Presentation of my Dissertation findings to Minister Bruton, Minister for Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation

        

In December I had a meeting with Minister Bruton (Minister for Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation) to brief him on findings from my Dissertation relevant to the work of his Department. My Dissertation examined the practical issues involved in the Higher Education-Enterprise Innovation Interface in Ireland using the Institute of Art, Design & Technology, Dun Laoghaire as a case study.

My recommendations that were relevant to the Department of Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation included:

• Introduce Mini Innovation Vouchers: To increase the level of engagement between students, SMEs and academic staff in key engagement enablers such as course projects and assignments it is recommended that a system of “mini” innovation vouchers be established. To a maximum value of €500 students (supervised by academic staff) complete projects on behalf of SMEs with similar processes as exists in respect of Innovation Vouchers.
• Justification – Such an initiative has the potential to create symbiosis at the interface and create a “tracer die” to measure the engagement objective mechanically. The low value of a voucher should not lead to complaints from providers in the private sector.
• Linkages with Enterprise Europe Network: To encourage all third level incubation centres to develop closer linkages with EEN. My recommendations at EEN’s annual conference in Warsaw included a similar recommendation to “Focus at developing long term collaborative relationships with “wholesale” producers of SMEs that need the input of the EEN for example third level incubation centres.”
• Justification –  To avoid duplication of IP creation, to help Irish start-ups leverage relevant IP that is available in Europe and to improve the export growth prospects of start-ups through European partnerships.
• Annual regional survey of skill needs: That the County Enterprise Boards be given the role of formally identifying regional enterprise skill needs via an annual survey in their county (carried out by an IoT) and that this be formally integrated into the strategic activities of the relevant HEIs and the relevant County Council County Development plan reviews where appropriate.
• Justification: Will serve to improve alignment of the activities of the HEIs more directly with the needs of SMEs regionally. Has the potential to increase alignment of relevant activities between Enterprise Boards, County Councils and HEIs(a mini Triple Helix).
• Accelerate the introduction of Knowledge Transfer Partnerships – this was a recommendation of Innovation Taskforce and would be helpful in creating increased symbiosis at the interface.
• Justification: In Northern Ireland this instrument has been successful at creating symbiosis at the interface, it enables academic staff to interact with enterprise on joint agendas (which can subsequently lead to “up-selling” opportunities for the HEI).
• Assign resources to the entry of students in relevant international competitions: That Enterprise Ireland be given the role of structuring a national framework encouraging high quality entries in relevant international student competitions that are relevant to the image the state wishes to project. EI would identify international competitions (or play a role in creating them), co-ordinate entry across HEIs (to encourage strongest entries) and provide soft resources to the supervising academic staff and students (mentors from the EI Mentor Programme for example).
• Justification: The winning by IT Sligo of a top prize in Microsoft’s international Imagine Cup competition generated considerable positive publicity internationally for Ireland’s education system and workforce.

My Social Media Strategy workshop with Enterprise Europe Scotland

I ran a social media workshop for Enterprise Europe Scotland in July 2011.

The objective of the workshop was to evaluate the effectiveness of the network’s current strategy in order to identify how to best use their web presence and social media to support their goal of supporting SMEs. There were two intertwined themes to the workshop in seeking to combine to best advantage the activities of Enterprise Europe Scotland and those of the SME client. They are a very enthusiastic group of people and are making a real difference to Scottish SMEs.

Feedback from client:

Eoin recently facilitated a workshop to help us evaluate our online presence and strategy. Eoin provided a new and knowledgeable voice to the team and had a real understanding of what we were trying to achieve. The day was well structured and engaged those of us already using social media for our business and newcomers alike. We were very pleased with the workshop and would like to thank Eoin for his expertise.

Elizabeth
European Business Advisor, Scottish Enterprise

My work with Info2Innovate regional workshops for Enterprise Europe Network

I’m down in Sligo at the moment working with Enteprise Europe Network on the EU SME innovation supports mapping workshops. Between now and June 2012 a series of workshops, focus groups and seminars will be organised by EEN in respect of SME innovation. The project is part of an EU wide initiative intended to identify the innovation supports available to SMEs and the main obstacles that SMEs experience in trying to engage in innovation. Here is the EU project outline:

My short presentation to the main event before our workshop:   Slides for Eoin Info2Innovate – Short presentation

In addition to identifying the obstacles to SMEs engaging in innovation another objective was to receive feedback on the new EEN Info2Innovate Directory. The Info2Innovate Directory is part-funded by the EU and is managed by the Enterprise Europe Network in Ireland as part of the Competitiveness and Innovation Framework Programme (CIP).  The Directory contains information relevant to SMEs seeking information on Innovation and Supports and Services available to Irish SMEs.

Feedback from the organiser on my input

We have just commenced our workshops to streamline / test our new EEN Directory on Innovation Services & Supports for SMEs in Ireland. Eoin has joined our team and took on the role as moderator for these workshops.
His knowledge on the subject matter and subsequent lead-in presentation on Innovation sets the right tone for a balanced discussion with the participants. We are delighted Eoin has joined the EEN team for this important piece of work for DG Enterprise in Brussels.

Jan Gerritsen
Manager Enterprise Europe Network at Enterprise Ireland

My presentation to the Enterprise Europe Network Annual Conference in Warsaw

I was invited over to the annual conference in Warsaw to present on the preliminary findings of my Dissertation at the Enterprise Europe Network Annual Conference.

The programme:

My slides: Connecting SMEs to international opportunities and IP – the ecosystem approach

Feedback from Member of Organising Team

Dear Eoin,

Thank you very much for your presentations. We have already had great feedback about your sessions and you definitely brought a new dimension to our conference.

Please stay in touch and we hope to see you again soon.

Good luck with the dissertation.

Best regards,
Susan
Communications Officer, European Commission

Thank you letter Mr Costello

My talk at the Dublin City Enterprise Week

DUBLIN CITY ENTERPRISE WEEK 2008 – FOCUS ON TECHNOLOGY

====How to raise investment======

What are investors seeking

Type of investors – Ent Board, banks, Enterprise Ireland, VC (rarely an option)

What they want

- VALUE – “Where’s the value” is the first question an investor wants answered, is it primarily the customer base or the IP.

- INCOME – Locked in, annually recurring income from quality customers.

- EXIT – A clear, credible exit strategy

- Something extra/special (this comes last not first)

What investors don’t like

- High sunk cost before start making money
- Over optimistic estimates of market worth
- Lack of focus

======How to successfully sell a business======

- Start with the end in mind – have a good idea of your exit strategy when you start your business. If you have a long term potential acquirer in mind make sure you make them aware of your existence at an early stage.

- Be Ready to respond at all times to an approach – Keep standard operating procedures such as monthly management accounts, software licensing records, customer contracts all referenced and up to date. If someone comes knocking on the door you may only have a window of a couple of months to get the deal complete, delays in due diligence increase the risk of a purchaser walking or a recession getting in the way!

-What you get will usually be based on turnover rather than profitability (ESAT example where turnover was ramped up at a loss in the final years before takeover)

======Opportunities in the I.C.T. industry======

It depends on whether you want a lifestyle business that provides you with a living (one or two customers that account for 90% of your business) or going the medium term exit route (opportunities in software as a service).

A major change is the Semantic Web whereby what is termed the productisation of traditional business services will occur with increasing rapidity. Amazon and ebay started it, then moved to betting, travel. Next phase will be “local” traditional services such as book keeping, graphic design,legal services.

I would restrict myself to where Enterprise Ireland are focussing their efforts: Internationally traded services. There are opportunities for companies as the ESRI requires that services account for 70% (as opposed to 43% at the moment) of our exports by 2025.

The Lexicon Gulf – crossing the divide between what you think you are selling and what web searchers think they need

I did research when setting up Omniserve on how there is a gap between what businesses believe they are selling (and in the terms they use to describe it) and what their intended audience are looking for (in the terms that they type into Google when searching). Please see attached. Lexicon Gulf slidedeck

Your website as your invisible staff member – leveraging virtual resources

Here is my address to the 2008 Online Edge Conference

online-edge-conference may 08

My talk to start-up online businesses at the NI Business Innovation Centre programme

NORIBIC_Castlereagh_Presentation[1]

Festival of Innovative Practice – Overall graduate entry Prize Winner

I am giving a talk at this http://screencast.com/t/bWxwqFVrBt0  event having won the overall prize in the graduate essay competition they ran in conjunction with the event http://screencast.com/t/RcF8YWloNkB  - Please drop in if you are near Jordanstown on the day, it would be great to see you.

Here are the slides from my talk: Putting graduate education at the heart of an ecosystem

Photos of the presentation

My presentation to the Enterprise Europe Network Conference 2011

My slide decks

Web 3.0 and International Innovation
Workshop 9