s Strategic Plan for 1982-92 focused on high-output growth using the best technology available. Apple set up a Cork plant in 1982 and IBM, Microsoft and Lotus followed. In 1990, IDA Ireland developed a package to attract Intel to set up its European base in Leixlip, county Kildare and this year, the company celebrates 30 years in Ireland. Under the provisions of the Industrial Development Act, 1993, IDA Ireland was to focus exclusively on the development and promotion of high-quality FDI, and between 1990 and 1994, attracted 40% of US electronic investment in Europe, with companies like Dell, Gateway 2000, Compaq, HP, Xerox, Ericsson, Matsushita, Philips, Siemens and Hitachi all following suit. By the late 1990s, roughly a third of all European PC production happened in Ireland. Throughout the economic crisis of the following decade, IDA Ireland continued to win investments thanks to astute leadership. Major tech players Google, LinkedIn and Facebook were joined by companies such as Airbnb and Uber. Manufacturing in the bio-pharmaceutical, medical devices and micro-electronics sectors continues to thrive and Abbott, Medtronic, Stryker and DePuy Synthes are just some of the medtech firms with expanding Irish operations. IDA Ireland’s current strategy, Winning: Foreign Direct Investment (2015-2019) has shown mid-year results of over 900 investments and over 80,000 jobs created. The strategy focused strongly on spreading investment throughout the country, and over the five-year period, it has secured 455 regional investments (as of June 2019), and to date, 27,000 new jobs have been created in locations outside of Dublin. According to IDA Ireland CEO Martin Shanahan, “As we come to the end of our current strategy, we are on course to have won record numbers

“By the end of the 1970s, the organisation had attracted investment of £2.7 billion .”

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of investments into Ireland. This strategy set very ambitious targets for achieving growth in the regions and we have achieved some remarkable investments in the first half of 2019, for example, Meissner committing to create 150 new jobs in Castlebar, and GrandPad setting up its European HQ in Gorey with the creation of 75 new jobs.” Since its inception, IDA Ireland has been instrumental in creating over 229,000 jobs in over 1,400 companies. Welcoming multinationals into Ireland has also helped to strengthen domestic businesses and over eight jobs are created for every 10 jobs in an FDI company. Multinational companies invest approximately €19.2bn directly into the Irish economy. According to Shanahan, the market for foreign investment is evolving at a rapid pace and has never been as competitive. The agency continues to operate at the highest level in the face of continuing challenges, threats and opportunities and its newly launched Brexit International Campaign emphasises Ireland’s commitment to the EU, while its new five-year strategy (2020 to 2024) will take account of the changing global landscape for FDI, changing sector profiles and changes in the nature of work and the impact of technology. Thanks to asture leadership, a dynamic approach and unwavering commitment, the incredible achievements of the past look set to continue in the future.

PAST & PRESENT IDA CEOs: (L-R) Barry O’Leary, Kieran McGowan, Martin Shanahan (current CEO), Padraic A. White and Sean Dorgan

“By the late 1990s, roughly a third of all European PC production happened in Ireland.” IDAIRELAND.COM

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A visit from Pfizer’s CEO

Pfizer Celebrating 50 years in Ireland Pfizer was one of the first pharmaceutical companies to locate in Ireland, establishing in May 1969, and since then it has grown to become one of the country’s leading employers with 3,700 employees across its six locations in Cork, Dublin, and Kildare. Pfizer’s interests in Ireland are diverse and include manufacturing, shared services, R&D, treasury and commercial operations. The Irish operation is responsible for commercialising leading medicines in the field of inflammation, cancer, vaccines, haemophilia, pain, stroke and rare diseases. Pfizer was an early adopter when it came to identifying Ireland as key location for the pharmaceutical sector, says Paul Duffy, Vice President

Wa n t t o know more? Log on to pfizer.ie

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of Pfizer Global Supply. “In 1969, we were one of the first US pharmaceutical businesses to locate here and almost five decades ago we set-up our production facility in Ringaskiddy, Cork. This marked a significant investment at an important time for Ireland and precipitated Cork’s role as the hub for the pharmaceutical industry in Ireland. Ireland is a very important country for Pfizer, and our presence and investment has grown steadily. We have invested €7 billion to date and contribute €2 billion annually to the economy. Many of Pfizer’s newest and most important medicines to help treat patients with cancer, arthritis, stroke, serious infections, high cholesterol and more are manufactured at our Irish facilities, for supply and distribution to over 140 countries globally.” Duffy believes that Ireland’s talent pool is the driving force behind the sector’s success. “For me the greatest contributing factor to our industry’s growth and development in Ireland is our people. Our people are amongst the best in the world, very well trained, competent in everything they do and capable of managing great complexity. And it is not just our technical capability that distinguishes us, it is our ability to navigate cultures: you can put an Irish person in China, Mexico, Germany or the US and they will find a way to connect with the local colleagues better than most other nations.” Government support has played a key role in the organisation’s growth in Ireland. “Pfizer was one of the first companies to respond to the government policy of attracting FDI and I’d like to acknowledge the work of IDA Ireland and successive governments for what has been one of the most important aspects of transforming Ireland into a modern democracy and economy. I also want to take this opportunity to congratulate IDA Ireland on a significant milestone – 70 years! IDA Ireland has been a fantastic supporter of us from day one and has played an important part in our journey here in Ireland.” Their long history has ensured that Pfizer is firmly a part of the community in Ringaskiddy, Little Island, Newbridge, Grange Castle, Ringsend and City West. “I am very proud of our contribution to the local communities and to charitable organisations over the last five decades. We have a strong tradition of giving back, be it through colleague fundraising or inviting Transition Year students into our Ringaskiddy site on a weekly basis.”

“We have invested €7 billion in our Irish operations.”

ABOVE: Pfizer’s Ringaskiddy plant in Cork through the decades

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BELOW: Maureen Walsh, MD and Sinead Joyce, Marketing Manager, with Basketball Ireland’s Jason Killeen at the launch of JNR NBA Basketball partnership.

BELOW: The ADVOCATE project

DeCare Dental Marking 20 years in Mayo and Dublin DeCare Dental is a dedicated dental insurance provider and oral health and wellness company with a mission to empower people to improve their oral and general health. DeCare Dental was established in Ireland 20 years ago and now provides service to the United States and Irish dental market from its Irish headquarters in Mayo and its site in Dublin. The firm is a wholly-owned subsidiary of Anthem Inc., who provides medical insurance to over 40 million members and dental benefits to over 10 million dental customers. Their team provides a variety of services to over 50,000 members and 500 corporate customers throughout Ireland, serving companies ranging in size from 10 to 5,000 employees, representing all sectors of the economy including technology, pharmaceuticals, agri-food, financial services, medical devices and gaming. “The DeCare Dental team has grown and innovated in countless ways since we started our journey in Claremorris, county Mayo in 1999,” reveals Managing Director, Maureen Walsh. The company started with 18 staff who provided claims service to its US market. Today, the 126-strong team contributes through a variety of roles including sales, marketing and talent, claims and customer service, professional review, data analytics, compliance and regulation. “Our mission has always been deeply rooted in empowering people to attend the dentist over a lifetime. Over the years, our Irish team has grown and innovated in order to reach, educate and serve over 10 million dental customers. When we began in Ireland, private dental insurance did not exist. Twenty years on, we are proud to serve over 400 leading organisations, across all sectors operating throughout Ireland. Passion, collaboration, innovation and work ethic describe the values that drive the talented team in Ireland.” The DeCare Dental team has been recognised for innovation, receiving the Presidential Award 2017 from the Irish Gerontology Society and Best Professional Services Company at the 2016 Mayo Business Awards. DeCare Dental’s corporate training and innovative health service programmes, such as screening, nutrition, oral cancer checks and Ireland’s first accredited ‘Breaking through Barriers in Oral Health Care’ training have been implemented in corporate settings, schools, nursing homes, hospitals, hospices and other organisations throughout the country. DeCare Dental provides a programme that includes general wellness and oral health training which addresses the mouth/body divide. The company is dedicated to ongoing global oral healthcare research in order to deliver solutions across the population, and is a partner of ADVOCATE (Added Value for Oral Care), a collaborative EU-funded project involving 11 partners, six EU countries and eight Oral Health Care Systems, which is innovating change in private and public oral health Wa n t t o care systems to make them safe, efficient and more know more? preventively oriented for consumers. Log on to decaredental.ie

“Our Irish team has grown and innovated in order to reach, educate and serve over 10 million dental customers.” 12

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LEFT: Staff celebrate the 25th anniversary of the European operation BELOW: Lisa Callanan, VP European Operations; Michael Payne, Senior VP and Chief Information Officer, ASGN; Mick Finn, Cork Lord Mayor; Simon Coveney, An Tánaiste; Denis Carroll, VP European Operations, Oxford Global Resources

Oxford Global Resources Celebrating 25 years in Cork city Oxford Global Resources is a recruiting and consulting company with offices across Europe and North America and it established its European headquarters in Cork in 1994. The company, which is based on Penrose Quay since 1999, comprises account managers and recruiters who operate within a narrow industry focus including engineering, ERP rollouts and IT security. “Having this division of labour enables us to understand the culture of clients we support; provide lightning-quick reaction to our clients’ most critical and urgent skills gaps; offer the most interesting projects to the consultants we are proud to represent; enable our recruiters to develop their skills as experts in their skill-focus, and provide the best combination of cost and quality,” says Denis Carroll, Vice President, European Operations. “We act as a one-stop-shop for all our clients but the difference between us and our competition is that our recruiters are experts in specific skills; we do not have recruiters trying to sell everything.” In 2015, the firm restructured, designed and implemented a Shared Services Centre in Cork. Today, its back office team comprises almost 30 law, accountancy, HR, training, marketing and IT professionals that support a sales team, a move that has no doubt contributed to its stellar growth. “Oxford Cork has grown its business ten years in a row; seven of those ten years have seen double-digit growth and that is expected to continue in both 2019 and 2020. Having done business with clients in 40 countries, our Cork operation is one of the driving forces of our success on the international market.” The region’s talent offering is a vital part of that force for growth. “Ireland, and Cork in particular, has a young, dynamic and ambitious workforce which challenges itself to be the best it can be; Oxford Cork mirrors this attitude.” Corporate Social Responsibility is something the firm is strongly committed to. “We recognise the value of developing partnerships between ourselves and our community. In 2018, the company virtually cycled the distance from our office in Zug, Switzerland to Cork and raised over €20,000 for Marymount Hospice, Cork Penny Dinners and The Rainbow Club for Children with Autism. Our male colleagues have supported Movember for the past five years and have raised over €15,000.” This year’s three charities, which were selected by staff, are Cork Foyer, Pieta House and Focus Ireland. “In April, staff members took part in the ‘Big Rebel Sleepout’ which helped to create awareness for the homeless in Ireland, and raised over €7,000.” The company marked Women’s Day 2019 by raising funds for Cuanlee Women’s Refuge, a Cork-based charity providing safe crisis accommodation for women and children experiencing domestic abuse.

“Oxford Cork has grown its business ten years in a row.” Wa n t t o know more? Log on to oxfordglobal resources.eu

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Engine Lease Finance Celebrating 30 years in Shannon, county Clare Headquartered in Shannon, with offices in Boston, London and Hong Kong, Engine Lease Finance (ELF) is the world’s largest independent spare engine leasing company and this year, the company is celebrating 30 years since its launch. ELF was founded in 1989 by Jon Sharp under the founding ownership of the Irish aircraft leasing company, International Aircraft Services (IAS), the Washington DC utility, Pepco, through its investment subsidiary Potomac Capital Investment Corporation (PCI) and a small London bank, BAII PLC. The Shannon region was chosen as it was the only Irish location authorised to offer tax efficient structuring, known as the Shannon Licence. In the 1990s, Dublin was authorised to issue similar licences and it was these government initiatives that facilitated Ireland’s development to become the world’s largest centre for aviation leasing. In 1993, ELF became a 100 per cent subsidiary of PCI before being sold in 1996 to BTM Capital Corporation, a subsidiary of the Bank of TokyoMitsubishi. At this time, ELF had just four staff and a portfolio of 11 engines. Under this ownership for the next 18 years, ELF established itself as the leading independent engine lessor in the world. In 2014, ELF was acquired by Mitsubishi UFJ Lease and Finance (MUL), and staff now number 68 employees who manage 300 engines and five aircraft valued at $2.7b. Since 1998, ELF has worked with a number of partners to acquire engines from all manufacturers. Significant transactions have included the 2011 acquisition of a 47 engine portfolio from Macquarie Bank Limited (and subsidiaries within the Macquarie engines business) and the 2017 acquisition of a majority stake in INAV, an Illinois-based engine spare parts company. This ability to do transactions of scale and the entry into the parts business has enhanced ELF’s business model such that it can pursue large scale transactions at the front end and manage engines during their period of ownership while having an in-house solution for end-of-life engines. According to Tom Barrett, ELF’s President and CEO, “The company was founded with the objective of satisfying the industry’s demand for a quality, truly independent, specialist engine leasing company providing operating leases for modern, fuel-efficient aircraft engines to airlines and operators worldwide. As one of the first participants in aircraft engine leasing, ELF is delighted to have completed 30 years of success and we are all looking forward to continuing to be a west of Ireland internationallyfocused company, serving our customers for many years to come.” ELF’s ownership by MUL provides the company with the underlying financing strength and stability required to satisfy the long-term financing needs of the airline industry and to meet the commercial challenges presented by today’s rapidly changing world markets. This inherent stability is enormously important to ELF’s customers as leasing and other financing products offered by ELF are playing increasingly significant roles in their long-term financing. With a customer base today of over 80 airlines, manufacturers and maintenance/repair organisations, ELF has served more than 200 customers since inception. With 30 continuous years of profits, ELF is firmly rooted in the locality and living the company’s mission to be the world’s leading engine leasing company.

LEFT: Osamu Muramoto, ELF Chairman; Ray O’Driscoll, Managing Director Shannon Commercial Properties; Tom Barrett, ELF President & CEO; Jon Sharp, ELF Founder BELOW: The company’s headquarters in Shannon

ELF manages 300 engines and five aircraft valued at $2.7b. Wa n t t o k n o w m o r e ? Log on to elfc.com

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CELEBRATE Anniversary

FAR LEFT: Rowa Pharmaceuticals plant in Bantry LEFT: The firm’s award-winning allergy product, Cetrine BELOW: The Rowa team for the Bantry Bay Run

Rowa Pharmaceuticals Celebrating 60 years in Bantry, county Cork Rowa Pharmaceuticals Ltd. was first established in Bantry, county Cork in 1959 and is a provider of prescription and nonprescription medicines with a portfolio of over 300 products available in over 75 countries. Joe Keane, Head of Operations, says, “It is phenomenal to say that we are 60 years in Bantry. The story of Rowa is remarkable, especially when you consider the difficulties facing a female entrepreneur in rural Ireland many years ago. Our owner and Managing Director, Mrs. Wagner has overseen operations for many years and has kept the business in Bantry despite multiple offers and opportunities to move, especially during the recession.” In 2018, Rowa Pharmaceuticals won Best Small to Medium Enterprise and also picked up the award for Overall West Cork Business of the Year at the Southern Star West Cork Business & Tourism Awards. In May of this year, at the Irish Pharmacy News over-the-counter (OTC) and Product Retail Awards, Cetrine Allergy (Cetirizine) picked up Best Allergy Product of the Year. “It is phenomenal to say that a small pharmaceutical company in West Cork is responsible for the number one hayfever medication in Ireland.” Over the years, Rowa has worked closely with local charities including Cork ARC, Cancer Connect, Bantry Tidy Towns and Bantry Hospice Project, on a multitude of projects and events. “For over 10 years, Bantry Hospice Project has been providing support to the palliative care team in West Cork, funding for ARC House and a range of other support services. All the money raised is kept in West Cork and the importance of this can be seen in the fantastic services that are available to people who need it the most. Bantry Hospice Project is a not-for-profit organisation with a committee of just 12 individuals, working on a volunteer basis, to help those who need it most at very difficult times. We’re very proud to be associated with the charity.” Pride in the job at hand is what elevates Rowa employees according to Keane. “The people at our company are what make it special. The words to describe our staff in the office and on the road are loyal, diligent and hard working. I could talk about about how skilled and educated the staff here are but what makes our team extra special is the level of pride and commitment they feel. I strongly believe that with our team, we will continue to grow and move in the right direction. Here’s to another successful 60 years in Bantry.”

Rowa Pharmaceuticals has a portfolio of 300 products.

Wa n t t o know more? Log on to rowa.ie

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23/07/2019 14:46

CELEBRATE Anniversary

ABOVE: James Lyons, VP Operations Galway LEFT: James Lyons; Martin Shanahan, CEO IDA Ireland; Mike Mahoney CEO & President Boston Scientific at the official opening of Building 2

Boston Scientific Celebrating 25 years in Ballybrit, county Galway

ABOVE: James Lyons (centre) with members of Boston Scientific’s Inclusion and Engagement Groups

Boston Scientific Galway produces four million life-saving devices a year.

In 1994, Boston Scientific began its operations in Ireland with a manufacturing facility in Galway and less than 30 employees. Twenty-five years later, the company has grown to become the largest medical device employer in Ireland with a workforce of over 5,700 people across three sites in Galway, Cork and Clonmel, and is dedicated to transforming lives through innovative medical solutions that improve the health of patients around the world. Boston Scientific Galway is one of the largest manufacturing facilities in the company’s global network, producing four million life-saving devices a year and shipping to all corners of the globe. Since it opened, the site has expanded its capability to include New Product Development, Regulatory Affairs, Supply Chain, Information Technology, EMEA and Corporate Support. Founded in 1979 and headquartered in Massachusetts, USA, Boston Scientific employs 32,000 people in over 100 countries. It is a global leader in the development of less-invasive medical devices that impact the lives of 30 million patients every year. Boston Scientific Galway has played a central role in developing and manufacturing leading-edge products in the areas of Interventional Cardiology, Structural Heart, Peripheral Interventions and Endoscopy. The official opening of Building 2 at the Galway Campus took place in May 2019 and was attended by Mike Mahoney, President and CEO of Boston Scientific, and Martin Shanahan, CEO IDA Ireland, and was part of a programme of celebrations for the company’s 25th Anniversary in Galway. There are plans to mark the important contribution of its employees and the wider community in Galway as well as its industry partners. “Given the scale of our operation and workforce here, the support of the wider community has been especially important in attracting employees. And I would like to Wa n t t o acknowledge the contribution in turn that our employees have know more? made to the community also, including raising over €2.6m for Log on to local charities and organisations since 1994,” said James Lyons, boston Vice President Operations Galway. scientific.com

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29/07/2019 08:38

CELEBRATE Anniversary

LEFT: Conor Simpson and Shane Nolan, IDA Ireland; Johan Rosenberg, SVP & Head of Commercial Division, Oriflame; former Cllr Pat Vance; Laoise Cowzer, IDA Ireland BELOW: Johan Rosenberg, SVP & Head of Commercial Division, Oriflame; former Cllr Pat Vance

Ori-Derm Celebrating 10 years in Bray, county Wicklow Oriflame is a leading direct-selling beauty company, established in Sweden in 1967. It has a presence in more than 60 countries, and is the market leader in over half. Oriflame first established in Ireland almost 40 years ago and according to Vice President of Global Research and Development, Emma Hagemo, the Irish site has made a significant contribution to the success of the wider Oriflame group. “It started off with a large manufacturing plant in Sandyford that supported the growing demands of the business across multiple markets. In response to changing business needs, the operation in Ireland was reconstituted in early 2000 into a very successful global research and development centre in Bray, county Wicklow. This facility is currently responsible for the research and development of most of the product portfolio and has evolved into a high-tech facility employing more than 120 staff.” In 2009, with the support of IDA Ireland, the company opened Ori-Derm – a clinical facility within the centre designed to assess the effectiveness of the products. “Oriflame research and development is constantly evolving to meet the demands of the future, such as high performance skincare, the growth in the nutritional supplements category and the appetite for rapid innovation. We continue to develop and improve the capabilities and competencies we have in Bray. The support of IDA Ireland has been invaluable in helping us to evolve into a more agile and responsive research and development centre and to expand our current facilities, which include the high specification clinical and sensory evaluation facility. The IDA has also helped with the development of the wellness capabilities (nutritional supplements) in the centre over the last couple of years. With the support of great partners such as the IDA, we can face business and consumer needs and we look forward to successfully delivering on ambitious strategic research and development plans over the coming years.” As well as state support, the skilled labour pool here is helping to propel the organisation forward. “The talent pool in Ireland is a contributing factor to the success of the Irish operation. Most of the staff are highly qualified scientific professionals and we continue to source high-calibre talent for the operation. It’s very much a symbiotic relationship: we get the benefit of some really talented performers and in return we offer people great opportunities within the company to develop and grow their careers in an exciting and dynamic environment.”

ABOVE: Liz Archer, Katherine Challacombe and Sonia Jakob, all Ori-Derm panellists recognised for their 10 years participation

Wa n t t o know more? Log on to ori-derm.ie

“The talent pool in Ireland is a contributing factor to the success of the Irish operation.” IDAIRELAND.COM

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29/07/2019 08:40

CELEBRATE Anniversary

LEFT: Supporting COPE Galway BELOW LEFT: The company’s core values

“Our Galway office provides leadership across our global offices.”

CSG Celebrating 25 years in Dangan, county Galway Situated a scenic 15 minutes from Galway city is CSG, a leading provider of revenue management and digital monetisation, payments and customer engagement solutions. The company has been in operation for over 35 years with locations across 120 countries, and this year, the Galway office celebrates its 25th year. The Irish arm was founded as Saville Systems in 1994 with five employees, and by 1996 had grown to 70 staff members. In 1999, it was acquired by ADC Telecommunications, 2004 saw it acquired by Intec Telecom Systems, and in 2010, it joined the CSG International organisation. According to Michael McKnight, Vice-President, Global Services EMEA, CSG helps its customers to reduce churn and operating expenses, rapidly launch new digital services and enter new markets. “Our end-to-end solutions are customisable and adapt quickly as new business models and opportunities emerge. With CSG, providers can quickly launch the innovative wireless services that customers demand and use real-time charging, dynamic account selection options and blended service propositions to win over new subscribers.” Leading telecommunication mobile operators rely on CSG solutions to deploy innovative subscriber tariff structures, convergent prepay and postpay options, and enhanced revenue assurance processes. CSG’s wireless solutions help hundreds of service providers worldwide to automate processes, consolidate multiple systems, enhance revenue and realise operational efficiency. “We support some of the world’s leading brands to deliver exceptional customer experiences and handle high volumes of transactions, including processing more than 600 million real-time charging transactions daily for a leading Asian operator, supporting over 250 million subscribers worldwide and processing more than one billion transactions monthly, and enabling the top ten telecom clients to process over 48 billion charging data records per day.” The Galway office has been an integral part of the global operations and McKnight is keen to highlight particular skills in the revenue management systems. “The Galway team includes approximately 75 employees as part of CSG’s nearly 4,000 employees worldwide, with roles in sales, services, software development and finance, and has participated in major implementations, and support business transformation for our customers throughout the globe in multiple industries ranging from telecoms, insurance, transport and logistics.” He continues: “Ireland offers a unique talent pool in terms of technical and business knowledge, experience and youth which enables our Galway office to provide leadership across our global offices and customer marketplace.” With 25 years under its belt, the office is firmly embedded in the Wa n t t o locality and, living the company’s core value of Be a Good Person, the CSG know more? Galway team has supported several community projects with Galway Autism Log on to Partnership, Brothers of Charity, St. Vincent De Paul and COPE Galway. csgi.com

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23/07/2019 14:46

PROFILE The Leader

The Leader Susan Hynes V P & S I T E L E A D , TA K E D A DUNBOYNE BIOLOGICS

Taked a is a le a d in g g lo b a l biopharmaceu tic a l c o mp a n y lo c a ted in over 8 0 countries; th r ee of its ma n u factu r in g facilities are locate d in Ir elan d .

“With a $600m investment in Dunboyne we are focused on delivering increased value for patients.” How have the Irish operations helped to position Takeda as a global leader? Takeda has been in Ireland since 1997 and has grown significantly, most recently with the acquisition of Shire. The Irish operations support all four key therapeutic areas for the company through manufacturing, commercial and corporate service operations. The three manufacturing plants in Ireland span small molecules, biologics and cell therapy. This diversity in manufacturing platforms demonstrates the confidence that Takeda has in the Irish operations and the depth and breadth of capabilities of the talent in Ireland. How will the new facility help Takeda to lead in the rare disease space? Takeda’s new state-of-the-art biologics manufacturing facility is being built in Dunboyne, county Meath. When operational in 2020, it will specialise in the manufacture of treatments for patients with rare diseases. There are over 7,000 rare diseases in the world today, only five per cent of those diseases have a treatment. With a $600m investment in Dunboyne, we have focused on ways in which we can

deliver increased value for patients. Using single-use technology in our manufacturing operations enables flexibility to meet the needs of our patients by reducing our changeover times and enables reconfiguration of the facility for the future pipeline. It also has the additional benefit of lowering our carbon footprint, something we passionately believe in at Takeda. By investing in digital, we can ensure that our employees spend less time gathering information and conducting non-value added activities, ensuring we can focus on the higher value activities for our patients. For example, rather than our preventative maintenance programme being time-based we can, through an integrated digital platform, enable the maintenance programme to be predictive and based on information fed back directly from the equipment. What are the disruptors facing your industry? One of the most important disruptors for our industry is technology. The opportunity we have is to use technology to accelerate the discovery of new treatments, reduce the time to launch new products, and to provide earlier diagnosis. One of the initiatives that Takeda is working on in collaboration with Microsoft and EURODIS Rare Diseases Europe is focused on ending the diagnostic odyssey for children with rare diseases. The majority of the 7,000 rare diseases begin in childhood and over 40 per cent of patients can be misdiagnosed at least once. Three pilots are currently underway as part of this collaboration, enabled

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PRESENCE IN A P P R O X I M AT E LY

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30 1997 120 acres O P E R AT I N G I N I R E L A N D SINCE

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by technology. The first programme uses machine learning to identify symptom patterns, the second employs technology collaboration tools for ‘intelligent triage’ and genetic consultation, and the third project is working to develop a secure rare disease patient registry. Is the world-leading talent you are looking for in Ireland? Absolutely. We have a large cluster of biologics manufacturers in Ireland, a strong third-level education system and partnerships through institutions such as NIBRT, which all help to build the right talent so that Ireland can compete globally. At Takeda Dunboyne Biologics, we have already hired over 150 employees who, through their agility, flexibility and passion for learning are committed to delivering for our patients. As a highly innovated and integrated facility, we have an ambition to be a workplace of the future and I am confident that with the talent we are building, this will become a reality. takeda.com IDAIRELAND.COM

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23/07/2019 10:34

LEADING

Jaguar I-Pace

Connected Cars

IDAIRELAND.COM

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23/07/2019 10:42

LEADING Connected Cars

Driving Forward A strong proof point of technology companies and an environment of collaboration has created an ecosystem of organisations in Ireland determined to lead the way in connected and autonomous vehicles. WORDS BY Ta ra C o rri st i n e

The race to succeed, to be the first, can create an environment of secrecy and competition. This isn’t the case in the connected and autonomous vehicles sector, where a climate of collaboration and partnership has emerged across the Shannon region. A hub of global excellence for software engineering architecture and development, one of the newest arrivals is Jaguar Land Rover. John Cormican is General Manager of the company’s new software engineering centre that is developing technologies to support electrification and selfdriving features on future Jaguar and Land Rover vehicles.

“We started the operation in May 2017 and are in the process of constructing a brand new campus beside Shannon airport. Our 55,000 sq. ft. office block, overlooking the runway and Shannon estuary, will be ready in June 2019, and our garage is probably one of the most advanced R&D workshops in the country.” The ‘garage’ is 33,000 sq. ft. with 25 vehicle bays, each measuring 1,000 sq. ft. allowing plenty of room to integrate and test software and features. It wasn’t the space or the views that attracted JLR but rather the array of companies operating in this sector located in the Shannon region. “If you look at the Limerick, Clare, Galway region, there’s already a very strong proof point of technology companies and foreign direct investment; Intel, Lufthansa, Uber, Analog Devices, Cisco, Ericsson. It’s one of the reasons why JLR set up the operation here in the first place.” Connecting and collaborating with these companies is a means to a shared end, says Cormican. “We are at the centre of the world when it comes to autonomous driving because we are the vehicle, everyone can relate to the vehicle driving down the road by itself. But in order for that to happen, we need sensors, like cameras, lidars, radars: we don’t build those so we need to work with companies like Analog Devices in Limerick. We don’t do end-to-end connectivity solutions, that would be someone like Cisco, who we’re working with as well.” These strategic partnerships have been facilitated by a steering group called CAV Ireland (connected and autonomous vehicles) that brings together the key stakeholders in industry, academia and research, transport authorities and support agencies to bolster Ireland’s position in this sector. “To build the entire solution you need software, sensors, algorithm development, machine learning experts, data centres and that all comes from different players and there’s a huge supply chain involved here, besides just the car manufacturer. Harnessing the power of all of those as a collective is very interesting and is what makes Ireland a very attractive place to locate because we have access and collaborations and strategic partnerships with the many different technology companies who are here already.” One such partner company is Valeo, a world leader in autonomous sensing technology for the connected and autonomous vehicle with a base in Tuam, county Galway. “Tuam is the global headquarters for Valeo’s camera sensing technology and vision camera,” says Vision Systems Vice President, Fergus Moyles. “Half of the 1,000 people employed here are in R&D, and there is an equivalent figure in eight other sites globally and we manage that global footprint from here in Tuam. We also have “If you camera manufacturing here and we manage look at the the global manufacturing footprint of four other Limerick, manufacturing sites for our camera technology.” Clare, Valeo first established a presence in Ireland Galway when it acquired an Irish company, region, Connaught Electronics, that had developed there’s a product that became the standard in the already a automotive industry for a multi-camera very strong systems. “Valeo was moving forward in its proof sensor technology offering and it was point of interested in what we had achieved and technology acquired us in 2007. Valeo came to Ireland companies.” for the combination of technology and people.” IDAIRELAND.COM

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23/07/2019 10:42

LEADING Connected Cars

The company’s technology continues to attract people, says Moyles, with Ireland offering rich talent pickings. “Over 50 per cent of our people are Irish and the remainder come from 32 other countries. There are excellent skills here when it comes to software development, and we’ve been very successful in attracting people into the country. Autonomous driving is very interesting to engineers and to work on the features pushing towards that is very attractive for these innovative minds. We are working with all the major global automotive companies.” JLR already has its eye on the next generation of software developers and Shannon’s proximity to universities and technical colleges in Cork, Limerick and Galway was another plus point for the region. “We are developing close relationships with the likes of UL, Limerick Institute of Technology, NUI Galway, GMIT, UCC and we’ve also been up to Trinity, UCD, DCU and Queens in Belfast,” says Cormican. “We not just going up to hire the graduates, we are differentiating ourselves by collaborating on final year projects, doing guest lectures, bringing our vehicles on campus. We have undergradute programmes: we took on 18 last year and are going to hire 11 of them as full-time employees. We’re brand new and we want to get the word out that JLR is here to hire the best software engineers, machine learning experts, the best in cyber security, in AI, in functional safety, virtualisation and cloud services – different areas of technology that perhaps you wouldn’t have associated with JLR in the past.” While companies like Valeo and JLR are making significant strides towards electric and autonomous vehicles, preparing our cities and towns, motorways and roads for this new ‘mobility’ needs to happen in tandem, and according to Cormican, the will and the support from the relevant authorities is there. “We might design and build the best technology solution in the world but it has to be authorised by the relevant government and legislative 22

bodies,” says Cormican. “We are a pretty small country so one of the advantages is access to senior people in the Department of Transport or the Department of Business, Enterprise and Innovation is quite straightforward. We are working with a lot of different government departments, whether its the Road Safety Authority, Transport Infrastructure Ireland and the different county councils. It’s about bringing all those parties together because they are all key stakeholders in this situation. I think everyone knows this new mobility wave is coming and “There are we have to be ready for it.” excellent And progress is well underway skills here according to John Davis, Chairperson when it of Intelligent Transport Systems Ireland. comes to “One of the sub-groups that came out software of the CAV Ireland forum was a testbed development, working group. This was led by JLR and and we’ve looked at what was needed to facilitate been very or enable the establishment of a testbed successful in Ireland.” The test bed, located in in attracting Shannon, is currently at the early stage people into of development. the country.” The second focal point was testing autonomous vehicles on public roads,

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LEADING Connected Cars

What is CAV Ireland? CAV Ireland, an initiative of IDA Ireland, Enterprise Ireland and Science Foundation Ireland, is a steering group and alongside these core members are the Intelligent Transport Systems Ireland; Lero, the Irish software research centre, and the Insight Centre for Data Analytics, with the Department of Transport in an observational capacity.

LEFT TO RIGHT: Park4U, the new generation automatic parking system from Valeo; Jaguar Land Rover software engineering centre; the Jaguar I-Pace

something Moyles says all parties are keen to progress. “That we can develop a test area in the west of Ireland for autonomous vehicles, on the motorway between Tuam and Limerick, is something we want to see happen. This network of companies, this CAV initiative, the Department of Transport are all very interested in this.” Regulation is being addressed too, with the Department of Transport working on guidelines for testing autonomous vehicles on public roads. The minister for the department, Shane Ross said: “We are working with industry shareholders, other Government departments and state agencies to develop guidelines. These will be supported by a National

Connected and Autonomous Vehicle roadmap and plan as well as a national strategy for Intelligent Transport Systems generally. Public confidence in autonomous vehicles must be fostered.” The opportunity – both in terms of revenue streams and social impact – is simply to big to ignore, Cormican points out. “Children growing up now may never have to learn to drive if they don’t want to, that’s the reality. If we decide to do nothing as a country and take a passive role, it will come anyway – either through the EU or vehicles being sold here with features that we have to legislate for – so we need to step up and make sure that as a country, we understand where this is going and get ready for it. That’s why there is strong support from the government to make sure that Ireland is positioned well to adopt this technology when it’s available. We have so many technology players in this country, there is no reason we can’t take a leadership position and that’s exactly what we are trying to do.” IDAIRELAND.COM

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23/07/2019 10:43

INNOVATING Zalando

In an era of fast fashion, data can make all the difference. We speak to Sean Mullaney, VP of Information at online fashion giant Zalando, about the learnings from their Fashion Insights Centre in Dublin and how theyâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;re applying them.

Runway Report

WORDS BY

Ta ra C o rri st i n e

IDAIRELAND.COM

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INNOVATING Zalando

A L A N D O ’ S FA S H I O N I N S I G H TS C E N T R E I N D U B L I N WA S S E T U P FOUR YEARS AGO AND IS THE FIRM’S FIRST OFFICE OUTSIDE G E R M A N Y . T H E R E A R E T W O T E A M S I N O P E R AT I O N : O N E G R O U P I S F O C U S E D O N D ATA S C I E N C E , U N D E R S TA N D I N G T H E I R P R O D U C T S A N D C U S TO M E R S U S I N G M A C H I N E L E A R N I N G A N D A I , A N D T H E S E C O N D T E A M I S B U I L D I N G A S C A L A B L E W O R L D - C L A S S D ATA I N F R A S T R U CT U R E A B L E TO C A P T U R E A L L O F T H E K N O W L E D G E O F T H E C O M PA N Y ’ S P R O D U CTS A N D C U S TO M E R S , A N D M A K I N G I T AVA I L A B L E TO T H E M A C H I N E L E A R N I N G T E A M S I N R E A L T I M E .

Zalando is a technology company at heart and the Fashion Insights Centre was set up to tap into the talent that the Irish engineering and data science market has, according to VP of Information, Sean Mullaney. The company invested early on in data science and machine learning which has delivered deep insights into their products and customers, enabling them to create a marketplace with a huge choice of stock while still creating a personal experience for shoppers. With 400,000 items on sale at any one time, is personalisation a key aspect of your strategy? It’s certainly an important part. If we were a high street retailer and we had a store that had 400,000 different items, and all the sizes and colours and variations, the store would be the size of the Aviva Stadium. As a consumer, you’d be overwhelmed. We have to understand everything about these 400,000 products and we use machine learning to extract all sorts of attributes: the fit, the size, the fabric, the cut, the length. We onboard about 10,000 new products a week and we use a lot of computer vision. Then we try to understand what customers like, their preferences, what brands they are into, what price point they shop at, what styles they like, and we can reduce that store and create a personal shopping experience. When you are on our site, it feels like the whole store was designed for you. We have a brand follow feature where you can chose the brands you like and we can tailor the shop to be more geared towards those brands. Then there are aspects we can observe: as you are shopping and adding to your wish list, we can tell that you like things in this colour, price point or style and we can tailor the experience even further. We try to understand as much about the customer in terms of what they end up buying and keeping. What other data are you looking at beyond the product and customer? Fashion is very local, not only in terms of styles and trends, but also on a day-to-day and week-by-week basis. It could be weather or a public holiday or a festival, and the weekend before, sales of wellies or T-shirts goes up. It’s impossible for the company to know what’s going on everywhere at a local level, we are in 17 different markets. Instead, we look

at local trends and are very quick to adapt our popularity weighting that we understand from every single product in the store. If you can imagine, customers browsing the store on a given day are going to click to buy and collect different items, depending on what the local demand is, and we can pick up on that very fast and start to promote and adapt our search and catalogue pages. How are the concerns of sustainability and transparency affecting your business? There is a new generation of consumers for whom sustainability, climate and other ethical considerations about their clothes is a really key factor. We are investing heavily to lead in this space. One of the exciting products we launched recently in Germany is Zalando Wardrobe where you can sell your clothes back to Zalando and receive credit in our store, and we can reuse and resell those clothes so they aren’t disposed of. It’s a growing issue for people to ensure that the companies that are using their data are doing so in a way that benefits them and that they can be in control of it. Coming off the back of GDPR, we want to take it one step further and have customers be in control of what data we have on them. We only mine data that’s right to provide this great service and explain why we are recommending certain items of clothes to you. If you walked into a retail store and spoke to a human and asked them to recommend something, they would probably explain why they think something is right for you. When you can explain to someone why you are making a recommendation, why the knowledge AT A G L A N C E : they have about you has led them to this recommendation, people trust it €5.4b net sales in 2018 more often. And it gives people the opportunity to correct it and create a 300m visits to the website dialogue to figure out what the per month customer really likes. 27m active customers You want to go to a site where things are really tailored to you but you also 15,500 employees want to be inspired. We are here to 2,000 brands introduce them to new things that are adjacent to what they like today and 17 markets give them the confidence to explore fashion, not just what they buy today but also what they want in the future. We have a service called Zalon, a personal styling service with human stylists offering products tailored to the customer based on what they tell them. That service has been IDAIRELAND.COM

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INNOVATING Zalando

LEFT AND ABOVE: The Fashion Insights Centre, Dublin

very successful and all of the data that we get helps us to improve our machine learning algorithms because we have humans who are making these recommendations. Is this an example of machine learning working in tandem with human experience? Robots can’t personally make recommendations to 27 million people every week in real time, we are always going to need to learn from humans. One human’s insights and help could affect hundreds of thousands of customers rather than helping one at a time, and being able to scale human capability and insights, rather than replacing it, is a really interesting way to look at it. I think in the future we are going to see a world where humans are there to do what they are best at and to help specific types of customers. Why did Zalando choose Ireland as its location for the Fashion Insights Centre? Putting your product development, engineering and R&D in Ireland is a fantastic opportunity. When I was at Google, we talked a lot about diversity creating better products, and when everyone thinks the same way you don’t get a lot of innovation. If you are running a global business and creating products for a global market you need diversity in engineering, innovation and R&D, and you need to put some of that product innovation in the markets that you are serving. There are a lot of companies that try to centralise product development and engineering in one place and I think that’s a risk. Zalando made a long-term investment. We’re still growing and what also helps is that the Irish engineering and data science market is growing, so there is a deep well of talent in Ireland that we can tap in to. 26

IDA Ireland was critical in helping to guide us through the whole process and even today, they are so hands-on in helping to make Zalando successful. The things that really stand out for me in terms of what Ireland has to offer is an English-speaking European capital city, which helps to attract talent from across Europe and abroad. In terms of indigenous talent, Ireland is a really young country. I think we are one of the youngest in terms of percentage under 40 in Europe. It has a fantastic education system, right the way through from junior school to the university system, and there are some truly exceptional computer science and data science programmes and PhDs in Trinity, UCD and TU Dublin. There is a lot of talent coming out of the education system here. I married a wonderful Irish girl and we lived in California for three years and it really brought home to us what’s important and, with three young kids, where we want them to grow up. Having the educational opportunities in Ireland, plus the community and the culture and quality of life were really important. I spent 20 years in London, I lived in San Francisco and Dublin won on all those aspects. I know so many people in our office who, maybe a “There are a lot decade ago, would have looked to of companies move to London, New York or Silicon that try to Valley to pursue career opportunities centralise and are now really happy they are product able to do it in Ireland. Plus, a lot of development people from outside of Ireland who and engineering moved here for their career, found in one place and the education and culture is so good I think that’s that they can’t see themselves a risk.” leaving Ireland. zalando.ie

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PROFILE The Innovator

AT A GLANCE

E S TA B L I S H E D I N

2000 11 14 2,400 190,000+ €2 mil ion €13 tril ion OFFICES WORLDWIDE

David Brosnan MANAGING DIRECTOR CLEARSTREAM GLOBAL SECURITY SERVICES IRELAND

Clear str ea m is an in te r n a tion al cen tr a l s ecurities dep o sito r y an d p ar t o f Deu tsch e Börs e Group , on e of th e wo r ld ’s la r g e st financial mar ket in fr a str u c tu r e p r ovid er s.

“The talent and attitude of our team is simply outstanding.”

What role does the Irish office play in your organisation? The Cork office is Clearstream’s largest operational centre for investment funds and complements fund servicing centres in Luxembourg, Prague and Singapore. In the last three years, the workforce has almost doubled to 480 employees. We are about to relocate to the regenerating Cork Docklands and we expect this move will facilitate even greater expansion. The operation plays a central role in enhancing client delivery and service, reducing complexities in institutional finance. The talent and attitude of our team is simply outstanding. We’re recognised internally as innovative and hard-working and our expertise is providing tangible client benefits and service enhancements across the company. The Cork operation, which has already grown its functions in risk and compliance, now plays a critical IT role in the organisation and plans to expand its capability in product development. We’re excited by the opportunities and potential to shape and contribute to our corporate vision and to further exploit blockchain technology, robotics and digitisation. What are the key opportunities for Clearstream in Ireland ? Ireland offers a highly skilled and welleducated talent pool. Our collaborative approach with the third level institutions

N AT I O N A L I T I E S I N T H E IRISH OFFICE

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ensures a strong pipeline of talent for the Deutsche Börse Group in Cork and within our other locations. After Brexit, Cork will become the second largest English-speaking city in the EU. On top of that, the high quality of life in Cork, coupled with career development opportunities, allows us to attract high calibre talent. How important is innovation in your organisation and sector? Deutsche Börse’s growth programme, Roadmap 2020, follows a three-pillar strategy: growth in existing businesses, growth through acquisitions, and growth by investments in new technologies, which hold great potential for the financial industry. We see four transformational technologies that will be key for future innovation: cloud, big data and analytics, robotics and artificial intelligence, and distributed ledger/ blockchain technology. Deutsche Börse and Microsoft have just reached a significant milestone for cloud adoption in the financial services industry. The strategic partnership is setting new contract standards in the EU financial services industry, allowing the launch of regulated workload on Microsoft cloud services in Europe and bringing innovation to mutual customers. Distributed ledger/blockchain technology is a key opportunity for the creation of new market structures and the enhancement of existing market structures. In March, Deutsche Börse Group, Swisscom and the fintech-start up Sygnum entered into a strategic partnership to jointly build out and grow a trusted and regulatory compliant financial market

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infrastructure for digital assets. This integrated ecosystem around digital assets will enable investors to tap into new asset classes and accommodate to future client needs. The core elements of the solution will include issuance, custody, access to liquidity, and banking services – all leveraging distributed ledger technology (DLT) in a regulatory compliant environment. What does the future hold for the Irish arm of the business? Cork is Clearstream’s IFS Operations hub and a centre for IT excellence. We’ve grown – and expect to continue to grow – IT functions outside of the investment funds space in Cork, such as Clearing and Risk IT (StatistiX team) and Corporate IT (SAP Ops). Both teams are heavily involved in migrating their platforms to the latest technology and to the cloud. clearstream.com IDAIRELAND.COM

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TRANSFORMING Advanced Manufacturing

CGI of the proposed Advanced Manufacturing Centre

Smart Move

WORDS BY Ta ra C o rri st i n e

Supporting smart manufacturing is vital to retaining Irelandâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s innovative edge. A new Advanced Manufacturing Centre aims to maintain our status as a global leader.

Michael Lohan Head of Life Sciences and Strategic Property at IDA Ireland

reland has become a global leader in the manufacture of high value, highly innovative products and services across a range of industry sectors such as bio-pharma, medtech, information communication technology, and engineering technologies. But with growth comes change and the fourth industrial revolution brings a convergence of new production and digital technologies, among them machine learning, artificial intelligence, data analytics, robotics/ automation and modeling/simulation. To ensure Ireland stays ahead of the curve, IDA Ireland, together with industry and research partners, is establishing the Advanced Manufacturing Centre, a collaborative environment focussed on the acceleration of core platform technologies to digitise Irelandâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s discrete manufacturing base and supply chain partners. Michael Lohan, Head of Life Sciences and Strategic Property at IDA Ireland, reveals the fundamentals of the facility.

â&#x20AC;&#x153;The National Advanced Manufacturing Centre (AMC) will be a collaborative area where companies can come and experience new technologies and adopt them into their own operation. Stretching over 32,000 sq. ft., the centre will be in the National Technology Park in Limerick, adjacent to the University of Limerick, and our objective is to be in construction by September, 2019 and operational in Q4 2020. It will be focused on discrete manufacturing sectors and our vision is to create a space where technology partners and providers can liaise and engage with industry players to define I4 implementation roadmaps, de-risk the associated access to trialling and adopting of disruptive technology platforms; provide peer companies with the capability for collaboration, and facilitate technical and skills training, all aimed at promoting adoption into their own organisation. The AMC will be a showcase and demonstrator of convergence between technology and discrete manufacturing in a

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TRANSFORMING

CGI of the proposed Advanced Manufacturing Centre

Advanced Manufacturing

CGI of the proposed centre

truly practical sense, complementing the existing ecosystem and offering strong adjacency to Ireland’s existing research ecosystem in I4, such as research centre, Confirm. The AMC will be the natural stepping stone for companies to pilot, test, scale, commercialise and deploy solutions close to market in a low-risk environment that doesn’t impact daily operations. We are currently embarking on an open-call process for technology partners and our ambition is to have leaders in innovation and digitalisation as anchor partners in the centre. There are a number of key technology platforms that the centre will embrace including automation, systems integration, data analytics, cybersecurity, the industrial Internet of things (IIoT), AI and AR, and cyber-physical systems. The disruption facing the discrete industry sector is digitalisation. Data is the next wave that is coming – layering in artificial intelligence, data mining and utilisation. These elements are converging so quickly in the manufacturing sector, it can be overwhelming to define the roadmap forward, and these are the challenges leaders are grappling with inside their organisations. The goal of this centre is to provide Ireland’s discrete manufacturing sector, both indigenous and multinational, with the opportunity to move forward through embracing and de-risking technology adoption, while developing the future skills and competencies.”

Dr Sinéad Keogh Director of Medtech and Engineering sectors, Ibec

“Manufacturing technology is advancing at an incredible pace, such that it is almost impossible for companies to stay ahead of the curve from a technological investment perspective. It is often too risky or resource intensive for individual companies to invest in the latest technologies alone, and with 80 per cent of medtech companies in Ireland being either SMEs or start-ups, the only solution is accessing these supports externally. Having a dedicated advanced discrete manufacturing centre will ensure companies are not left behind and can continue to compete globally. To continue to be successful, Ireland must have the right talent in place and continue to focus on talent development. Cutting edge technology is changing rapidly and businesses in competing economies are experiencing significant productivity gains from new technologies like 3D printing, collaborative robots, data analytics and the Internet of Things. An advanced manufacturing centre with the most innovative technologies will provide an excellent training ground for the continuous professional development of current and future manufacturing professionals. This will support more established and formal models of training such as apprenticeships in a demonstrator environment. Product innovation and time-to-market reduction are top competitive drivers. The AMC would support market-focused research and innovation capabilities.” IDAIRELAND.COM

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TRANSFORMING Advanced Manufacturing

Vivian Farrell Chief Executive Officer at Modular Automation

“We provide leading automation solutions for some of the largest multinational medical device manufacturers in Ireland such as Stryker, DePuy Synthes, Boston Scientific, Johnson & Johnson Vision and their sister sites around the globe. Investment in this centre is a positive and necessary move that will ensure manufacturing in Ireland continues to thrive and remain innovative and competitive. Manufacturers in Ireland compete globally, we’ve done extremely well to attract and retain multinational manufacturing. The success of manufacturing in Ireland is based on having a superb talent pool, and investment in the AMC will help to grow this necessary pool of researchers and engineers in Ireland. Industrial automation is moving quickly and is very much technology-led. It’s critical that we stay ahead and become expert on enabling technologies that will help manufacturers do things better, quicker and safer. The AMC will provide that collaborative space where all involved in manufacturing in Ireland can share learnings, get exposure to the latest thinking and also support with evaluating and testing the latest enabling technologies. This is particularly important in the context of Industry 4.0 and delivering flexible manufacturing, in terms of leveraging data and testing the latest manufacturing technologies such as AI, collaborative robotics and industrial autonomous vehicles. Leveraging these technologies will be critical in strengthening manufacturing in Ireland so we become best in class. Our customers in Ireland are competing globally to win new business and grow their footprint here: for example, if there’s a new medical device product launch, the best site will win the manufacture of the product. It’s by doing things smarter that will enable the existing manufacturers in Ireland to win new business for Ireland Inc.” 30

CGI of the proposed centre

Professor Conor McCarthy Confirm Centre Director and Principal Investigator

“The Confirm Centre is Science Foundation Ireland’s research centre for smart manufacturing and is predominantly about developing new ideas and technologies in the area of cyber-physical manufacturing systems and demonstrating them on test beds. We have nine research-performing organisations and have the ability to bring together different expertise from around the country to work on a specific project with industry, expertise such as sensing and sensors, modelling and AI, software and cyber security, data analytics for manufacturing and other key enabling technologies related to smart manufacturing and Industry 4.0. I could see Confirm working very closely when our technologies are starting to mature, in that we would pass them on to the AMC for pre-production pilots on certain activities. On a human capital level, I can see the Confirm Centre providing the people and training and the fundamental research base that will be needed to drive the digital engines in future factories. In terms of our partnership, I see Confirm as a research centre and the AMC as a development centre: one is about new knowledge, and the other is about tailoring current technology for specific applications and development. There is a real need to bring in this development phase with short turnaround on projects, but with a strong fundamental science and engineering base so that Ireland can be at the forefront. We want to build a community of practice that brings together the academic community, industry, the key decision makers in government and the community to develop technologies and lead in the world of smart manufacturing. You need to come together, you can’t do this alone, it’s too large and too complex, but Ireland as a nation has the talent and infrastructure to deliver and lead in digital manufacturing, especially in highly regulated manufacturing environments, where we are considered world class. Indeed, the convergence of ICT and manufacturing are critical to the competitiveness and sustainability of our manufacturing base.”

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PROFILE The Transformer

AT A L G ANCE

Elaine Murphy GENERAL MANAGER, EMEA, LIVETILES

Liv eTiles is a g lob al so f twa r e company that emp owe r s its u se r s to create their own in tellig en t workplace e xp er ien ces.

E S TA B L I S H E D I N

2018

ENTERPRISE CUSTOMERS WORLDWIDE

900 300%

A R R G R O W T H I N 2 018

“We have been able to develop wonderful synergies with other tech companies in the region.”

How is LiveTiles transforming the workplace? LiveTiles makes the complexities that we face in our day-to-day working environment much simpler by introducing innovative software. We combine artificial intelligence and analytics with a user-friendly interface that allows workers to surface the content, data and tools they require in a smart fashion that boosts productivity. We are on a mission to reshape the way people interact with technology and our intelligent intranet software helps professionals and educators invest their time in high-value activities and get the most out of their digital investments. How will Hopper transform the workload of SMEs? Hopper is an exciting product developed by our Sligo-based development team. Essentially, we are using artificial intelligence and machine learning to take the pain out of setting up meetings and saving as much as four hours per week on tasks that can be easily automated. Hopper goes to market in June 2019 and will be a unique proposition, especially for businesses that work with global teams in different locations.

How important is the Irish office and workforce to LiveTiles global operation and strategy? Sligo is evolving into the hub for all European operations including a centre of excellence for onboarding new talent from across the region and integrating new teams from recent acquisitions. We are one of the only integrated services locations where our development, marketing and sales work side-by-side. Culturally, the Sligo operation is also a great fit globally. We are passionate at LiveTiles about work-life balance and where better to make that happen than in the no-commute, coastal town of Sligo. What are the key opportunities for LiveTiles in Ireland? Being based in the north-west means that we have been able to develop wonderful synergies with other tech companies in the region and are part of a truly collaborative ‘better together’ spirit where we feel every day that we are part of building something important and lasting. What are the disruptors facing your industry? At LiveTiles we believe that we need to disrupt or get disrupted. Our vision is built around tech for good, but we prize the need to be agile and collaborative. We are shaping the future of work and productivity, but also shaping the future of wellness and happiness at work. Work is a central part of our lives and it doesn’t have to suck. That is what we want to disrupt and overturn.

How has Ireland changed as a place to work and grow a business? I think we have a fantastic work culture in Ireland that strengthens the organisational culture of multinationals and FDI companies. The range and quality of talent is also a massive plus; this allows a company with its sights on growth to be able to plan, assured that the talent will be developed and available to take their vision forward. What is next for LiveTiles in Ireland? We aim to establish a state-of-theart sales facility covering the EMEA region and to continue developing cutting edge technologies that release people from rudimentary and mundane tasks. We firmly believe that the world is a better place when people are freed up to do their best work and we intend to make this happen. livetiles.nyc

awards 2018 Microsoft US Partner of the Year Award for Modern Workplace Transformation 2018 AIconics award for Best Application of AI in the Enterprise

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EVOLVING Employment

THE FUTURE OF WORK WORDS BY Barry Winkless

From the gig economy to globalisation, AI to automation, the way we work is changing and organisations need to adjust and adapt, explains Barry Winkless of The Cpl Future of Work Institute.

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EVOLVING Employment

MUCH HAS BEEN WRITTEN ABOUT THE FUTURE O F W O R K . S O M E S AY W E A R E L I V I N G T H E F U T U R E O F W O R K T O D AY, O T H E R S T E L L U S I T ’ S C O M I N G S O O N T O A N O R G A N I S AT I O N N E A R Y O U . The reality lies somewhere in between: a hybrid state, with many organisations straddling the effective practices of the past and the experimental approaches of the future. In this hybrid world of work, it would be easy for organisations to stick with what they know. This would be a mistake. There is no doubt that things are changing rapidly. Technology disruption, climate crisis, globalisation, and demography are some of the driving forces behind this change. McKinsey (2015) estimated that automation could replace 45 per cent of activities currently undertaken by humans, but only five per cent of full jobs could be totally substituted by technology. The rise of the platform, gig or sharing economy is expected to contribute to the continuous growth in self-employment and contingent work. Flexible working arrangements are growing and flexible work is rising in “It is more developed economies and making inroads important among middle-class occupations in than ever for emerging economies. As an example, in organisations to the UK the solo self-employed now adopt an open, constitute 14 per cent of the workforce curious and (this represents a 34 per cent increase experimental between 2008 and 2017). In the US, the mindset.” gig economy is booming. One could also argue there is a shifting zeitgeist in our younger generations about how we think about society and how we can best create a sustainable economy that works for all. In a 2018 Gallup poll, Americans aged 18 to 29 stated they were as positive about socialism (51 per cent) as they were about capitalism (45 per cent). This represents a 12-point decline in young adults’ positive views of capitalism in just the past two years and a marked shift since 2010, when 68 per cent viewed it positively. It’s therefore more important than ever for organisations to adopt an open, curious and experimental mindset. Trying new modes of flexibility, disruptive technologies, designed experiences, alternative operating models and inclusive management philosophies – knowing full well that some will lead to success and some to failure – might just be the key to taking a step in the right direction.

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EVOLVING Employment

So how can organisations thrive in this changing landscape and what can they do about how they work to create sustainable success? Fundamentally, I believe they need to embrace three major modes: sociocentricity, smartness, and creativity. Sociocentricity Much of the commentary about the workplace calls out a human-centred future. While this may be a simplified version of the underlying truth, what is true is that organisations must become highly sociocentric, viewing their organisation as the centre of a living network, recognising the power of hyper collaboration, adopting a worknet perspective as opposed to a workforce one. It’s a total system view that begins to understand the role an organisation plays in society and beyond. Many organisations today think too much about their workforce through the lens of permanency and contract employees. In reality, we are moving towards a socially diverse employment workforce model – a worknet – comprising of permanent employees, contractors, temporary staff, gig workers, SoW workers, consultants, contributors, ambassadors, co-partnerships and beyond. These new network models of work pose significant opportunity but also significant threat in terms of managing network complexity. Strategic workforce planning will need to be able to fully embrace these new realities. As part of the sociocentricity mode, we will see even further efforts made to ensure organisations are ‘net positive’ from a sustainability perspective. We can already see how organisations like Ikea place sustainability at the core of their business model. In the words of former Unilever CEO Paul Polman, “We are entering a very interesting period of history where the responsible business world is running ahead of the politicians,” and taking on a broader role to ‘serve society.’ Smartness Smart technology has massively disrupted the world of work. In our own business we are exploring how to best harness data, new tools of analysis and insight like AI and ML, and immersive technologies through focused experiments and pilot studies. According to Kevin Sweeney, Cpl Director and Talent Technology lead, “By embracing artificial intelligence, we can deliver better outcomes for our candidates, clients, and the business. It’s transforming how we think and informing how we act.” Ultimately, we will see (and are already seeing) an exponential growth in harnessing solutions that will result in a smarter, more informed employee, using democratised 34

tools that are friction-free and immediate at the point of use. It would be wrong to view ‘smart’ just through the lens of technology. It also means designing and embracing new work practices that create more efficiency and effectiveness. The rise of design thinking in organisations is well documented, with a growing body of impact – both good and bad. The focus is definitively shifting towards properly designed employee experiences as a mechanism to properly engage and motivate employees in an increasingly competitive and global landscape. We will see further developments in this space with a renewed emphasis on highlighting the uniqueness of an organisation’s purpose and experience as a means to attract and retain talent. We will see more and more use of agile methodologies, and new work organisation models. For example, in Spotify, teams have started to experiment with a scaling model that uses Squads, Chapters, Guilds and Tribes who aim to implement ‘minimum viable bureaucracy’ and balance high autonomy with high alignment. Creativity The Future of Jobs (2018) report published by the World Economic Forum examined employment, skills and workforce strategy for the future. The report asked chief human resources and strategy officers from leading global employers what the current shifts mean, specifically for employment, skills and recruitment across industries and geographies. Complex problem solving, analytical and critical thinking and creativity were highlighted as the top three skills for 2022 and beyond. Given that problem-solving and critical thinking are part of and essential to creativity, I would view the higher-level competency as creativity. “Complex There is a growing body of research that problem solving, suggests increased diversity in business can analytical drive greater levels of creativity. In one study and critical assessing board diversity focused on a thinking and sample of 385 Norwegian companies, results creativity were provided strong support for the notion that highlighted as the higher the level of board diversity with the top three respect to the board members’ backgrounds skills for 2022 and personalities, the higher the degree of and beyond.” board creativity and cognitive conflict during the decision-making process. Interestingly, the study supported the increasing importance of going beyond ‘surface level diversity,’ for example, diversity in terms of gender, and investigating characteristics that are less visible and that are labelled ‘deep-level’ diversity attributes to drive a more creative workplace. Deep-level diversity however will not be enough: inclusion and engagement must also play their part. This means implementing practices that ensure strong participation and collaboration both within and beyond the organisation. In many instances an organisation, even large ones with significant resources, can no longer be creative ‘on their own’. We will see an even greater emphasis on

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EVOLVING Employment

inter-organisational collaboration. For example, as Ford increased its research and development in hybrid and electric drivetrains, it saw an opportunity for customers to live more electrified lifestyles overall. Together with Infineon, SunPower, Whirlpool, and Eaton, Ford have developed the MyEnergi Lifestyle programme that explores ways in which hybrid electric vehicles, solar power systems, energy-efficient appliances, and home design can be integrated to reduce the total carbon footprint. Creativity squarely places emphasis on constant skills renewal and an inclusive approach to coaching and development. “On one hand, Inclusive coaching will mean coaching that organisations is both forward, backward, inside and outside. are seeking For example, older employees will be coached engaged by younger employees in new digital and highly capabilities, but equally those younger committed employees will be coached by older employees, employees in other skills attained through and on the hands-on experience. Equally, employees will other hand we be coached not just by those inside the are seeing a organisation but by those in other massive shift organisations and institutions. We will also toward selfsee an increasing shift towards new ways of employment learning. For example, The Real Play Coalition and greater — made up of Ikea, the Lego Foundation, worker National Geographic and Unilever — is autonomy.” creating a movement towards building a wide range of skills through play. Digital learning platforms like Coursera will be further embraced by organisations in a world where accelerated skill renewal is now a priority. Contradictory Probably the most important thing to highlight about the future of work is the seemingly contradictory nature of it. On one hand, organisations are seeking engaged and highly committed employees, and on the other hand we are seeing a massive shift toward selfemployment and greater worker autonomy. Organisations and commentators alike call out a ‘human-centred’ workplace future and yet the very technologies that are enabling this may indeed be the death of it. Even the very definition of what an ‘organisation’ and ‘employee’ is, is changing rapidly. As stated earlier, we have neither truly arrived at the future of work nor have we truly left our working past. We are somewhere in-between. This means as leaders we need to question, experiment and learn in order to try to design for the new contradictions of work.

Barry Winkless is Strategy and Innovation Director with Cpl, Ireland’s largest talent solutions company. He leads Cpl’s Future of Work Institute which explores, questions and helps design future work solutions with clients, partners, collaborators and candidates. He has more than 20 years extensive experience working with some of the world’s largest and most respected organisations across diverse sectors. cpl.ie

ABOVE: Barry Winkless

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ADAPTING

Jamie Cudden

WORDS BY

Smart in the City

Smart City

The wealth of technology companies in Dublin offers the city a unique opportunity to accelerate it’s trajectory to becoming a smarter city, and it’s one we can’t afford to waste, writes Jamie Cudden, Smart City Programme Manager for Dublin City Council. He shares the strategy behind an initiative set to do just that. 36

R It was through this initial work that we established the Smart Dublin initiative, where we collaborate across the four Dublin Local Authorities to jointly tackle the challenges that the city region faces. Some of our priority work areas include promoting sustainable mobility, optimising energy efficiency, how the city responds to extreme weather events and climate change, and how we deliver better services for citizens. An important strategic decision that followed was the establishment of our Smart Docklands district which we set up to deliver and fasttrack smart city projects and deployments and understand the different types of connectivity and networks that would enable future cities. This was established in partnership with

E W I N D B A C K TO 2 0 1 5 W H E N I WA S A S K E D BY THE CHIEF EXECUTIVE OF D U B L I N C I T Y C O U N C I L TO D E V E LO P A S M A R T C I T Y F R A M E W O R K T H AT C O U L D H E L P A C C E L E R AT E D E P LOY M E N TS A C R O S S THE CITY COUNCIL.

CONNECT, a national research centre for connectivity and future networks. Launched in February 2018, Smart Docklands was a first of its kind in Ireland, where the municipality and academia have created a dedicated Project Management Office (PMO) to play an independent role amongst multiple stakeholders, from global technology companies to local residents’ groups, from academic institutions to international property developers and from the municipality itself to innovative start-ups and SMEs. From a city council perspective, we aren’t the experts in connectivity and networks so being able to partner and co-fund roles with CONNECT was a game changer. At the same

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ADAPTING Smart City

An aerial view of the Dublin Docklands

time, I was working with a network of European cities, collaborating on how to share best practice for scaling out smart city solutions. A lot of things aligned at the right time. It made sense for us to pick a district where we could concentrate activities and move a bit quicker; we wanted to give companies faster access to infrastructure, city assets, share domain expertise and knowledge, get projects out into the public realm faster, and bring together key stakeholders like the technology companies, developers, building owners and resident groups to ensure that we were aligning the programme to their needs. In the Docklands, we saw the opportunity for Dublin City Council to bring that together in an independent way. The key to success is that we work alongside our City Council team who fast-track the strategic development of the Docklands district, put in the right infrastructure, plan framework, and the engagement: it was an obvious fit. Another catalyst was an IoT network led by Paddy Flynn, Director of Geo Data Operations at Google. He heard about the work we were doing and felt that there was overlap, so we brought it all together under the one umbrella, the Smart Docklands. Flynn put it best when he said, “There is already a fantastic entrepreneurial ecosystem in the city, as well as world-leading research and development facilities. With more collaboration between academia, city authorities and industry, Dublin can capitalise on this and encourage real innovation in the urban environment.” Google is just one of the companies based in the Docklands that has partnered to support the initiative along with others such as SoftBank, Dense Air, Bigbelly, Intel, Microsoft, IBM and Vodafone. The challenges we face in cities are very complex and we don’t have the necessary expertise within the administration, whether it’s big data specialists or cyber security experts, but Dublin is a tech

capital, with amazing talent, innovation teams, research centres and a great start-up scene: all of the ingredients to really innovate and look at how we can solve some of these problems and create new opportunities for cities. If we can do it in Dublin, we can scale that in cities around the world. With all of these international groups here in Dublin’s Docklands, we have massive potential. Accenture, for example, has its global IoT connected building showcase on our doorstep, Deloitte has its EMEA blockchain lab here. ConsenSys, a massive player in blockchain, is moving in beside Google. Google is expanding, Salesforce is coming in. Cities are competing with each other for talent and jobs and if you are not ahead of the curve, you could be left behind, and that’s a vulnerable situation. With disruptive technology, all of a sudden, new opportunities can emerge, however if they are not managed DID YOU KNOW? properly, cities may not realise the full benefits. For example a thousand electric scooters can arrive on your city streets Dublin recently and the question arises: how do we manage this in a way that ranked in third creates the best outcomes for our citizens and our cities? place in fDi’s There are really important decision points to be made in terms Smart Location of of how cities and states respond to new technologies and also the Future, how they can better use data to improve decision making. while the Smart If the city doesn’t help shape the future are we happy for Docklands initiative commercial entities and corporates to do so without the input was first place in of the voice of the citizen? And if cities aren’t stepping up and being proactive and working with partners and engaging the the FDI Strategy market, it’s a missed opportunity. category. The For Dublin, the Smart City programme is about inspiring our project was also partners and creating new economic opportunities, delivering shortlisted for the better city services and better outcomes for citizens. Dublin is Smart City now leading the way in demonstrating the potential of new and Innovative Idea of emerging technologies that will transform cities. Fast tracking the Year at the projects such as 5G connectivity and open-sourced 3D city World Smart City models, as well as creating a test bed for companies to innovate Awards in will ensure that Dublin is at the forefront of innovation. Barcelona in November 2018. S M A R T S O LU T I O N S As a smart city test bed, Smart Docklands is a platform to test a wide range of solutions in a real-life city setting and the projects range from university research initiatives to preprocurement testing and pilot projects. It reinforces Ireland and Dublin’s position as a great scale to test new technology solutions. Here are three: 5G TRIAL NETWORK There are various major projects underway at Smart Docklands. This includes a non-commercial ‘pervasive’ connectivity zone 5G Trial Network to better understand how cities can support and build 5G networks. This is a partnership between Dense Air and CONNECT and is intended to provide a framework for cities across the world to prepare for the large-scale deployment of ‘pervasive’ 5G connectivity solutions. We are excited about the opportunity of 5G, which provides extremely reliable connectivity at the right network speed at the right time, everywhere, supporting new services such as connected drones, or making sure cars are talking to each other as we move towards a world of connected autonomous vehicles. We are also working on developing use cases that demonstrate the value of these new networks for cities. For 5G networks to be successful, you need to supplement the traditional mobile

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ADAPTING Smart City

ABOVE: 3D City Data Hackathon LEFT: 3D model of Dublin’s Silicon Docks

want to deliver more insights into the way cyclists travel to optimise the value of investment in cycling infrastructure.” The project builds on a previously successful pilot run as part of the Smart Dublin and Enterprise Ireland Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) Smart Cycling Challenge run in Dublin in 2017 with 500 participants.

phone operator towers with a lot more equipment on poles and buildings to create that pervasive network. Mobile operators are trying to figure out where to put these small cells so this changes the engagement with cities and asset owners in terms of how you build those networks in a cost-effective way. Neutral host is a concept where you build one physical network that all of the operators can share. It’s much more efficient and there is less equipment so it’s less ugly. We are working to understand the economics and logistics of how you build these networks and as part of this we are helping to shape the national policy, which will enable faster rollout nationally. S M A R T CYC L I N G T EC H Helping to promote more sustainable mobility and a greater uptake in cycling, we are delighted to support the SynchroniCity initiative, an EU project which runs from June to August 2019, connecting circa 800 cyclists across Dublin, Antwerp and Manchester simultaneously. Cyclists will use smart bike lights and a mobile app to collect crowdsourced sensor data and insights across the three cities. The data collected will be shared with city planners to highlight situations faced by cyclists in the three cities on a daily basis. Partnering with cycling technology start-up See.Sense and telecommunications company BT, the project is aimed at encouraging the growth of cycling across the participating cities. The award-winning See.Sense bike light shines brightly both in daylight and at nighttime and reacts when a cyclist may be at risk by automatically flashing brighter and faster. Technology inside the light collects near real-time data on journeys, speed, dwell time, road surface quality, collisions, near-miss events and other self-reported events. In addition, via the app, user profile data is collected detailing gender, age, level of cycling experience, alongside the type of bicycle used. These insights are then gathered and anonymised and shared with the city to provide the evidence needed to support cycling infrastructure planning, and promote active travel. City stakeholders will have access to a digital dashboard providing interactive heat maps to support data-driven decision making. Speaking about the smart cycling project Christopher Manzira, Acting Senior Engineer with Dublin City Council says, “The rich data gathered from this approach will help to inform our strategies for overall mobility, how we promote active travel, plan, engage with citizens and how we evaluate the impact of new cycling infrastructure investment”. Professor John Davies, Chief Researcher, BT’s Future Business Technology, says, ‘“We want to validate the scalability of the BT IoT hub across multiple locations with increased volume of data. We 38

3D MODEL OF THE DOCKLANDS We commissioned a highly accurate 3D model covering four kilometre squares of Dublin’s Silicon Docks. Through it, we can use augmented realities to look at the impact of new buildings and heights and see what the future district will look like. At a recent 3D City Data Hackathon competing teams ‘hacked’ the model and were challenged to deliver new solutions, applications and services across four areas; Transportation, Mobility and Environment; Urban Planning and Digital Construction; City Infrastructure and Asset Use; and Civic Engagement and Serious Gaming. The winning concept, Place Engage, was a town hall brought to life through virtual reality. An augmented reality app, it will help citizens of Dublin understand new developments in the city whilst in conception phase and visualise them in real time and see the impact of new heights on the local environment. Second place went to Smart Responders, a team led by Dublin Fire Brigade, for their idea of an augmented reality app to help first responders locate essential services such as fire hydrants during emergencies. When you arrive at the scene of a fire, you will know exactly where the hydrants and emergency gas valves are. When you learn that it took 13 hours to find the gas switch at the Grenfell Tower fire, it will make a big difference for emergency services in how they respond to emergency situations. smartdocklands.ie; smartdublin.ie

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THRIVING Region in focus

Regional Review Comprising counties Cavan, Louth and Monaghan, the north east region is a hive of exciting and innovative industries. From fintech to manufacturing to compliance, here’s just a selection. North East

Monag

Monaghan

Entekra

Gernord

han

Wa n t t o know more? Visit Entekra. com for more information

Entekra Entekra was founded in 2016 to innovate how houses are framed in the United States by introducing technologically advanced off-site construction methods to replace the labour-intensive stick-framing process currently used. The Monaghan site, which opened in 2017, houses the research and design facility, where technical staff oversee the critical design and engineering phase for every house being manufactured and assembled in America.

There are plans to triple the size of the technical department in Monaghan.

Gernord Gernord Ltd, based in Carrickmacross in county Monaghan, is a manufacturer of PVC wall and flooring and is part of the French global flooring group, Gerflor. Gerflor Group creates, manufactures and markets innovative, decorative and sustainable flooring solutions and wall finishes to meet every indoor market need, including housing, healthcare, education, sport, retail, industry, offices, hospitality and transport vehicles. gerflor.com

Did you know “The ability to leverage Irish offsite construction experience and expertise has provided Entekra with the technological leadership that is unmatched in the United States building industry.” Alan Fannin, Senior Vice President, Technical

YEARS IN BUSINESS

The products manufactured at the Irish site are an integral part of the group’s contract product ranges. IDAIRELAND.COM

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THRIVING Region in focus

North East

Cavan

Wellman International

CG Power Systems CG Power Systems is amongst the top 10 transformer manufacturers in the world. Embedded in Cavan since 1977, it operates across a broad spectrum of sectors in the energy market: utilities, renewables industrial, EPC, and nuclear, oil and gas and service and maintenance availability, battery storage, electrical vehicle and tidal. cgglobal.com

Cavan Wellman International Wellman International is Europe’s leading producer of high performance recycled polyester staple fibre for the hygiene and healthcare, automotive, industrial, and home and apparel sectors. The Cavan site, which was opened in 1972, has a production capacity of 90KT. A pioneer of recycling technologies, each year Wellman recycles 4.6b plastic bottles to make its fibre products. wellman-intl.com

North East

Louth

Chemical Inspection and Regulation Service (CIRS) is a leading product safety and chemical management consulting firm. Serving clients in 25 countries, CIRS Ireland has pre-registered over 10,000 substances; prepared over 5,000 REACH SDS and CLP labels to date, and acted as only representative for over 3,000 non-EU companies. cirs-reach.com

Irish Presence

2008

Louth

One of the largest only representatives under EU REACH in the world.

CG Power Systems

CIRS

Yapstone Among the largest private payment companies in the world and processing billions of dollars annually, fintech company Yapstone established its Drogheda operation in 2013. It has embedded itself in the local community through its corporate responsibility initiative,YapCares, which was established to fight homelessness. yapstone.com

CG CONTRIBUTES

€25

MILLION TO THE LOCAL ECONOMY EVERY YEAR.

Yapstone

Did you know “Yapstone located its international headquarters in Drogheda where we can benefit from a rich and diverse pool of some of the best tech talent in the country.” Peter Rowan, EVP of International Operations

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ACHIEVING Academic excellence

WORDS BY

Ireland’s talent pipeline is being nourished by excellent colleges and universities who are distinguishing themselves on the world stage, not only academically, but socially and environmentally.

Ta ra C o rri st i n e

DCU: A CHAMPION OF I N C L U S I O N I N E D U C AT I O N Dublin City University (DCU) has been recognised as the world’s first autismfriendly university by AsIAm, the autism advocacy charity, following an 18-month research project. The study showed that students with autism in third level often experience greater levels of difficulty settling in and adapting to university life than their peers. DCU will implement a series of practical actions and initiatives around: communication and socialisation; provision of quiet spaces and times; life skills; navigation of the physical campus and securing internships and employment. Amongst the quiet spaces are three sensory pods that have been installed in locations across the three campuses. Each pod allows the student to control their environment and to destress in a calming space, explains Dr Mary ABOVE: Rose Sweeney, School of Nursing DCU campus and Human Sciences, Principal Investigator and Project Lead, Autism LEFT: Friendly University, DCU. The One of the university will also augment autismsensory pods specific training and awareness on campus amongst academic and support staff as well as amongst the general student body. “This whole-of-university initiative will enhance the experiences of students with autism while at DCU and help them to transition successfully to employment or further studies,” says Dr Sweeney. This is just one of a series of designations awarded to DCU that includes University of Sanctuary (2016) and AgeFriendly University (2012), and its Access Programme currently supports more than 1,300 students from economically disadvantaged backgrounds. Professor Brian MacCraith, President of DCU explains: “The designation of DCU as the world’s first autism-friendly university is recognition of our commitment to educational opportunity and to social inclusion. We hope to provide the blueprint for others to follow and that this will become a global movement. Our commitment is to create an environment which helps students with autism to flourish educationally and socially and to significantly enhance their employability.” dcu.ie

MU: A TOP 50 YOUNG UNIVERSITY RANKING In June 2019, Maynooth University was ranked 50th in the Times Higher Education (THE) Young University Rankings, the highest position achieved by an Irish university this year. The Young University Rankings are based on a range of criteria including research income achieved, reputation for teaching, numbers of PhDs awarded, the number and quality of scholarly papers and citations from staff, and the number of international staff and students. Commenting on the ranking, Maynooth University President, Professor Philip Nolan, said: “Since becoming an independent university in 1997, MU has nearly tripled its enrolment to 13,000 students to become the fastest growing university in Ireland.” MU is recognised among the top 400 universities in the world, the top 200 European universities, and as one of the top 200 universities for international connections and outlook. maynoothuniversity.ie

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ACHIEVING Academic excellence

UCC: A GLOBAL LEADER IN RESPONSIBLE CONSUMPTION AND PRODUCTION

UCC Campus

University College Cork (UCC) has been ranked as one of the leading universities in the world for sustainable social and economic impact in the inaugural 2019 Times Higher Education (THE) University Impact rankings. Over 500 institutions from 75 countries were assessed on their work towards the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals, which seek to develop the world in a sustainable manner. UCC was ranked first in the world for its work towards the UN goal of ‘responsible consumption and production’, first in Ireland for working towards the UN goal of ‘peace, justice and strong institutions’ (12th globally) and third in Ireland (21st globally) for its contribution towards the UN goal of ‘good health and well-being.’ Commenting Professor Patrick O’Shea, President of UCC stated, “The UN Sustainable Development Goals are embedded in our strategic plan and academic strategy. Our mission is to benefit our community and these rankings today highlight the significant contribution that an Irish university is making towards ensuring we create a sustainable future for all.” “Student-led, research-informed and a practice-focussed approach is driving change across the university,” added Professor John O’Halloran, Deputy President and Registrar, UCC. UCC is the only university in Ireland to make the top 10 in the UI Greenmetric World University 2018 ranking of the ‘greenest’ universities in the world, and holds a gold star rating from the Association for the Advancement of Sustainability in Higher Education (AASHE). ucc.ie

UCD: OFFERING A WORLD-LEADING MANAGEMENT PROGRAMME

University College Dublin (UCD) Michael Smurfit Graduate Business School’s MSc in International Management is ranked 7th in the world by the Financial Times 2018 Global Masters in Management Ranking. A dual degree, graduates are awarded an MSc in International Management from UCD Smurfit School and a Masters in International Management (MIM) from CEMS, a global strategic alliance of 32 leading business schools and over 60 leading corporate partners. CEMS business schools include the London School of Economics, the National University of Singapore, HEC Paris and Cornell College of Business and UCD Smurfit School is the only Irish member. The curricula covers areas of international management such as strategy, leadership, and applied business projects with organisations such as McKinsey, EY, Deloitte, P&G, Salesforce, Kerry Group, Facebook and Google. “We are interested in developing their theoretical knowledge but you need the application so we work hard in grounding our programme in the real world,” explains Programme Director, Dr Andrew Keating. “With our corporate partners, we run applied skills seminars in subjects such as working in groups, negotiating wages or sales techniques. For example, Google do a skills seminar on their method of selling. We are creating connections between industry and programme. We are trying to shape responsible leaders of the future.” The course is aimed at graduates with a business or economics background with two languages, one to be English, and includes a mandatory semester abroad. “It’s a very attractive proposition for students who are internationally minded and want to work in leading positions in industry.” smurfitschool.ie

UCD Smurfit School

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ACHIEVING Academic excellence

T U D U B L I N : F O S T E R I N G I R E L A N D - C H I N A R E S E A R C H R E L AT I O N S

ABOVE: The Irish-Sino Research and Innovation Institute for Novel and Emerging Sciences and Technologies (NEST) at the Greenway Hub at TU Dublin

Technological University Dublin (TU Dublin) signed a historic agreement with leading Chinese University, the University of Electronic Science and Technology (UESTC) in October 2018, to develop the Irish-Sino Research and Innovation Institute for Novel and Emerging Sciences and Technologies (NEST). This is the first time a Chinese University has established an overseas research and development organisation in Ireland. UESTC is located in Chengdu and is a national key multidisciplinary university specialising in electronic engineering and information science and technology. It is one of the top 30 out of over 2,500 Chinese universities and institutions, and one of less than 40 classified as a Class A Double First Class University by the Chinese Ministry of Education. NEST will advance joint TU Dublin-

NUI Galway is set to lead a new €13m Science Foundation Ireland (SFI) Centre for Research Training in Genomics Data Science, it was announced in April of this year. The new centre will train 100 PhD graduates to harness the collective potential of genomics and data science and will involve partners from UCD, TCD, RCSI and UCC. Genomics is the branch of science that studies genomes – an organism’s complete set of DNA or genetic material – to see how they direct the growth and function of cells and organisms. In recent years, genomics has been driven by new technologies that generate data on an enormous scale, requiring highly trained data scientists. Professor Cathal Seoighe, Stokes Professor of Bioinformatics, and Director of the SFI Centre for Research Training in Genomics and Data Science, NUI Galway, said: “In combination with modern data science techniques, genomics has the capacity both to reveal deep biological insights and to transform applications of the life sciences from health to food and agriculture.” One of the main areas where genomics is having a real world impact is the study of how mutations and abnormalities in our genome causes diseases such as cancer – this is the main research focus of Dr Eva Erzsebet Szegezdi, lecturer in biochemistry at NUI Galway, one of the six lead scientists in the centre. Dr Szegezdi is, “working to understand how cancer cells can alter their genome to become resistant to chemotherapy and to find ways to exploit mutations in cancer cells to develop new therapies that only kill the cancer cells.” Genomics is already beginning to be used to diagnose rare genetic disorders. It can also predict the risk of common, complex disorders, in which lifestyle plays a role, raising the possibility of interventions targeted towards at-risk individuals. Genomics is also used to guide improvements in agricultural crops, enabling disease resistance and improving yields and genomics-guided animal breeding has resulted in large gains in productivity. nuigalway.ie

UESTC research through the shared use of research facilities, the exchange of personnel and the joint publication of research papers at major conferences in China, Ireland and internationally, as well as in leading academic journals. Speaking at the signing ceremony Professor Brian O’Neill, Director of Research, Enterprise and Innovation at TU Dublin said, “Phase one will see researchers from both organisations work together to target funding opportunities to help find real-world solutions in the areas of information and communication technology, machine learning, wireless communications and medical applications, personalised medicine and the application of computational intelligence technologies to a variety of real-world problems.” Professor Xiong Caidong, Vice President UESTC said, “Ireland’s higher education has rich experience in innovative talent training, integration of industry and education, and transformation of scientific and technological achievements. UESTC will focus on promoting the cooperation with TU Dublin at this new starting point.” tudublin.ie

N U I G A L W AY: L E A D I N G T H E WAY I N G E N O M I C S

NUI Galway Quadrangle

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ACHIEVING Academic excellence

TCD: A BUSINESS SCHOOL ACCREDITED IN THE TOP ONE PER CENT

LEFT: Trinity Business School includes an Innovation and Entrepreneurial hub, a 600 seat auditorium, smart classrooms, an executive education centre and two ‘living walls’ with seven different species of plants.

Trinity Business School, Trinity College Dublin, is now double accredited by two of the three largest and most influential business school accreditation organisations worldwide. Located in a new cutting-edge €80m building, the school was re-accredited by the Association of MBAs (AMBA) in 2015, and in 2018, was awarded full EQUIS Accreditation by the European Foundation for Management Development (EFMD). Commenting, the Dean of Trinity Business School, Professor Andrew Burke said, “We’re delighted to have secured EQUIS accreditation who only accredit the top one per cent of business schools in the world. With a growth rate of 127 per cent over the last three years, we are one of the fastest growing established business schools in Europe.” The school’s programmes impress in the rankings, too: The Trinity MBA is ranked number one in Ireland in the Eduniversal Best Masters Rankings 2018 for both the one year full-time and two year part-time categories, whilst the part-time Trinity Executive MBA is listed in the World’s Top 50 Executive MBAs by The Economist (2018). The Trinity MBA is an intensive, project-based management programme requiring participants to undertake three ‘live’ projects across three types of organisations: high potential start-up, not-for-profit, and blue-chip multinational. Director of the Trinity MBA, Professor Amanda Shantz said: “The Trinity Executive MBA is distinct because our students are provided with an opportunity to put theory to practice. Each student is charged with creating bespoke solutions to multinationals, social enterprises and SMEs.” tcd.ie

U L : S E C O N D I N T H E W O R L D AT AT T R A C T I N G A N D S U P P O R T I N G I N T E R N AT I O N A L S T U D E N T S

Graduate Entry Medical School

Glucksman Library

Over 95 per cent of international students who studied at the University of Limerick responded that they were happy with their study experience, placing UL second out of 199 institutions across the globe. According to the 2019 I-Graduate International Student Barometer (ISB), a global benchmark for the international student experience, UL scored the top mark out of every participating institution worldwide for social activities, clubs and societies. The UL International Office was ranked first out of 51 UK and Ireland universities, and the university scored highest for pre-arrival information for international students. Nationally, UL boasts the best access to and quality of, accommodation; the best campus environment; the best multi-cultural campus, the best library; the best internet access, the best formal welcome and the best sports facilities, according to the 2019 ISB. The barometer tracks and compares the decision-making, expectations, perceptions and intentions of international students from application to graduation. Speaking about the results, UL President Dr Des Fitzgerald commented, “The staff work closely with the UL International Education Division to ensure that every international student returns home having had an excellent personal and academic experience at UL.” ul.ie

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THRIVING The Screen

Ireland has amplified its tradition of storytelling into TV, film and animation success across the world.

THE

BIG PICTURE The Favourite

R E L A N D â&#x20AC;&#x2122; S T V , F I L M A N D A N I M AT I O N I N D U S T R Y I S G A R N E R I N G I N T E R N AT I O N A L A C C L A I M , A N D A M A S S I N G A S I Z E A B L E C O L L ECT I O N O F AWA R D S WORDS BY

A L O N G T H E W AY , T H A N K S T O T H E C A L I B R E O F

Ta ra C o rri st i n e

W R I T E R S , A N I M AT O R S , P R O D U C E R S A N D D I R E C T O R S O N T H E I S L A N D . W E S P E A K T O T W O M U LT I - A W A R D W I N N I N G I R I S H S T U D I O S A B O U T AT T E N D I N G T H E O S C A R S , T H E I M P O R TA N C E O F S TAT E S U P P O R T A N D WHY DUBLIN IS THEIR BEST BASE. IDAIRELAND.COM

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THRIVING The Screen

ELEMENT PICTURES

An eye for talent is fundamental when it comes to making movies and Ed Guiney and Andrew Lowe, the co-founders of production and distribution company, Element Pictures look to an all-star cast of Irish writers and directors. In 2016, their production Room, a screen adaption of Dublin author Emma Donoghue’s book, directed by fellow Dubliner Lenny Abrahamson, was nominated for four Academy Awards, with Brie Larson scooping the Best Actress statue. It took the same award at the Golden Globes where it was nominated in three categories. “We have had the privilege of working with many of Ireland’s leading writers, directors, actors and crew, both in Ireland and abroad, and we can say with confidence that the Irish talent pool is as strong as any we have come across internationally,” says Guiney. “The international recognition the industry here has garnered in the last decade in terms of awards and box office success is the return on investment over many years by Screen Ireland (formerly the Irish Film Board) in the talent pool here.” The company drew the spotlight again in 2018 when its production The Favourite, starring Olivia Colman, Emma Stone and Rachel Weisz, was an international success, securing 10 Academy Award nominations and a win for Best Actress for Colman, seven BAFTA’s including Outstanding British Film, and a Best Actress Golden Globe, again for Colman. “It was particularly exciting for Element to be back at the Oscars this year with The Favourite after the nominations and success of Room three years ago. It is also great to see how highly Irish talent is regarded in LA and it’s great to know that there is still so much excellent work to come from this small country of ours for the wider world to discover. The success of the industry and our part in that success is a source of immense pride to all of us in Element.” Both Guiney and Lowe hail from Dublin and they believe their base in Ireland is well placed to operate a global business. “We have a team of brilliant people based in

ABOVE: The Favourite LEFT: Room

Dublin with world-class expertise in development, production, finance and business affairs who can develop, manage and monitor our productions wherever they are shooting – The Favourite shot in the UK, our recent production The Nest shot partly in Canada and we, of course, have productions shooting in Ireland.” The pair credit state funding and support with helping to drive the industry forward. “Screen Ireland investment has been instrumental in developing the local talent pool, and in a country as small as Ireland, their role is crucial in enabling Irish producers to develop and retain control over their IP which they can then in turn exploit internationally,” explains Lowe. “Film Relief Section 481 is also a crucial state investment in the industry and is the prime “We have a team driver of the inward investment sector that has of brilliant been key in creating scale in the industry in people in Dublin Ireland.” with worldStaying true to form, Irish productions feature class expertise heavily on their upcoming slate. Normal People, in development, Irish author Sally Rooney’s novel which won production, Book of the Year at the The British Book finance and Awards, is green lit with the BBC for production. business affairs.” The BBC has also picked up Dublin Murders, based on the bestselling series by IrishAmerican author, Tana French.

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THRIVING The Screen

BROWN BAG FILMS

A quick flick through daytime television, here or across the pond, and it might surprise you to discover that one Irish company is leading the charge in cartoons. Doc McStuffins, Octonauts, Bing, Olivia, Noddy In Toyland, Nella the Princess Knight, Vampirina are just some of the stellar programmes made by Brown Bag Films animation studio. The studio was founded in Dublin in 1994 by Cathal Gaffney and Darragh O’Connell, and the team has since become a powerhouse in the industry, with offices in Toronto, Manchester and L.A., racking up dozens of awards including Emmys, IFTAs, Annies, NAACPs and Gracies, as well as two Oscar nominations. “The Oscars were incredible, it was an amazing experience, and we have 20 Emmy nominations this year,” reveals Gaffney. “It’s nice that your work is recognised externally and for the second year in a row we’ve been voted by Kidscreen, a peer review award, as the number one production company in the world.” Their calibre of work caught the eye of Canadian company, 9 Story Media Group who acquired Brown Bag Films in August 2015. “That’s been a really successsful partnership,” says Gaffney, who was appointed Chief Operating Officer of the group in 2016. “They are very strong in development and distribution, they have a live action division and a merchandise and licensing division. Between all of those components, Brown Bag Films neatly slots in. After two years together, we rebranded their animation studio as Brown Bag Films. The synergy of coming together plays to each other’s

RIGHT: Octonauts BELOW: Angela’s Christmas

LEFT: Cathal Gaffney ABOVE: Sadie Sparks

strengths. We’ve a very talented team embedded in our studio in Smithfield and I think that’s “Kids in 150 the reason 9 Story looked at countries Ireland: talent.” watch Fostering that talent is vital to something the future of the industry, that was Gaffney says, and the studio produced has long-standing relationships here in with Irish colleges. “We take Smithfield graduates from Ballyfermot every day.” College or the Institute of Art, Design and Technology in Dun Laoghaire and we put huge emphasis on training. One example is Bronagh O’Hanlon: she worked her way up and designed the character of Doc McStuffins. She went on to direct a number of episodes and has since created her own TV series called Sadie Sparks, airing on the Disney channel. Nicky Phelan was Oscar nominated for Granny O’Grimm’s Sleeping Beauty and has gone on to direct Octonauts and Bing, and create his own shows as well. That’s a great career trajectory for a Ballyfermot graduate from the Brown Bag family.” The 9 Studio partnership allowed them to invest in international talent, and earlier this year they acquired BASE animation studio in Bali. “We’ve been working with them for a number of years as an outsource provider of animation services and it made sense for us to own that whole pipeline to give us complete quality control, from scripts through to delivery to broadcaster. We are going to rebrand them as Brown Bag Films Bali, and this acquisition has seen us grow to over 1,000 staff.” While the scaling of the business has been ‘massive’ over the last number of years, delivering a quality product to their audience underscores everything they create. “As long as you are focused on making cartoons for six-year-old children around the world. Millions and millions of kids in 150 countries watch something that was produced here in Smithfield every day, it gives us great pride that so much home-grown talent can be seen around the world.”

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EXCELLING

Donal Murphy Photography

Buildings

ExceptionalBuildings I r e l a n d â&#x20AC;&#x2122;s m o d e r n a p p r o a c h t o a r c h i t e c t u r e embraces social spaces, acknowledges its heritage and environment, and centres community at the heart of design. Read about four such award-winning buildings. 48

WORDS BY Ta ra C o rri st i n e

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EXCELLING Buildings

Donal Murphy Photography

ELIZABETH’S TREE HOUSE, BARRETSTOWN An exciting innovative dining hall designed for very special guests. Barretstown Camp in county Kildare provides therapeutic and respite care for children who live with serious illness, and their families. Over the past 20 years, over 35,000 campers have been to Barretstown and each year, it serves over 2,500 residential campers. The ‘heart’ of the camp, the dining hall is where campers, staff and volunteers meet for meals, dancing, fun and games. The camp had outgrown the old dining hall and McCauley Daye O’Connell Architects created an exciting new dining hall with a series of connected spaces that could accommodate 250 children and helpers. Natural materials were used inside and out in response to the building’s forest setting and the glass wall in the main hall offers generous views of the Barretstown lake. According to MDO director Dan Daye, “The building

blurs the lines between indoor and outdoor space with irregular shapes and floating terraces. Energetic vibrant colours are used extensively throughout, with a sense of fun in mind.” The project has received several awards including The Architecture MasterPrize 2018, Joint Winner of Best Universal Design at the 2017 RIAI Awards, and Building of the Year award at the Building and Architect of the Year Awards 2017. mdo.ie

“Energetic vibrant colours are used extensively throughout, with a sense of fun in mind.”

P Á L Á S C I N E M A , G A LWAY Returning the picture house to the heart of the city. The Pálás cinema in Galway’s Latin Quarter was designed by award-winning architect Tom dePaor who sought to return the cinema to a “picture palace at the heart of the city”. This seven-storey building with restaurant and bar sits on the site of an 1820s merchant’s house, the façade of which was incorporated into the design. A key concern was providing natural light and this was achieved by featuring painted glass windows that suffuse the space with light during the day and cast colour and illumination to the street at night. “They are located to choreograph and colour the interiors, painted within the double-glazed unit: red to the front stair, green to the back and amber to the bar for atmosphere,” explains dePaor. The vibrancy continues with red fabric hung in each cinema, the bottom as a marquee, the middle ruched and the top as a theatre. A winner of the Best Cultural/ Public Building at the 2019 RIAI Awards, a

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EXCELLING Buildings

Photography credits Ed Reeve

Build 2018 Global Excellence Award, and an Architectural Association of Ireland Award, the cinema was recently awarded the prize for Best Use of Colour at the World Architecture Awards. Judges noted that ‘colour is completely integrated and critical to the conceptual design and experience’ of the cinema, calling it a beautiful building that ‘reveals itself like a magic lantern.’ depaor.com

“A beautiful building that reveals itself like a magic lantern.”

C L O N A K I LT Y 4 0 0 U R B A N D E S I G N , C O R K A framework that puts people at the heart of urban design. The Clonakilty 400 Urban Design Masterplan is a methodology that addresses the design issues facing urban spaces. Initially developed for a small town in west Cork, its framework can be used in towns across the world, says Giulia Vallone, Senior Architect with Cork County Council. “The project was initiated to re-establish the public realm in the small market town of Clonakilty. The objective was to make the local community aware of the heritage value of its townscape, including traditional shopfront preservation, and re-establish social activities on the street.” The project sought to regenerate existing meeting squares in the town and connect them by a new urban streetscape. This was achieved by introducing gathering spaces, commissioning art and sculpture pieces, adding play areas, facilitating social events and reversing car priority. Vallone cites ‘bottom-up public participation’ as vital, as it informed and empowered the community and created project champions. Since the public works, property around the meeting squares has increased in value and retail units that had previously been closed are all full. The Masterplan won the European Category of the prestigious Gubbio Prize 2018 which recognises excellence in contemporary interventions to historical centres; the RIAI Public Choice Award in 2014, and Best Place in the 2017 RIAI Awards, upon completion.

“Bottomup public participation informed and empowered the community and created project champions.”

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EXCELLING Buildings

Photography credits Kelvin Gillmor

SCOIL PHÁDRAIG, WESTPORT The ‘New School in Town’ proved a hit with judges and locals alike. Delivering a building that will not only appeal to but withstand the most energetic of users, while being mindful of its location in the scenic town of Westport, is no mean feat, yet Simon J Kelly Architects approached it with gusto. “Scoil Phádraig was a dream project,” says practice director Dermot McCabe, “to challenge ourselves, our clients, the local authority and the Department of Education to come up with an innovative functional design that turned out to be just the right fit for this sensitive site in the heart of Westport, while achieving an exemplar building for the highest standards of primary school teaching.” Creating such a landmark building in your local town was a daring move. “It has been a rare career opportunity to design and build on a prominent site in the town where we live, where the friendly

informality of rural Ireland meant that everyone locally would not hold back on their comments and opinions – on the street, in the supermarket, at the café – about the project and all, thankfully, have been universally positive.” The school was co-awarded Winner in the Best Education Building Category in the 2018 RIAI Awards, took second place in the 2018 Irish Architecture Public Choice Awards and was nominated for the EU Prize for Contemporary Architecture – Mies van der Rohe Award 2019. sjk.ie

“The friendly informality of rural Ireland meant that everyone locally would not hold back their opinions about the project.”

“Scoil Phádraig was a dream project.”

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THRIVING Distilleries

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Clonakilty Distillery

THRIVING Distilleries

Top Shelf Enterprising spirit blended with superior natural ingredients has seen a wealth of craft distilleries emerge across Ireland to become serious contenders in the global drinks industry. Meet the makers who have diversified their way to success.

WORDS BY

Ta ra C o rri st i n e

ounding a distillery on the site of the first written account of distilling in Ireland, as recorded in 1324 in the Red Book of Ossory, seems like a smart move. Ballykeefe Distillery, nestled in Kilkenny’s lush green countryside, was set up in 2017 by farmer Morgan Ging and his wife, Anne. “Through my father’s side, we have an unbroken lineage in farming as far back as written records go. My mother’s father had a grocery shop and bar on their family farm,

with a license to blend whiskey. As I grew up I developed a passion and fascination for the intertwined histories of farming and whiskey, and for 25 years, I harboured the ambition of reviving the lost tradition of a family farm distillery.” Keeping busy until the whiskey matures in 2020, Ging and his team are producing three gins, two vodkas and two poitíns in small batches in their handcrafted Italian copper stills. “Super premium is the quality standard at Ballykeefe Distillery and as an artisan, handcrafted operation, it is a ‘hearts only’ distiller’s cut, which means all heads and tails are discarded, with the emphasis on quality and not quantity.” It’s proving to be a winning formula. “Our gin won Gold at the World Gin Awards 2019 and our Sloe Gin was a Gold Medal Winner at the World Liqueur Awards 2019, the vodka was awarded Best Irish Vodka in 2018 at the Irish Whiskey Awards and our poitín won Master Class at the 2018 Global Spirits Masters, and Gold at the Irish Whiskey Awards 2018. The poitín of today is very different from its illegal predecessor: today it is crafted to the same standards as whiskey. It is made from a combination of malted and unmalted barley and it goes through a seven-day, seven-stage milling, brewing, fermentation and distillation process. Instead of putting it into a cask for three years to mature and become whiskey, we bottle it straight from the spirit still.” As for the taste, it has a biscuity flavour, thanks to the malt, with hints of red pepper and a creamy finish. Sustainability and environmental protection are central to the business plan. “The relationship between the cattle, barley and whiskey is at the very heart of our operation, we have fully integrated the distillery into our farm and vice versa. There is zero off-farm waste and high capital investment to ensure a fully sustainable low carbon footprint in every aspect of the operation. Ballykeefe is the first single estate family farm whiskey distillery in over 200 years, where all barley is sown, grown, harvested and distilled on the farm. This makes it a uniquely ‘field to glass operation’, where the by-products of distilling, the pot ale and spent grains, are a nutritious part of the ration fed to the cattle on the farm, giving the beef a uniquely tender and subtle whiskey flavour.” The distillery even uses its own deep well limestone water which is hand-blended in its spirits. The future is bright for this farmer-turneddistiller, recently securing a nationwide retail distribution deal, and the US market on the horizon. “The Ballykeefe whiskey range will IDAIRELAND.COM

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THRIVING Distilleries

RIGHT: Ballykeefe Distillery casks BELOW: Clonakilty Distillery BELOW RIGHT: Dingle Distillery

include Single Malt, Pure Pot Still and Rye whiskeys. Our whiskeys will only use Ballykeefe distilled spirits, and the first limited release will take place in August 2020.” ballykeefedistillery.ie The Dingle Whiskey Distillery was conceived by Oliver Hughes, Liam LaHart and Peter Mosley. The trio enjoyed considerable success in craft beer brewing, founding the Porterhouse Brewing Company in the nineties, before their attention turned to whiskey. The distillery came into being in a tin shed “The Dingle in Dingle, county Kerry and Whiskey the first casks were filled on Distillery the 18th of December, 2012. came into While the founders waited being in a for the first sups to be ready, tin shed in their attention turned to other Dingle.” spirits, creating Dingle Distillery Vodka, which is distilled five times, and offers an incredible purity with a touch of sweetness and creamy texture. The experts certainly agree and it has scooped a slew of awards including a Silver at The Global Vodka Masters in 2018, a double Gold in the same year by the Wine and Spirits Wholesalers of America, and a Gold at the Irish Whiskey Awards, 2018. Their gin is no slouch in the award stakes either, earning the accolade of World’s Best London Dry Gin at the World Gin Awards this year, beating over 400 gins from over 20 countries. Dingle Original Gin’s unique character and flavour comes from the mix of 13 botanicals: six traditional, including juniper, coriander and lemon peel, and seven local such as the rowan berry from the mountain ash trees, fuchsia, bog myrtle, hawthorn and heather for a taste of the Kerry landscape, designed to create a sense of place and provenance. In another nod to its heritage, it is distilled in a copper pot still named Aisling, meaning vision or dream in Irish. And what of its whiskey? It’s made in small batches in three distinctive, hand-crafted copper pot stills. Batch No 1, the distillery’s first whiskey was released in late 2016, and has notes of marzipan, vanilla and hay, finished with a pleasant dryness and hints of aniseed and liquorice. It was a success straight off the bat, winning Gold at the Irish Whiskey Awards that year. Its Single Malt Batch No 3, with its jammy sweetness and subtle notes of citrus peels earned the title of Best New Irish Whiskey at the 2018 Irish Whiskey Awards, and a Silver at The Whiskey Irish Masters. dingledistillery.ie 54

The Scully family has farmed the coast of Galley Head for 320 years and in 2016, the current generation saw an opportunity to diversify from their agricultural roots, establishing the Clonakilty Distillery. Founding directors Michael Scully had ambitions to create a product that used ingredients from the farm and with the Galley Head’s maritime climate in mind, they set their sights on whiskey. Today, Clonakilty Distillery makes whiskey and gin using heritage barley grown on the family farm, and wild botanicals harvested from the shoreline near Galley Head. A commitment to heritage and innovation has led the team to use ancient malting barley that was traditionally sown on the island and now grows at the base of Galley Head Lighthouse where centuries of sea mist, soft rain and ocean spray provide a complexity to the soil that permeates right through to the grain. This is also the location of their Atlantic warehouse which sits 200ft above sea level. The water used to cut the spirits is drawn from deep within the untouched rock formations by the ocean cliffs and is naturally filtered through multiple layers of sandstone and baryte. Three copper pot stills were specially commissioned and the distillery is still largely manually operated, affording Paul Corbett, the Head Distiller, precise control of each and every drop. Minke Gin, named for the whale that swims along the coastline, has a citrus and aniseed flavour thanks to its use of native rock samphire, also known as sea fennel. The botanical is sustainably harvested by hand only when in season. The base spirit used in the gin is derived from whey produced from the Scully’s dairy farm along with others in the locality and gives a unique velvety texture. The distillery has a range of whiskeys including its Single Batch whiskey which won a double

gold at the 2019 San Francisco World Spirits competition. Up against 3,000 whiskeys in a blind tasting, it is considered one of the most prestigious awards in the whiskey world. Its Port Cask whiskey is finished in casks imported from the Douro Valley in Portugal in a process that adds a sweetness with spicy notes, while its Single Grain expression uses a premium nine-year-old grain finished in Bordeaux “Minke Gin, casks, allowing the whiskey to absorb the colour and named for sweetness of the wine with the whale flavours of strawberries, that swims honey and wood spice. along the Capitalising on its success, coastline, earlier this year the distillery uses native launched the Cask rock Keepers Club, a presamphire, also known purchase programme that has seen a number of as sea casks already sold, while fennel.” the Visitor Experience had its official opening in March and is expected to attract 35,000 visitors a year. World domination is another goal: the products are currently available in a handful of US states, mainland Europe and selected provinces in the Far East, and the Scully family hope to add Canada and a further 15 American states to the list by the end of 2019. clonakiltydistillery.ie

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24 HOURS Cork

To p P i c k s CORK

hours in

Monkstown Castle

The team at the Marriott International Customer Engagement Centres in Blackpool and MacCurtain Street i n C o r k s h a r e t h e i r i n s i d e r g u i d e t o t h e ‘ r e a l c a p i t a l .’ The Bosun

MacCarthy’s

Crosshaven sunset

Cobh, Co.Cork

K i r i l l F e d o t o v, Business Analytics Te a m , B l a c k p o o l , is originally from R u s s i a a n d h e ’s a fan of the village of Monkstown, sitting on the estuary of the River Lee. “Start with an authentic Italian espresso and sweet treat at Napoli café, then browse the nearby antique shops before you walk through Monkstown Castle and demesne, which was recently restored. The village has a seaside resort feel and from the upper road, there are wonderful views of Cork harbour. The perfect

end to your day trip would be a pint and grub in The Bosun, probably the best seafood pub in Ireland.”

Tilman S c h n e i d e r, a German Elite Associate for Marriott Hotels, MacCurtain Street, has become a fan of a famous Irish hostelry in a pretty fishing port. “One of my favourite places in Cork has to be MacCarthy’s Bar in Castletownbere, the pub from the hilarious book by Pete McCarthy, McCarthy’s

Bar - A Journey of Discovery in Ireland. Visiting this place, hidden in the rugged beauty of the Beara Peninsula, always reminds me of why I came to this country in the first place.” T h e r e ’s a l o t t o l o v e about Cork, says Russian native Vera K e n n e d y, R u s s i a n Elite Associate, Marriott Hotels, MacCurtain Street, and she enjoys exploring the area with her children. “The Carrigaline to Crosshaven walk is a very beautiful walk

along the marina – you can cycle it too. Market Lane restaurant is great, as is the café by the castle in Blackrock. We like to visit Myrtleville and Fountainstown beaches, they are very close to each other. Fountainstown beach is my favourite: when the tide is out, it reveals a huge sandy beach.”

Marius Kalinowski, Polish Loyalty Care Associate, Marriott Hotels, MacCurtain Street, recommends spending a day in Cobh, situated on

the Great Island, the Ti t a n i c ’s l a s t p o r t of call. “For such a small town, there is plenty to do in Cobh: from the Titanic Experience to Spike Island, once the largest convict depot in the world. In the city, I would highly recommend Tara’s Tea Room on MacCurtain street, a charming place that serves good locallysourced food, then visit the English Market for local farm produce. For a fancy dinner, go to the Elm Tree restaurant in Glounthaune. It’s really good food that is worth traveling for. Book in advance, it’s always packed!”

Spike Island Credit: Tony O’Connell

The English Market

The Elm Tree

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PROFILE The Disruptor

AT A GLANCE

Linda Kiely CO-FOUNDER & DIRECTOR VOXPRO

Voxp r o is a glo b a l p r o vid e r of mu ltilin g u al cus tomer experie n c e a n d tech n ical su p p o r t s olutions with c e n tr es o f excellen ce in Dublin and Cork , Ca lifor n ia, Roman ia, th e Philippines and Latin Amer ica.

“Our Cork and Dublin centres have proved critical to both our success and that of our partners.” How is Voxpro disrupting the traditional approach to customer service? At an early stage, we recognised that the traditional delivery of customer experience was broken. Too many providers were offering a one-size -fits-all, low-cost service and viewed customer interactions as a cost rather than a solution. Additionally, poor customer service was causing huge reputational damage to major brands. We embarked on a journey to lead what we call ‘the CX Evolution,’ providing high-touch experiences to customers across a number of channels. This approach has helped us to partner with really exciting companies such as Airbnb, Google, Robinhood and, most recently, Wix. How does the Irish operation support the growth of the organisation? From an operational viewpoint, our Cork and Dublin centres of excellence have proved critical to both our success and that of our partners. Ireland – being a hub for some of the major tech companies of the world – affords us the opportunity to be close to the EMEA headquarters for many of our partners. The fact that Irish society 56

has become such a progressive, multicultural one means that the talent pool has improved greatly in recent years. You just have to look at the number of languages we now provide from Cork and Dublin to understand the diversity of people living here. Diversity not only lends itself to increased language skills, but a workforce made up of individuals with a wide range of characteristics and experiences enables us to understand a diverse range of customers and drive innovation within the company. What are the disruptors facing your industry? Artificial Intelligence and machine learning are a complete gamechanger for the CX industry. These new technologies are enabling companies to use chatbots and predictive analytics in order to enhance processes and, ultimately, create authentic, personalised customer experiences at scale. AI is a disrupter for positive change in CX, but only if companies are utilising it for the right reasons. How are you approaching these disruptors? Any company that fails to embrace new technologies in the CX industry will be left behind. However, despite the arrival of AI, it’s important that the human element of customer experience is not lost. At Voxpro, we strive to get that balance of human and AI just right. Indeed, we have carried out research in the area and found that while technology has transformed the CX landscape,

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consumers still want human interactions. For this reason, Voxpro deploys a balanced approach. What are the key opportunities for Voxpro in Ireland? As our partner list shows, we work with some of the most disruptive tech companies in the world. As more and more of these industrychanging businesses emerge across the globe, Voxpro is ready to support them in scaling fast and to help them provide exceptional CX for their customers. We’ll continue to offer this support from our Dublin and Cork centres of excellence, locations which prospective and existing partners alike continue to value. What is next for Voxpro? Through our integration with TELUS International, we now have an even greater global footprint than before, with access to markets on four continents. We’ll be helping our partners expand into new locations and building on existing partnerships at our Cork and Dublin centres; all the while forming new and exciting partnerships for the future. voxprogroup.com

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We are 9% redhead. We are 33.3% under 25. We are 52% of 25-34 year olds with higher level education, 10% above the OECD average. We are 100% committed to the EU. Ready to talk about locating in Ireland? We are. You can count on it.

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