Back in the Helix in DCU for our first DICE conference of 2015 which was our Get Started conference. The day ahead consisted of entrepreneurs with different companies and different stories to tell. We were also going to have panelists from different areas of DCU and I was excited to learn about what its like setting up your own company.
Niamh Bushnell was our first speaker. She is the Dublin commissioner for Startups. Before she got this job she worked for a many companies including Frame Technology and World merchandise exchange. She also worked in New 
York as the VP for software for Enterprise Ireland. The two main aims she has as the startups commissioner for Dublin is to promote Dublin as a start up county internationally and her other aim is to promote collaborations with different companies within Ireland as it would benefit Irish companies a lot more if there was more collaborations between them. I felt that she focused a lot about her previous jobs rather than what she was doing now and although it was interesting I felt she could have gone into more detail about what her current position as the Startups commissioner entails .
Next up was David McKernan who is the founder and CEO of Java Republic. I found him to be the most memorable and captivating speaker from the 
conference. The company took 18 months to set up and is now the second largest coffee company in Ireland. What I really like about Davids talk was that he was direct, straight and honest about what he told us about his company and the process of setting it up. In 2002 he brought the Java brand to DCU and it was the first ever college they put the brand into. The brand grew by 20% every year until 2008 but got through the recession.
The reasons why the brand worked:
- he had a never ending drive
- he had a love of coffee
- he had a product people wanted
- he surrounded himself with great people
Richard Stokes, Eoghan Stack and Ronan Furlong
These speakers were slightly different to our usual speakers as they were all part of DCU and they all sat down as panelists and spoke about what their area of worked involved and then there was a Q&A.
Richard Stokes was the first panelist who is the Director of Innovation here at DCU. He works in the Invent centre which I’ve passed many times going to and from lecture but never actually knew what it was until now. They have been 
helping entrepreneurs start up new businesses since 2001. For me as a business student this is great knowing now that this facility could be of great use to me in the not so far off future if ever I wanted to start my own business. He told us how out of 35 spin-out companies they dealt with 11 still existed which is pretty good in relation to spin-out companies. He also explained to us how all theses companies are usually high risk and that the moment they have about 3-5 spin-out companies a year on average.
Ronan Furlong is the Executive Director of Innovation at the DCU Innovation Campus. Before the conference I had never heard of the Innovation Campus and as it turns out I don’t think most people had either as he explained how they don’t have a website, a brochure or a brand which is a shame I thought considering 
learnt what a great and interesting thing they do. He told us how the campus was previously the headquarters for Enterprise Ireland. He explained how their aim is to act as the new centre for innovation in the cleantech sector. Their campus has companies including Siemens, Veolia and Fujitsu from the areas of ICT, energy and health. The campus connects all theses companies together and help them to engage and interact with each other. I thought the whole thing was a great idea in helping companies to interact with each other so they can develop and grow.
Eoghan Stack is the Chief Executive at DCU Ryan Academy which is collaboration between DCU and Tony Ryan of Ryanair. He told us how the aim of the academy was to be ‘ the leading supporter of entrepreneurs and innovation in Ireland’. Some of what they do incuded: 
- tech venture program
- accelerator program
- online grad cert program
- DCU USTART
Next up was Kealan Lennon who is the founder and CEO of Clevercards. What they do is they are a company where you can have a personalised card made and sent from your smartphone. I though it was a really great because who doesn’t 
love a personalised birthday card! What I liked even more about Clevercard was that it connects to Facebook so its really easy to get your photos for your card. Their aim he told us was to be the largest gifting business in the world. 52% of their users are in the US and what I found to be extremely astounding was that they have 67% of the US population in their database considering they only launched the company 18 months ago.
Sean Ahern was next up who is the founder and CEO of Thankfrank. The company rewards goodwill such as posting nice comment to people online by
giving them credits in return they can get vouchers or donate to charity. He told 
us how 75% of the money made will go back to the people trusted rather than big companies. As much as I saw how he was trying to make the internet and social media a more caring place, if I’m honest the whole idea didn’t really appeal to me and I can’t imagine ever really fully partaking in it. However he did give some very good insight into starting your own company such as:
- If you can’t explain it simply you don’t understand it well enough
- ‘Failure is simply the opportunity to begin again, this time more intelligently’
- ‘ Coming together is a beginning, keeping together is progress, working together is success’- Henry Ford
Our final speaker of the day was Paul Kerley who was the previous CEO of Norkom. The company is a leading provider in the detection and combating of 
financial crime for companies. The company went from being work €1 million to €20 million in 4 years. The company tried twice for an IPO the first was unsuccessful but in 2006 the IPO was successful. He then sold the company for €220 million but it was important he to him that he was able to do it at a time where everyone who had invested and stayed in the company even through the rough times made money. I like how he did this as it showed how he valued the people around him who supported him which I think is very important in setting up your own company and throughout life itself.
So that was all the speakers from our Get Started conference. As you can see all the speakers had very different jobs and companies. I learnt that if ever I want to become and entrepreneur and start my own business that it’ll be hard work but if I really want it, it can be done and I just have to have people around me for support and don’t forget to appreciate them! I’ll be back again in April for our last conference, see you then!
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