Pestle & Mortar CEO Sonia Deasy

Read how Irish skincare company Pestle & Mortar is perfecting sales around the world

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Kildare woman Sonia Deasy and her husband Padraic have always had global ambition in business. Unfortunately, their first enterprise, a highly successful photographic studio, couldn’t deliver it.

“No matter how much we did, we knew we couldn’t scale it,” says Sonia.

Photography did, however, provide the inspiration for a business that could scale. In 2010, while attending a trade conference in the US, Sonia watched other photographers at work.

“We were always photographing normal people but at these events, other photographers were photographing models and they’d bring along make-up artists. I’d see them prepping their skin before the shoot. I noticed that a lot of models don’t have good skin. They’re up late and work really long hours.”

The make-up artists were using a product that seemed to have a transformative effect.  On further investigation, she discovered it contained a super ingredient, hyaluronic acid.

Though HA is common now, at the time it was almost unknown in Ireland. Where it was available, it cost hundreds of euro.

Deasy reckoned there was enough of a gap in the market to make it worth her while to develop her own product, initially working with a laboratory in Taiwan, a contact she got through her brother.Pestle & Mortar product range

After three years in development, in 2014 she had a product ready to bring to market. She called the brand Pestle & Mortar, a nod to her heritage. Deasy’s parents are Indian and a family member was a ‘medicine man’, whose work crushing herbs inspired the name. It also captured both the best of what is natural with the innovation of science.

She and Padraic built an e-commerce website for what would be, she fully expected, an online only business.

 

Pestle & Mortar goes global

An early slot on a TV magazine show resulted in immediate sales however and calls from Brown Thomas and Arnotts followed. A subsequent stand taken at a cosmetics trade show at the RDS sold out and attracted 120 more retail stockists nationwide.

But it was an appearance on US shopping channel QVC that provided the business with its biggest fillip. It was the channel’s first Irish skincare brand and Pestle & Mortar sold out in just seven minutes. “It was monumental,” she says.

That led to its first international retail order, to supply Bloomingdale’s throughout the US. Today, Deasy regularly appears on QVC in London, helping to grow UK sales too.

Pestle & Mortar HQ in KildareWith the help of Local Enterprise Office Kildare, the business took on new staff and, in 2017, the couple closed the photography studio completely to concentrate on Pestle & Mortar.

Within 18 months, it had launched a second product. Today, it has an entire range, some of which were developed and manufactured in Germany but most of which are made in Ireland. “Because we are Irish-based, we felt we should have products that are made in Ireland and which use Irish ingredients. We are very proud of that,” she says.

Pestle & Mortar was the overall winner of the LEO National Enterprise Awards in 2019 but by the time it received the award it had already attained Enterprise Ireland High Performance Start-Up status.

In 2018, the company had revenues of €3 million, which Deasy predicts will double by the end of 2019. Some 30% of its revenues are generated online, with the rest coming via distributors and wholesale customers worldwide.

With Enterprise Ireland’s help, Deasy spent much of 2018 and 2019 developing its international distributor networks. “My commercial team was out in Indonesia, Dubai and China,” says Deasy, who today employs 27 staff.

The business moved from its original base, a 1500 sq ft converted photographic studio, into a new 10,000 sq ft facility in Kildare, giving it space to grow. She invested €500,000 in the fit out alone, to create a showroom fit for a worldwide brand.

 

Get support for market discovery

“Ireland has just 4.5 million people, our ambition is to think global,” says Deasy, who retains public relations agencies in London and New York to support the brand in those markets. Every three months she travels to both to meet with bloggers and influencers. “It’s all personal, it’s all hands on,” she says.

Enterprise Ireland facilitates this. “We wanted to transition from the LEO to Enterprise Ireland as soon as possible because we knew we could really use Enterprise Ireland’s resources. Thanks to its Market Discovery Fund, my commercial team has been out to its China office six times, which provides us with both contacts and office space,” she says.

“Distribution is key for us and Enterprise Ireland’s team helps us with contacts. If you choose the wrong distributor it can ruin your business in a country and even worldwide. Enterprise Ireland’s offices became our eyes and ears on the ground.”

When Pestle & Mortar recently won a global beauty product award in Dubai, at a ceremony she couldn’t attend, “Enterprise Ireland staff collected our award for us”.

All of the support Enterprise Ireland provides helped to reinforce Deasy’s belief that she was doing the right things. “It confirms the fact that this is what you should be doing, you should be going global, and ‘we can help you do that’. That is the message you get from Enterprise Ireland.”

Today Pestle & Mortar retails in the US, UK, Sweden, Denmark, Thailand, Indonesia, Russia, Hong Kong and China, as well as the UAE. What’s more, “We’re only starting,” says Deasy, whose medium term plan is to grow turnover to €40 million.

From there, the sky’s the limit. That’s the beauty of a scalable business. “If you can get to €40 million you can get to €100 million. After that it’s just numbers.”

Learn how the Market Discovery Fund can support your diversification plans.

p3 hotels CEO

Agile Innovation funding helped p3 Hotels to develop a core product that is scalable

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Phelim Pekaar

“We found it simpler than the R&D to apply, and the approval came faster as well.”

Phelim Pekaar, CEO, p3 Hotels

Key Takeouts:

  • Support from Enterprise Ireland’s Agile Innovation Fund enabled p3 Hotels to develop a scalable product that could be rolled out to multiple customers.
  • Approval allowed them to allocate the full €100,000 project cost, with €50,000 provided by the Agile Innovation Fund and €50,000 by p3 Hotels.
  • Investment in innovation has helped p3 Hotels to grow revenues from €700,000 between 2008-2016 to a projected €1.2m this year.

Case Study: P3 Hotels

 

Securing a contract to develop innovative booking engine integrated with the property management software for Ireland’s largest hotel group was just the opportunity p3 Hotels CEO Phelim Pekaar had been looking for.

After years of successfully supplying hotel groups with custom-designed ecommerce software solutions, Phelim wanted to develop a scalable product that p3 Hotels could roll out to multiple customers. However, it would take significant resources to research, develop and test such a product.

Phelim explains: “We came to Dalata [Hotel Group] with a design of how we thought the booking engine should really look. It was a fresh design for the user interface and we also pitched the idea of online check-in. The response was really positive – they loved the online check-in and we won the contract.”

p3 Hotels decided to build the software solution and sell it to Dalata on a license fee basis, as opposed to being paid a project fee, which also meant that p3 Hotels would have to fund the development costs.

 

Simpler and faster Agile Innovation application process

Phelim spoke to Enterprise Ireland about research and development support. “We had done an R&D grant and a business improvement grant with Enterprise Ireland before and this time I was advised to do the Agile Innovation Grant,” he says. “We found it simpler than the R&D to apply, and the approval came faster as well.

“It meant that we were able to allocate the full €100,000 that this was going to cost us to build – €50,000 from p3 Hotels and €50,000 from the Agile Innovation Fund.

Apply for the Agile Innovation Fund now.

“We were able to do the project properly; we didn’t have to cut corners. We had six people involved in the project, we did user testing, we designed the screens, we talked to four hotels about how they did the check-in process.

“Our ecommerce solutions for hotel groups have to communicate with a central reservation system called Opera, which is owned by Oracle. We got the engineer from Opera over to our office for two days and we went through all the APIs of how this works.

“The product went live in two Dalata properties last July and has since been rolled out to another 24 hotels.”

The Agile Innovation Fund offers up to 50% funding to a maximum of €150,000 in grant aid for projects with a total cost of up to €300,000. It is designed to make it easier and quicker for smaller companies to access research, development and innovation funding. Agile’s main feature is its fast turnaround time, with an application process that results in decisions in a few weeks rather than several months.

The innovative approach p3 Hotels took carried an element of uncertainty. However, it wasn’t the first time that the company had shown the courage to do things differently. Since 2009, p3 Hotels hadn’t gone after any new business that was not a hotel but had maintained existing contracts with customers in other sectors. By 2016, these contracts still accounted for almost 30% of their revenue but Phelim took the tough decision to end all non-hotel contracts in order to focus exclusively on winning customers in that sector.

He says: “That was really hard – it was a big risk – but it was absolutely the right decision because before the money stopped coming in from our last non-hotel contract, we had already replaced it with a new large hotel group, Britannia Hotels.

“It’s serendipitous, isn’t it? The minute you let something go, your focus is different, and you allow new opportunities to come along. In the next two years we won five new hotel groups, doubling the number that we had.” says Pekaar.

The approach p3 Hotels has taken to achieving growth through innovation is paying off. The company’s revenue, which flatlined at €600,000 to €700,000 from 2008-2016, is projected to reach €1.2m this year.

The support of the Agile Innovation Fund has been instrumental in this growth. Phelim says: “Agile helped us turn our whole development process on its head. It provided the resources that meant we could develop a core software product that is scalable – one that can be rolled out to new customers. Previously, our work was all custom-built for individual customers.”

“We now have a very aggressive growth plan to target hotel groups in the UK, Europe, and the US. Oracle is now recommending us because of the value we bring to their Opera system. I would say that we were instrumental in Dalata rolling out Opera throughout all their hotels. We’ve also been instrumental in a number of other hotels staying with Opera when they go to a retainer process. Our hotel clients know that if they move away from Opera, they lose us – and we add so much value to the rest of their business.”

Apply for the Agile Innovation Fund now.

edtech

Edtech for the workplace: opportunity or obligation?

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As AI and automation change the nature of work and jobs rapidly over the coming years, edtech innovations must be ready to help people and organisations keep pace.

Jean Hammond of LearnLaunch, an edtech accelerator and innovation hub based in Boston, was keynote speaker at a conference organised by Enterprise Ireland and The Learning Forum in Dublin in June. At Impacts and Future Trends in the EdTech and Corporate Learning Landscapes, Enterprise Ireland-backed companies met industry experts and investors, to hear how education is changing, and the opportunities that change presents.

As automation becomes more widespread, the importance of soft skills – including complex problem solving, critical thinking and teamwork – will persist. In her keynote presentation, Jean asked: “Why do we call them soft skills? Because they’re really, really hard.”

 

Edtech is an unstoppable force

Edtech innovation is accelerating, as the ways people learn in school, university and the workplace undergo a major transformation. Workforce education is about to become intricately entwined with people’s careers, Jean explained: “We’ve had a history of thinking that there was a period of time, four years in college, and then you worked for ten years and then maybe went away for two weeks, or went back to education for a year, but that’s not what the world looks like now.”

This is a challenge facing society as a whole, Jean noted. She advised delegates not to solely focus on the next great start-up or innovation: “Don’t spend all your time thinking about the innovators. Think carefully about the innovation adopters. What does it take to adopt change?”

Industries must interact with edtech entrepreneurs and signal what they need, in order for start-ups to create the solutions required. If the market fails to tell innovators what it wants, it’s extremely unlikely that innovators will be able to develop the right solutions.

Jean described her role linking companies with start-ups: “I have probably seen over a thousand different edtech start-up business plans over the last ten years. We know what people are out there trying to work on.”

 

Impact of big data and machine learning

Technology has moved at an amazing pace over the past few decades. Jean advised that big data and machine learning will drive change even faster: “Machine learning can analyse any system and find out where there are problems, where there are issues, and then go and provide a way to address these.”

The challenge for edtech is to react to change in time, so that people can transition into new roles before their old tasks become automated or obsolete. Jean commented, “We need to make the systems and processes of learning and deliver them where we need them.”

 

Today’s edtech market

She explained that only about 2.7% of the global education market is currently digitised: “Probably it will max out at around 12% because we’ll always have teachers, we’ll always have humans as a part of the system, but across the next few years, there will be a lot of change.”

The market globally is worth around US $5.75 trillion, with that value projected to rise to US $10 trillion by 2030. Jean explained that education is the biggest sector to ever undergo digital transformation.

Delegate John O’Donnell of Irish curriculum management company Akari Software asked Jean about lifetime learning and how it may disrupt universities. Jean noted that a level of transformation is inevitable but that universities provide quality credentials and should start offering “bites of learning that can be delivered over and over again into a set of stackable credentials.”

After reaching a high in 2015, venture capital investment in edtech fell but is now rising again. A LearnLaunch study looked at where funding for edtech resides: “Clearly there are some things happening in formal education to bring an increased amount of skill training into the higher education and community college, or sometimes even high school. Then the workplace is delivering both functional skills and soft skills, with a high rate of company formation in technology.”

Jean said that some of the most intriguing innovations were the next generation of learning management systems (LMSs), new e-learning tools, advanced ways of looking at assessment and analytics, and credential management.

Companies who have never invested in edtech previously are entering the market (such as Walmart) and long-time funders are entering the process earlier. Jean explained that earlier engagement is intended to “push those start-ups in the direction that they need because start-ups will listen if you tell them what to do. They care about your opinion so they will be steering themselves to try and meet your needs.”

This is advanced strategic thinking, which will help ensure companies have the tools they need to upskill their workforce: “I don’t just think edtech is the opportunity of the decade, I think that we have to do this.”

Learn how Enterprise Ireland invests in new technologies with our range of innovation supports.

Business opportunities are heating up in Iberia

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Irish travellers visit Iberia in their droves – at least two million last year alone. But while we have long since exported our tourism to Spain and Portugal, the same cannot be said for Irish firms.

Given the proximity of Iberia’s Eurozone neighbours, with a GDP five times that of Ireland and offering gateways to growing domestic markets, as well as to Latin America and Africa, Irish exporters should take a closer look.

While Spain and Portugal joined Ireland, Italy and Greece as the hardest-hit economies during the crash, they have emerged, like Ireland, as reformed models showing above-average Eurozone growth.

 

New opportunities in Spain

Spain is the powerhouse of the peninsula with the country’s real GDP and job growth set to exceed that of the euro area for the fourth year in a row.

With 10 times the population of Ireland, Spain is the much larger market opportunity with a GDP of €1.2 trillion and a 2019 growth rate forecast at 2.1% by the IMF. While unemployment remains high at 14.7%, in key sectors such as telecoms, banking, travel tech and services, it has a wealth of expertise, as would be expected from a country home to telecoms and banking giants Telefónica and Banco Santander.

Spain’s logistics infrastructure is excellent, hosting two of Europe’s biggest airports in Madrid and Barcelona, while its 46 ports serve the Atlantic and Mediterranean, and its internal rail network is one of the most advanced in Europe. It has the digital infrastructure to match and ranks fourth in the world for e-government services.

 

Spain’s business renaissance

While the market has been perceived as more difficult to enter for exporters, this is changing as Spain continues to experience a post-crisis renaissance. Language remains a traditional barrier for entry, as does the country’s regional devolution, which poses challenges to marketing and product fits between areas.

At Enterprise Ireland’s Ambition Spain and Portugal event in Dublin, delegates heard how exports of companies supported by the agency totalled €338 million last year. Spain is a knowledge-based economy, where services account for around three-quarters of economic activity, the conference heard.

Irish firms may look to some of the strongest growing sectors, such as telecommunications, life sciences and agriculture. Telecoms is expected to grow to around €21 billion by 2022, with agriculture growing to some €27.4 billion.

Opportunities are there for Irish firms with innovative solutions willing to put in the market research, Gedeth Network founder Juan Millan told attendees.

“Irish companies are very well known for their innovation and their technology,” said Millan. “Consequently, we are very interested in Irish offerings in medtech, life sciences and fintech.”

Exporters should be aware that Spain acts as a bridge beyond the Eurozone, thanks to longstanding trade links from its colonial past to Latin America.

“It’s a good place to access decision-makers for firms in Latin America, as they have headquarters in Madrid and Barcelona,” he said. “And remember, Irish firms have great access to North America, the UK and Australia, which is equally of interest to Spanish firms. There is a natural synergy to be had and you should use this if you have activity in these markets as part of your negotiating position.”

Tourism remains huge at more than €180 billion per year – half the GDP of Ireland – and offers opportunities to Irish firms in travel tech. “Think not only about the sun and sangria,” Millan said. “But all the solutions you can offer to that market.”

 

Economic growth in Portugal

Being the smaller neighbour has not stopped Portugal transforming into a high-income advanced economy with a high living standard. Its growth forecast at 2.2% for 2019 is ahead of the likes of Germany, with unemployment steady at 6.8%.

The country’s major cities, Lisbon and Oporto, are the country’s major industrial hubs, with Lisbon accounting for banking and financial services, oil and gas and ICT hubs – and is now home to the world-class Web Summit founded in Dublin – while to the north there is a focus on manufacturing. Tourism is a valuable sector looking for travel tech solutions in a market centred mainly in the Algarve and expected to grow from around €22 billion last year to €27 billion by 2023.

Like its bigger neighbour, Portugal’s colonial legacy sees strong trade links remain, offering gateway trade opportunities to not only Brazil but African markets such as Angola.

According to Professor Jorge Sa, from the Swiss Business School, Portugal presents an untapped export opportunity to Irish firms worth around €3 billion. “There are great chances for firms working in pharma, organic chemicals, electronic equipment, essential oils, machinery and plastics,” he said.

 

Enterprise Ireland supports for expanding to Iberia

Accessing either market requires thorough research, and there are, of course, traditional barriers to entry such as mature supply chains and language issues, but there are a range of Enterprise Ireland supports to aid firms looking to future-proof their export sales including the Market Discovery Fund and GradStart, which provides up to 70 per cent of two-year salaries for graduates with relevant market language skills.

In the meantime, Enterprise Ireland’s office in Madrid is ready to assist Irish companies with ambitions to be more than just tourists to Iberia.

Man with lightbulb representing Innovation

Agile Innovation Fund: Easier than ever for companies of all sizes to access R&D funding

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It is now easier than ever for Irish companies to access R&D funding to improve their products and services and compete internationally.

That was the message from Enterprise Ireland and the national network of Local Enterprise Offices to representatives from more than 60 companies who attended a research, development and innovation event recently in Dublin.

Enterprise Ireland and the LEOs pledged to use the Agile Innovation Fund to support companies of all sizes as they to seek to open new export markets and grow – promising a fast, flexible and simple application process.

 

Find more information about the Agile Innovation Fund here.

Speaking at the Agile Innovation Workshop, Eoghan Hanrahan, Enterprise Ireland Regional Director for the Dublin Region and Regional Development, said: “In doing R&D, companies have to challenge the norms, do something different, look at achieving some kind of technical innovation to try and future-proof their company.

 

Get support for Agile Innovation

“We recognise that R&D can be challenging but it is a very important step for any business to take and it’s also important that they are supported in doing so. Enterprise Ireland and the LEOs are here to assist people and companies who want to invest in R&D. The Agile Innovation Fund offers up to 50% funding to a maximum of €150,000 in grant aid.”

Irish companies are spending less on R&D than most European competitors. Latest Eurostat figures show that spending in 2017 equated to 1.05% of GDP, almost half the EU average of 2.07% and well behind R&D leaders Sweden, Austria, Denmark and Germany – all of whom spent more than 3% of GDP.

Of the €3bn that was invested in R&D in Ireland, €1bn was spent by indigenous companies. It is notable that in 2007, Ireland spent a higher percentage of GDP (1.23%) on R&D than it did in 2017.

Joe Madden, Manager of In-Company R&D Supports at Enterprise Ireland, told the workshop that the Agile Innovation Fund was designed to counter the belief among SMEs that funding R&D is too costly and that securing state support for projects is too complex and geared towards larger operations.

 

Flexible and fast access to Agile Innovation funding

“The Agile innovation fund was introduced at the beginning of 2018 as a response to a very steep fall off in applications for R&D support,” Mr Madden said. “Companies were telling us that the standard R&D application process was too complicated and very often they would have a project finished before they even knew whether they were going to get approval to do it.

“We needed to introduce something much more flexible, much faster and where the funding wasn’t as high so that we could apply a less onerous process for evaluating and approving applications.”

The main feature of the Agile Innovation Fund is its fast turnaround time, with an application process that results in decisions in a few weeks rather than several months. More than 90 companies have drawn down around €20m in funding since it was launched last year, with 90% of them rating the application process as relatively simple in a survey.

Madden added: “There are only two documents required to apply for the Agile Innovation Fund, an online application form and a project plan. The project plan is what the technical assessment of the application is based on. The technical assessors are looking for two things: is this eligible R&D and are the costs reasonable. To be eligible R&D, there has to be technical uncertainty – this means the project must demonstrate some kind of product or process development technical challenge.

“Total expenditure on any single application is limited to €300,000, so if your project spend goes to €300,001, it is not eligible for funding. Typically for a smaller company, the funding would be 45% of the total cost, which equates to a maximum grant of €135,000. If a small company collaborates with a partner, this funding can rise to 50% and therefore the limit increases to €150,000.”

The goal of the Agile Innovation Fund is to increase the amount of spending by indigenous companies of all sizes on R&D across the economy.

 

Local Enterprise Office support

Oisin Geoghegan, Head of Enterprise at LEO Fingal, advised companies that are not Enterprise Ireland clients to get in touch with their Local Enterprise Office.

He said: “Providing assistance and funding for R&D projects or innovation is one of the core reasons why the Local Enterprise Offices are here. R&D is not just about wearing white coats and having a lab. Most of the businesses we are dealing with could potentially apply for and receive R&D grants

“We want to see more applications from SMEs and the LEOs will work with you to give you advice and guidance on the application process. It’s called Agile for a reason, the application process is straightforward, it’s online and we want to see applications processed and approved quickly.”

Apply for the Agile Innovation Fund now.

Irish start-up Hidramed aims to revolutionise wound care with innovative product

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“I think Ireland is a great place to be a female entrepreneur. There are so many networking opportunities and great support. It’s just a case of finding it and using it.”

Suzanne Moloney, Founder and CEO, Hidramed Solutions

Key Takeouts:

  • Need for a solution to a medical issue led to the development of an innovative wound management system.
  • Mentoring helped progress to happen quickly.
  • The right support is essential to success at every phase of the journey, from prototype to launch and beyond.

Case Study: Hidramed

Finding a solution to a problem leads to the development of innovative and vital products – or to put it another way, necessity is the mother of invention. One Irish entrepreneur who embodies this phrase is Suzanne Moloney, whose very real need for a solution to managing her medical issue led to the development of a new and innovative wound management system, HidraWear.

HidraWear is the first product from Hidramed Solutions, and was developed with the support of Enterprise Ireland’s Competitive Start Fund (CSF). Suzanne herself was the recipient of a grant from a round of the CSF for Women Entrepreneurs, and believes that it is this type of support that helps the growth of women in the business world. “I think Ireland is a great place to be a female entrepreneur – there are so many networking opportunities, great support – it’s just a case of finding it and using it.”

 

Hidramed Solutions was inspired by patient frustrations

Suzanne was inspired to start Hidramed Solutions and develop HidraWear when she found that her own frustration at managing her medical condition was shared by other patients. “I have a condition called HS, or hidradenitis suppurativa. It’s a debilitating disease of the skin that affects at least 1% of the population globally, and it’s incurable. It causes lesions in the skin in places like the armpit and the groin, quite sensitive areas, which would need to be covered with a bandage. I was a chef and a baker and quite physically active in my work, and to keep a dressing on my thigh or armpit would be virtually impossible – they’d just fall off due to the moisture in the area and the fact that these areas are not flat surfaces and need to move in multiple directions. I’ve come across other HS patients improvising with sanitary towels and kitchen paper – there was literally no solution there for HS patients.

Hidramed documentation“I found myself spending far too much time on trying to manage these dressings. The straw that really broke the camel’s back was when I attended a friend’s hen party and was talking to the groom’s mother. I was shaking her hand and a dressing just fell out of my dress. I always had this idea to develop some sort of solution and that just spurred me on to really find something that worked for HS patients.”

After initial work with a product designer that didn’t progress, Suzanne decided to try again, this time with the help of Enterprise Ireland. “I applied for a co-funded Innovation Voucher to develop a prototype with design experts at NCAD.”

The result was HidraWear. “The product removes the need for using adhesive on the skin, which can damage the skin around the lesion if you’re constantly putting bandages on the area, causing medical adhesive-related skin injuries (MARSI). We’re also giving back control to HS patients by making changing a dressing quick, painless and easy. It’s very discreet and convenient too.”

“It’s a Class one medical device, so the regulatory burden is quite low, which means we can roll it out to other countries relatively quickly.” says Moloney.

The product is scheduled for launch towards the end of 2019, initially in the UK and Irish markets, but the plan is to roll it out quickly into the US and throughout Europe. We are beginning with an armpit solution and then moving onto products for other areas of the body quite quickly. But we also plan to be a support system for HS patients – we want to help, not just be a dressing company.”

 

Getting support from prototype to launch

Going from prototype to launching a working product is a long journey, but Suzanne did the research and found plenty of support along the way. “We received a grant from the CSF for Women Entrepreneurs in 2018. We also received invaluable advice and guidance along the way. Through the mentoring programme, we were paired with Aileen McGrath, who is a marketing expert and highly skilled in ecommerce – which was really vital, as we are selling directly to the consumer, an unusual approach for a medical product.

“I made some mistakes at the start but once I got the right advice, things began to happen for me very quickly – particularly when I was accepted on the BioExel Medtech Accelerator Programme at NUI Galway, which is backed by Enterprise Ireland. This was a six-month programme that taught me everything I needed to know about developing a medical device and developing a business.”

Once the first product is launched, growing its distribution and developing more products are the next items on Suzanne’s list.  The company plans to sell direct to consumer to begin with but is developing reimbursement strategies for the UK and USA, with plans to sell into healthcare channels too.

“We also have a whole series of products planned for the future, for example, adhesive-free bandaging for elderly patients, venous leg ulcers and pressure sores. Our market entry point, however, is through HS.”

Under the Competitive Start Fund, up to €50,000 in equity funding is available to successful applicants with early stage start-up companies.

 

Founder & CEO Pharmapod

Pharmapod leads the way in reducing medication errors and improving patient safety

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“You need to be completely dedicated to finding the solution, and you need to sacrifice a lot. It doesn’t matter if you’re a man or a woman, you just have to have that fire in your belly.”

Founder and CEO, Leonora O’Brien

Key Takeouts:

  • Leonora O’Brien’s career as a pharmacist alerted her to issues regarding patient safety.
  • Pharmapod aims to be a worldwide solution to a global problem.
  • Local support has been invaluable for launching internationally.

Case Study: Pharmapod

If it takes a village to raise a child, as the saying goes, what exactly does it take to start and build a worldwide business? Support, dedication and even more support, says Leonora O’Brien, the founder of Pharmapod, a cloud-based system that aims to reduce medication errors by allowing healthcare professionals to record and share information with other healthcare professionals both within their country and globally.

“To succeed you need to make sacrifices and be dedicated to your business; it’s not for everyone,” she says. “There is support out there but you have to do the groundwork to find it. It’s up to you and your team to see what’s available and position yourselves to avail of it.”

 

Pharmapod offers a worldwide solution for a global problem

Pharmapod was established in 2012 with help and financial support from Enterprise Ireland, which has announced a new €750k Competitive Start Fund (CSF) for Women Entrepreneurs, opening for applications on 25 June 2019. The company aims to address what Leonora identified as a very real issue globally.

“Throughout my career as a pharmacist, I became aware of the issues regarding medication and patient safety,” Leonora explained. “At the same time, there was a growing legal obligation on pharmacists to record and analyse the risks to their patients. There was no solution in place, and being a chief pharmacist at Ireland’s biggest pharmacy chain at the time, I found that not having a system for recording patient safety issues was a real barrier for us as an organisation, and for the sector in general to learn and improve.

“You come across these issues on a daily basis, in pharmacies, hospitals and nursing homes, from the minor to the major, and many of these are preventable – we really needed a system that allowed healthcare professionals to learn from each other. Pharmapod is really fulfilling a need in the sector.”

The issue, Leonora says, is a global one – and Pharmapod is aiming to be the worldwide solution to the problem.

“To date, Pharmapod has been primarily active across three countries – Ireland, the UK and Canada – but we have recently signed a partnership agreement with the International Pharmaceutical Federation, The FIP, who has 144 members organisations internationally. We’re now starting to work through the different geographical regions with the FIP – for example the Middle East is a key focus area right now. No country is exempt from the issue – for instance, medical error is the third-leading cause of death in the United States – so this is a solution for a global issue.”

 

Global growth followed success in Ireland

The system grew steadily from its beginnings in Ireland – the secret to its success, Leonora says, is a great team dedicated to the solving the problem. “We launched initially onto the Irish market, and had some really excellent, brave and innovative pharmacists in Ireland who understood the benefits of such a system and took it on at an early stage. We have 30 people on our team now, and we are constantly evolving the system, keeping our ears to the ground for changes in regulations and responding to feedback and new requirements from users.”

A key turning point was the launch of Pharmapod into Canada. “At the moment, 58% of community pharmacies in Canada are using Pharmapod – and that number is growing. Ontario mandated for the system to be used in 2018; they have 45% of the pharmacies in the whole of Canada, but we already have pharmacy groups using it on a pan-Canadian basis too.”

Having local support has been invaluable when launching internationally, says Leonora – and this is where Enterprise Ireland came in. “We went for the Competitive Start Fund at the start of the business, and all the way through, Enterprise Ireland has been a great support to us. The Canadian office was fantastic when we were launching in the country, giving us advice on the local market, supplying contacts and connections, and including us in local activities. They really are an extension of your team, a great support for companies expanding internationally. They’re so well informed and helpful, an invaluable resource.

“Initiatives like the CSF for Women Entrepreneurs are addressing a real issue that’s still there. We have to remember, this is not only helping fix things for women, in terms of effective supports and role models, it’s benefitting the economy as a whole,” says O’Brien.

“For us, having that government backup has been really helpful. It lends weight to our offering and adds to our credibility in the eyes of customers and potential investors who might not have been familiar with the company before.”

Leonora’s experience has taught her that the support is there if you look for it. “I believe the biggest barrier is in your mind. You need to be completely dedicated to finding the solution, and you need to sacrifice a lot. Not everyone is prepared to do that. It doesn’t matter if you’re a man or a woman, you just have to have that fire in your belly.”

And for female entrepreneurs, the business world has never been more accessible or attractive. “In a very short period of time, we’ve made a lot of progress, and a lot of that is down to us as a country shining a light on the issue. Initiatives like the CSF for Women Entrepreneurs are addressing a real issue that’s still there; fixing this issue will not only benefit the economy as a whole, but will also help the next generation in terms of female role models – and very quickly the world can change in that way.”

Enterprise Ireland’s €750,000 Competitive Start Fund (CSF) for Women Entrepreneurs is open for applications between 25 June and 16 July 2019. Under this CSF, up to €50,000 in equity funding is available to a maximum of 15 successful women applicants with early stage start-up companies. In addition, up to 15 of the successful applicants will be offered a place on Dublin BIC’s INNOVATE accelerator programme.

wind turbines

Gearing up for success in the growing UK offshore wind sector

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Significant investment by the UK government and ambitious targets could create major opportunities for Irish businesses entering the UK offshore wind sector. Playing to your strengths is key to success, say industry experts.

Irish companies are in an ideal position to support and collaborate with the UK offshore wind industry, which recently received a big boost through a commitment made by the UK government to significantly expand its offshore wind industry. The ability to compete in what is now a global marketplace is vital to its success. This was the general opinion held by the industry leaders who took part in Enterprise Ireland’s Offshore Wind Forum and UK Industry Visit, which took place in Dublin in March 2019.

The event took place just a few weeks after the UK government announced ambitious plans to generate a total of 30 Gigawatts (GW) of offshore wind power by 2030 – a huge jump from the current operational capacity of 7GW. To fulfill such an ambitious target, over £40 (€45) billion will be invested in infrastructure. It’s also worth noting that the UK government has made a strong commitment to the investment regardless of the outcome of Brexit.

While a significant objective of the plan is to create jobs and regenerate rural coastal communities, therefore requiring local content (the plan aims for 60% local content), the offshore wind industry is a global marketplace, and the UK must engage globally in order to achieve such ambitious targets in a timely and cost-effective manner.

 

Competitive market

The race to find cheaper and more sustainable natural forms of energy is a global one, and not surprisingly, the offshore wind industry is a very competitive marketplace – and that competition is showing no signs of slowing down. Irish companies can find themselves competing with an established European supply chain, along with global entrants emerging from Asia, the Middle East and North America. So how can Irish companies stand out?

Alan Duncan of Scotia Supply Chain, and a speaker at the Enterprise Ireland Offshore Wind Forum, commented: “There’s no point in Irish companies being a ‘me too’. They must work out what they’re good at and play to those strengths.”

This was a general theme at the forum – but as showcased by Duncan and other speakers, Ireland has impressive strengths in several areas, and has an excellent reputation for innovation across key sectors. Thanks to our extensive marine heritage and history, Irish companies tend to be particularly strong and innovative in the areas of marine consultancy, offshore survey provision, technical authority and geotechnical services. With wind farms now being built further offshore and environmental challenges becoming ever more challenging, these services are becoming more and more vital. With the growth of floating offshore wind, the demand will be even greater.

Irish companies also possess strengths in the areas of high voltage engineering and civil engineering. Within the area of installation, which includes vessel design, ancillary engineering, component handling, port services and marine coordination credentials, Irish companies are considered extremely innovative and capable.

 

Meeting challenges

Building wind farms further offshore brings challenges beyond construction. Maintenance and repair work is time and capital intensive and the ‘race to zero’ (in terms of human interaction with turbines) is well and truly on. Finding innovative ways to reduce repairs and ensure wind farms are operating optimally is an area of real growth, with industry actively looking for the tools and services to expand the life cycle of assets.

Remote monitoring and data analytics are areas of strength for Irish companies, owing in large part to Ireland’s strong historical capability in the IT and IoT sector as well as our focus on technical innovation. Finding ways to gather data and remotely monitor assets is highly sought after and an area of the offshore wind industry that the Irish supply chain is poised for and ready to excel in.

However, when asset inspection and repair work is required, Irish companies can also deliver, with subsea cable repair and topside inspection and repair strengths.

Importantly, the UK industry has recognised the capability of Irish companies in these and other areas and is keen to work with them in order to find solutions to the challenges that lie ahead. This was evidenced by the number of offshore wind developers and top tier contracting companies that attended the forum, including SSE, Jan De Nul, EDF Renewables, and EDP Renewables. The key, says Duncan, is for Irish companies to work out where they fit within the supply chain and play to their strengths.

There is also power in numbers. Enterprise Ireland has launched an offshore wind cluster, which includes approximately 35 Irish SMEs that are in a prime position to meet the challenges posed by the expansion of the UK offshore wind industry. With over 80 companies earmarked by Enterprise Ireland for involvement, this cluster is sure to grow both in number and capability. The cluster also facilitates internal knowledge sharing and partnerships to place Ireland in an even stronger position to support the UK’s ambitious wind power plans.

For further information on Enterprise Ireland’s offshore wind cluster plans, please contact Darragh Cotter at: darragh.cotter@enterprise-ireland.com

 

Evolve UK – Food and Drink Manufacturing Webinar

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This webinar forms part of the Evolve UK Webinar series and examines the UK Food and Drink Manufacturing sector with expert insights provided by Fintan O’Leary, Managing Director, Levercliff.

Hosted by Kevin Fennelly of Enterprise Ireland UK, key points include:

  • An overview of the UK food and drink manufacturing sector

  • How Covid-19 has impacted the sector

  • The buyer sentiment in the Food and Drink Sector

  • The opportunities and challenges for Irish suppliers

  • The post-Brexit outlook in UK Food and Drink

Key questions to ask at your US Market Advisor meeting

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Ireland would fit into the US 130 times over and as you probably know there are cultural differences between the north and south, as well as the east and west coasts. For this reason, it’s important not to treat the US as one market, instead view it as 50 markets with four time zones. 

You should keep the following questions front of mind when having your first meeting with our dedicated team. 

  • What is the awareness of Ireland in this state?
  • What are the core sectors and what sectors should I avoid in this state?
  • Will I need a local partner company?
  • What kind of obstacles should I expect when entering the market in this state?
  • What local competitors are active in this market?
  • What taxes, charges or hidden costs should I be aware of?
  • Are there any social/political instabilities in this state that could affect my business here?
  • Are there any environmental instabilities in this state that could affect my business here?
  • What social norms should I be cognizant of when engaging in meetings with local people?
  • Will I need to set up an office in the state?
  • Will I need to hire local staff?
  • Can I relocate Irish staff in this region?

Set up a call with our team in the US today 

For more be sure to check out our Going Global Guide 

Enterprise Ireland’s top tips for entering the US market can be viewed by clicking the graphic below.

Water Sector

Time for the water sector to embrace innovation

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In late February 2019, Enterprise Ireland held a water innovation seminar in Dublin, collaborating with Wet Networks, an Arup and Water Research Centre (WRc) initiative – the first time the organisation held an event outside the UK.

The seminar brought together UK water utilities and their top tier contracting partners with Irish innovators keen to collaborate to overcome significant challenges.

The seminar addressed the sector at a crucial moment, as it faces into its most challenging regulatory period so far, Asset Management Period 7 (AMP7), which runs from 2020-2025. Water sector executives heard from Irish businesses offering a range of solutions in a series of innovation presentations

During AMP7, water companies in England and Wales expect to invest £50bn in service improvements. Among other aims, utilities plan to increase resilience to drought, cut water bills by 4% on average, and cut leakage by more than 16% over five years.

 

Innovation crucial to water sector during AMP7

Water company delegates at the seminar were clear – a focus on innovation will be crucial during AMP7. For instance, companies do not yet know how they will cut leakage by 16% but are acting on the belief that innovation will provide a solution.

Dr. Fabio Bacci of Glan Agua described the importance of the event in connecting water companies with innovators: “This type of forum is absolutely essential and fundamental for a successful innovation project”.

Glan Agua advocates for the value of combining resources. For a recent project in London, the company collaborated with project partners Mota-Engil and Blücher in order to bring its carbon-based synthetic absorbent for the removal of metaldehyde and other micropollutants from the domestic water supply to market.

 

Saving energy

Several Irish companies in the sector are enabling massive reductions in wastewater sector energy use. The water sector in the UK currently accounts for 3% of the total national energy demand.

One of the most sought-after start-ups in the Irish water treatment sector is OxyMem. Its membrane-aerated biofilm reactor (MABR) technology uses significantly less energy than traditional waste water oxygenation systems, which use large compressors to diffuse oxygen into water.

Wastewater needs oxygen, as the biology in the water that removes pollutants requires oxygen to live and grow. MABR delivers oxygen to wastewater in a similar manner as the human body does to cells, said John McConomy of OxyMem: “In your body, you have approximately 50,000 miles of blood vessels. That’s enough in one adult to go around the world two times. One of the primary objectives of those is to deliver oxygen on a concentration gradient to all cells in the body. MABR does the same; it has tiny hollow gas-permeable tubes, but there are no perforations. This is not a filter. We put it in the wastewater. We pass air through it, the biology grows on it and it sucks the oxygen on demand.”

SMEs can be agile and think differently to large players, explained Michael Murray of NVP Energy. He showed delegates how NVP Energy’s unique low-temperature anaerobic digestion technology is enabling the move to low-temperature, low-stress wastewater treatment. Unlike traditional methods, NVP Energy’s system works without the need for water to be heated, saving considerable amounts of energy.

Michael explained that when the company was established, a major driver for him and his team was to use the business to positively impact the environment: “We wanted to challenge the status quo to offer our customers simpler alternatives, simpler solutions to wastewater treatment.”

 

Using data

Companies in the sector are experienced at handling immense flows of water but now face a less familiar torrent: that of data. The industry is experiencing exponential growth in this area, raising two main issues: how to manage the data, and how best to utilise it. Energy Elephant’s Joe Borza explained that the challenge will grow. He noted that, for a fraction of the cost of its competitors, Energy Elephant provides one AI-powered location for a water company’s data.

The value of data has becoming a pressing issue in almost every industry, and Gearoid Ó Riain of Compass Informatics said his company is exploring if anonymised mobile phone or transport data could be utilised in the water sector. The company has been working with large UK water company Severn Trent, providing it with a biosolids management system: “It’s a system that has been working very well and has been generating real value back to the water companies over recent years.”

 

Rising to challenges

Compliance is a second major challenge that water companies currently face. “You must do it, you spend a lot of time doing it, and it has the ability to cause untold grief and angst, as well as actually costing real money,” commented Klir’s Denis Neavyn. Many companies also bear additional responsibility, as regulators. Klir’s software assists with compliance processes, enabling companies to progress from reactive to proactive systems, keeping track of what licences must be renewed, when and by whom.

For water companies to meet these challenges, they must recruit and retain the most capable staff, but Billy Glennon of VISION Consulting believes many suffer from a “culture of resignation”. He noted a tension in the sector between how companies conform to the standards of the industry and the creation of a space where innovators can take risks. He advised that it can be difficult to complete projects in water companies and that managers tend to be risk averse: “When you ‘over process’ things and you ‘over control’ things, you reduce the capacity for innovation. We’re in the culture transformation business. What we do is we transform those kinds of environments into vibrant, entrepreneurial cultures.”

Read how Enterprise Ireland enables companies to develop new market opportunities with its Innovation Supports. 

FAITH: Improving mental health care for cancer survivors

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H2020 FAITH team image and case study heading

“FAITH is potentially life-changing research. To achieve the ambitious goals of the project we needed to leverage our networks in Europe and build a consortium of experts.”


Philip O’ Brien, Technical Co-ordinator, FAITH Horizon 2020 project

Key Takeouts:

  • Walton, part of the Waterford Institute of Technology, is leading a project that aims to develop a model for mental health monitoring of cancer patients, to improve their quality of life.
  • The FAITH project has received €4.8m in funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme.
  • As well as co-ordinating FAITH, Walton is driving the development of artificial intelligence (AI) models and the deployment of a federated learning framework.

H2020 Case Study: FAITH

    Cancer remains the second leading cause of death globally and as many as one in five people living with cancer experiences depression and mood change post diagnosis. It’s a stark statistic and one that led researchers at Walton Institute, an ICT research and development centre within the Waterford Institute of Technology, to begin looking at the area of mental health in cancer patients to see if they could use their expertise to help. 

    “We believe the potential for ICT applications in health is massive. We had an initial idea about looking at markers of depression and when the Horizon 2020 call came out, which was specifically targeting improving the quality of life for cancer survivors, it was an opportunity to take the idea to the next level,” says Philip O’ Brien, technical co-ordinator of FAITH.

    The goal of FAITH (a Federated Artificial Intelligence solution for moniToring mental Health status after cancer treatment) is to provide an ‘AI Angel’ app that remotely analyses depression markers, such as changes in activity, outlook, sleep and appetite. When a negative trend is detected, an alert can be sent to the patient’s healthcare providers or other caregivers who can then offer support.

    The project uses the latest, secure AI and machine learning techniques within the interactive app located on patients’ phones. Key to the project is federated machine learning, which enables the patient’s personal data to stay within the AI model on each phone, guaranteeing privacy.

    “As the model collects data on a person’s phone it retrains itself to improve and personalize it for each individual.” explains O’Brien

    “As the model collects data on a person’s phone it retrains itself to improve and personalize it for each individual. But we also want to learn from all that data to gain insights that are beneficial to the broader population, so when a model updates, that update, rather than the person’s data is sent back to the cloud. All the updates are processed and a new, improved model is sent back out to everyone and that cycle repeats,”

     

    Another important aspect of the project is a focus on explainable AI, which is about ensuring that healthcare professionals can understand why the machine has reached a particular decision about the person’s mental health.

    “Explainable AI is extremely important for building trust. As AI impacts more and more on our lives the implications of this are huge,” says O’Brien.

     

    Why Horizon 2020?

    “It was clear from the start that to achieve the ambitious goals of the FAITH project we would need to leverage our networks in Europe and build a consortium of clinicians and technical experts. By breaking the project concept into a number of key objectives we then built our consortium based on specific expertise to achieve each objective,” says O’Brien.

    FAITH brings together partners from Ireland, Portugal, Spain, Italy and Cyprus into a strong multi-disciplinary team. Trial sites in eminent cancer hospitals in Madrid, Waterford and Lisbon, involving both clinicians and patients, are assessing the concept and feedback is being used to refine the model.

    As with most Horizon projects there are multiple dependencies across the various work packages and co-ordinating the whole presents some challenges. At the helm of FAITH is Gary McManus, Research Project Manager at Walton.

    “Different countries and organisations have different regulations and ways of operating so that’s one challenge. Also, from experience from previous projects, I knew it was important to remember that each partner, although working towards the global aim of the project, will have their own interests. Being cognisant of these sub-goals from the outset and, where possible, facilitating these in the overall planning process is essential,” says McManus.’

    “Different countries and organisations have different regulations and ways of operating so that’s one challenge. Also, from experience from previous projects, I knew it was important to remember that each partner, although working towards the global aim of the project, will have their own interests. Being cognisant of these sub-goals from the outset and, where possible, facilitating these in the overall planning process is essential,” says McManus.

    “But by having strong leaders for each work package, who are experts in their domain, we can be sure that delivery of each element will build towards the final offering.”

     

    Knowledge gain

    Having taken part in multiple Horizon 2020 projects, O’Brien believes that one of the great benefits is the extensive knowledge gain within a short period.

    “Being involved in a Horizon project is the opportunity to upskill rapidly and build on your underlying expertise. Through your links with other organisations across Europe you get an insight into different ways of working and you cross paths with people from many disciplines. For example, through FAITH we’ve been talking to a range of healthcare professionals and leveraging their experience.

    “The EU spends a lot of time and money with experts pinpointing the areas where we need to see technology improving to tackle specific challenges in the next five to ten years. By being involved in these projects you’re building on all of that knowledge rather than working in isolation. Then learning from the people you are working with across Europe pushes you up a level again.”

    Moreover, the end of a Horizon project is usually the beginning of something else.

    “One of our work packages is looking at what happens post project and how we take it to the next stage. We know bigger healthcare trials will be needed, for example. But from Walton’s point of view we’ve broken some new ground on explainable AI which has a lot of applications outside this project, so that’s an area we’d like to take forward. You need to be clear about how you build on the project, either in a well-defined follow-up project or by commercial exploitation of the output.”

     

    For further information about applying for support from Horizon Europe, the successor programme to Horizon 2020, please contact HorizonSupport@enterprise-ireland.com or consult www.horizoneurope.ie.