Peter Jensen is CEO and Chairman of Normax, an mRNA vaccine R&D and manufacturing company headquartered in Cork, Ireland. He founded the company in 2020 and has since raised €300 million in pre-IPO capital. Peter has extensive expertise in life sciences, computer sciences, finance and distributed ledger technology. Peter earned a Master of Fine Arts (MFA) at UCLA Motion Picture Film and Television Producer’s Program (1988) and a Bachelor of Arts (BA) in Biological Sciences at UCSB (1980). A true entrepreneur, he invented and delivered the world’s first real-time tissue realistic 3D surgical training system for robotic laparoscopic surgery, in cooperation with SINTEF and The Intervention Centre research and development centre for image guided and minimally invasive therapy at Oslo University Hospital and Faculty of Medicine at University of Oslo. Peter is focused on delivery of social enterprise ventures with competitive financial returns and extraordinary social impact.

Éimear Moloney, Non-Executive Director, Kingspan Group plc, Irish Continental Group plc, Hostelworld Group plc and Chanelle Pharmaceuticals Group

Éimear has a B.A. Accounting and Finance and MSc. Investment and Treasury from Dublin City University and is a fellow of the Institute of Chartered Accountants in Ireland. Éimear is a non-executive Director Kingspan Group plc, Irish Continental Group plc, Hostelworld Group plc where she chairs the Audit Committee, and Chanelle Pharmaceuticals Group. Prior to taking up her board roles Éimear held a senior investment manager role in Zurich Life Assurance (Ireland) plc, for over 20 years up to December 2017, with responsibility for asset allocation. During her career in Zurich, Éimear managed the Irish, US and UK equity portfolios. Eimear has an excellent understanding of capital markets and macro-economics having spent the majority of her career analysing companies, focusing on their strategy and ability to drive shareholder returns. Éimear is also a member of the Institute of Directors in Ireland.

Brian O’Connor, Investment Director, Ireland Strategic Investment Fund (ISIF)

Brian is a Senior Investment Director at the Ireland Strategic Investment Fund and leads the Scaling Businesses investment team. His team’s remit covers commitments to growth equity, private equity and debt platforms, through which ISIF’s capital supports many scores of Irish companies. It also includes ISIF’s direct investments via debt and equity. ISIF’s long term goal is to support the development of a robust Irish funding ecosystem and to spur the growth of more and larger Irish businesses that can compete globally. Brian has been with ISIF for eight years and in his prior career he worked as a civil engineer, in software and for a family office. He holds a degree in Civil Engineering from University College Cork and an MBA from the Smurfit Business School in UCD.

Tara Dalton, CEO, Altratech

Dr Dalton is a faculty member in the School of Engineering at the University of Limerick, and a fellow of the Irish Academy of Engineers. She is one of the founders of Stokes Bio – a spin-out company that was sold to Life Technologies that developed high throughput microfluidic instruments for PCR. She is currently the CEO of Altratech – a start-up developing molecular diagnostics for point of care applications. Her research interest is in the development of microfluidic devices for biological assays. She has graduated 20 PhD Students, published over 100 refereed papers and has over 50 granted patent and patent applications.

Claire McHugh, CEO & Co-Founder, Axonista

Claire McHugh is co-founder and CEO of Axonista, the award-winning video technology company that powers interactive video commerce for global e-commerce brands such as QVC and HSN, helping them to increase sales. Axonista is a remote-first company with a team of 47 in Ireland and Europe. Claire is currently scaling Axonista, as it expands the video commerce capabilities of its platform for media companies and e-commerce marketplaces.

Claire’s career spans TV and digital media. She is a member of the Board of Directors of Scale Ireland, and of the Irish Film Institute. She has experience as an expert evaluator in the European Innovation Council and Creative Europe Media grant funding programmes. In 2017 Claire was awarded Image Magazine’s Businesswoman of the Year for Digital, Science and Technology.

Clive Lennox, VC & Investor Relationships, Silicon Valley Bank

Based in Ireland, Clive Lennox is a director of Silicon Valley Bank and works closely with technology and life science companies of all sizes. Silicon Valley Bank offers credit solutions from EUR1m to EUR100m plus at every life stage of a business; including venture & growth loans, working capital, acquisition finance, leveraged financing and a full corporate suite. Clive heads up Silicon Valley Bank’s investor coverage for US VCs and CVCs investing in EMEA. Previously, Clive set up SVB’s Irish office and built and managed SVB’s EMEA FX Trading desk in London. Prior to joining Silicon Valley Bank, Clive founded Clear Treasury, a FCA regulated payments business in London. Clive holds an EMBA, a master’s degree in International Banking and Finance and a bachelor’s degree in Actuarial and Financial Mathematics.

David Bateman, Managing Partner, Claret Capital

David Bateman is a Senior Managing Director – European Growth Capital of CCP, which will act as investment advisor to the Portfolio Manager. David has more than 20 years of experience in technology lending and financing. Prior to joining HMC in January 2013, he and Johan co-founded Benefide, a firm focused on originating specialty debt transactions on a deal-by-deal basis, closing eight transactions over an 18 month period. From 2002-2011 David was with ETV Capital, one of the leading providers of European growth loans at the time, where he was responsible for originating investments and served on the Board of the company and was an alternate on the company’s investment committee. Prior to ETV, David worked at Broadview International, where he spent 7 years originating and executing technology M&A and financing transactions. David earned a BA at Trinity College Dublin, a Diplomkaufmann from EAP-ESCP and a Masters in Finance at the London Business School. David is a citizen and resident of Ireland.

Denise Sidhu, Partner and Director, Kernel Capital

Denise Sidhu is a Partner and Director at Kernel Capital. An active investment committee member across all the Kernel Funds with particular responsibility for transactional legal’s and compliance. Denise is a board member with portfolio investees Cirdan Imaging, B-Secur, Nova Leah and Kianda Technologies. Denise is also a Board Member of the Irish Venture Capital Association. Prior to joining Kernel in 2001, Denise’s corporate finance experience varied from debt financing as Head of Finance in Ulster Bank Commercial Finance Limited and to trust and private banking in her role as Financial Controller of The Bank of Nova Scotia, Channel Islands. Denise is a Certified Public Accountant and a Licentiate of the Compliance Institute in Ireland.

Donal Mac Nioclais, Investment Director, Waterland Private Equity Investments

Donal Mac Nioclais is an Investment Director in the Dublin office of Waterland, a leading European mid-market private equity firm. Prior to joining Waterland, Donal was Vice President of Strategy & Development at CRH plc, where he led M&A and strategy activities for the group’s heavy materials divisions in Western Europe and Northern US. Earlier in his career, he was the CEO of an Irish biotech start-up and held a variety of roles in strategy consulting and renewables site development.

Ivan Yates, Entrepreneur and Broadcaster

Ivan has had unique life experience in politics, business and media. A former government minister and Wexford TD for more than 20 years; an entrepreneur who founded and developed Celtic Bookmakers to employ 400 people, with €200 million turnover.
He bounced back from bankruptcy in Wales in 2012 to become a highly successful national broadcaster presenting The Hard Shoulder on Newstalk and co-presenting The Tonight Show with Matt Cooper on Virgin Media1.
In 2014 he published his best-selling autobiography, Full On with acclaimed reviews.
His original forthright style of entertaining punditry and analysis on the full range of current affairs and sport has made him a much sought after motivational public speaker at corporate and formal events. He also acts as a versatile conference facilitator/moderator, MC with a flair for asking the questions that need answering.

Kevin MacSweeny, Head of New Investments & Origination, Broadlake Capital

Kevin heads up New Investments for Broadlake, along with Origination of Acquisitions and Investments for Broadlake’s portfolio partner companies. He works closely with the Founders and CEOs of the Broadlake partner companies on their acquisition strategies and their origination process to completion. Broadlake actively looks for ambitious Entrepreneurs with great teams and supports them on their growth journey through both organic and acquisitive growth strategies.

John Phelan, All Ireland Director, Halo Business Angel Network (HBAN)

John has been involved with Angel funding since 2006 and is the All Island Director of the Halo Business Angels Network (www.hban.org) which has invested over €150m of private funds in over 650 companies. HBAN manage 13 Syndicates on the Island of Ireland and four international Syndicates in New York, London, Singapore and Dubai.

John has started and managed companies in the USA, the UK and Ireland. These include founding and co-founding companies in Artificial Intelligence, Animation and GM of a games company in Chicago. John is involved with all stages of funding (Equity, Debt, Grant, R&D) and stages of development from M&A exit transactions, Series A, Seed and R&D.

Tom Early, Head of Funding and Scaling Solutions, Enterprise Ireland

Currently responsible for developing Enterprise Ireland’s (EI) strategic engagement with rapidly scaling clients with a particular focus on the funding ecosystem. A key aspect to this role is intensive engagement with Scaleups to discuss their funding strategy and assist in their fundraising. Previously held the position of Head of Equity and Legal, responsible for the EI investment strategy and managed a portfolio of 3,600 investments that cost €433m.

A strong track record in assisting clients from a wide variety of sectors at various stages in their lifecycle, in the development and implementation of their growth strategy, helping them to identify and secure the most appropriate form of finance necessary to achieve scale. Prior to joining Enterprise Ireland, worked for over 9 years across multiple industries including telecoms, banking and consulting.
A qualified CIMA Accountant, with a Master of Business from the IMI and a degree in Business Studies (specialising in Economics & Finance) from Waterford Institute of Technology. In addition, completed executive training courses in IMD (Switzerland) and EVCA.

Ronan Horgan, CEO, Capitalflow

Ronan Horgan is CEO of Capitalflow Group which he co-founded back in 2016 with Pollen Street Capital, a specialist financial services Private Equity firm. Since beginning life as a start-up, Capitalflow has advanced over €850m to a range of Irish businesses across all sectors and geographical regions. The company currently employ 80 people from its two main offices in Dublin.
In July 2021 Capitalflow was acquired by bunq, a Neobank with a full European Banking licence regulated by the Dutch National Bank. bunq operates in over 30 European countries offering a range of comprehensive banking offers for personal customers and sole traders. After gaining Central Bank of Ireland authorisation, bunq recently established a branch in Ireland and is the first digital bank to offer accounts with Irish IBANs.
Ronan has had an extensive career in banking dating back to 1993 during which time he experienced lending through all the economic cycles, and as a result he is a strong advocate for supporting business owners through the range of ups and downs they must endure. Ronan is focussed on continuing to create a unique customer centric offering in the financial services market in Ireland and continuing to grow a team who are passionate about putting customers first in everything they do. During the pandemic, Ronan completed a diploma in Corporate Governance with UCD Michael Smurfit Graduate Business School.

Sonia Neary, CEO & Co-Founder, Wellola

Sonia Neary is the CEO & Co-Founder, of Wellola. Wellola is an innovative digital health software company, whose founders believe only the sickest of the sick should be hospitalised and that the future of healthcare is preventative, community-based and supported by digital tools. With over seventeen year’s previous experience working as a Physiotherapist in the Irish healthcare setting, Sonia is a big believer in leveraging digital technology to support hospital-at-home and self-management care models. She champions Wellola’s mission to offer care-enabling technology, which arms clinicians to keep well people well (and treat those that are unwell) in the community where possible, maximising clinical & economic outcomes & optimising patients’ healthcare experiences. An advocate for greater gender diversity in entrepreneurship, Sonia was honoured to represent Ireland as a finalist in the global ‘Women Who Tech’ awards in Paris (2019), and to accept both the Runner-up award for the IBEC ‘Digital Health Innovation of the Year’ and the ‘Integrated Care’ award from the Irish Medical & Surgical Trade Association on behalf of Wellola (2020).

Conor O’Sullivan, Investment Director, Atlantic Bridge

Conor joined Atlantic Bridge in 2021 where he focuses on identifying and evaluating new investment opportunities for the University Bridge Funds. Prior to joining Atlantic Bridge, Conor was based in London where he was Vice President at Paladin Capital, one of the most active early-stage venture capital investors in the cybersecurity sector. Before Paladin Conor was Investment Manager at Seraphim Capital, the largest investment group dedicated to investing in space technology start-ups. Following his MBA at the University of Oxford, Conor joined the Satellite Applications Catapult, a space research and technology centre funded by the UK Government, as Head of Business Strategy supporting over 100 start-ups. Prior to this Conor worked in sales, trading and operational roles for 5 years at two global investment banks. Conor holds an MBA from the University of Oxford and a BA in Business and Economics from Trinity College Dublin.

Helen Cahill, Founder & CEO, InvoiceFair

Helen Cahill is a Founder and CEO of fintech innovator InvoiceFair.com. Her 3 decades in financial services comprises experience from trading rooms through Treasury and FX Management to wealth management. A UCD graduate, Helen cut her financial teeth in the trading room of Barclays Bank in Dublin whilst simultaneously pursuing a Masters in Business with UCD. Progressing into the world of Treasury and FX Management, Helen found a natural home for many years dealing with the intricacies of the foreign exchange and investment arena. But it was her time in wealth management in 2010-2012 where the inspiration for InvoiceFair.com emerged. Institutional investors, exploring new opportunities to position funds, were open to deploying funds into receivables as an investment asset class. Seizing this opportunity, Helen and co-founder Peter Brady created an innovative technology platform that established a bridge between those investors and scaling Irish companies that allowed them to regain control of their growth in a way not considered by the pillar banks.

Sarah Bogossian, Director, Corporate Finance, Investment Banking, Goodbody Stockbrokers

Sarah is a Corporate Finance Director within Goodbody’s Investment Banking division with over 20 years’ experience of working closely with high growth companies to raise capital (debt and equity) and pursue M&A strategies. With a strong international network of investors (VC, PE, Institutional, Sovereign Wealth, Patient capital), credit providers and corporate connections, Sarah assists high growth companies effect transactions at pace for value maximisation. Prior to Goodbody, Sarah spent 3 years at EY as a Director of Corporate Finance in the Strategy & Transaction Dept and previously worked for a range of banks and investment funds providing equity funding, corporate finance, corporate banking and strategic advice. Member of World M&A Alliance. Masters from UCD Graduate School, BA (Bus, Econ) from Trinity College Dublin. Also a kitesurfer and fan of all things equestrian.

Don Harrington, Director, Corporate Finance, Investment Banking, Goodbody Stockbrokers

Don Harrington is a M&A and capital raising specialist having spent more than 25 years helping many of the leading growth and family-owned businesses in Ireland and the UK maximise their value through IPO, M&A, restructuring and disposals. Don’s advisory experience covers both public and private companies, Private Equity firms as well as the semi state sector. Don’s international network of contacts spans Institutional Equity/Cross Over funds, PE, Sovereign Wealth Funds, Venture Capital, Family Office and strategic investors /acquirors. Don joined Goodbody in 2007, having previously spent six years investing in technology and medtech companies for Trinity Venture Capital, and an earlier advisory career at Davy and EY UK. Member of the Enterprise Ireland Seed & Venture Capital Committee. BComm from University College Galway. Qualified as a Chartered Accountant.

John Flynn, Director, Corporate Finance, Investment Banking, Goodbody Stockbrokers

John is a Corporate Finance Director within Goodbody’s Investment Banking division with over 19 years’ experience advising publicly quoted and privately owned companies across multiple industries on capital raising (equity and debt) and M&A. John has advised companies in Ireland, the UK, France, USA and South Africa. Prior to Goodbody, John worked for Credit Suisse in London (specialising in UK M&A and equity capital markets) and AIB in Dublin, New York and LA (specialising in US leveraged buyouts). John has a BComm from University College Dublin and is a Qualified Accountant.

Ríona Ní Ghriallais, Co-Founder, ProVerum

Ríona is a biomedical engineer and the Co Founder & CTO of ProVerum, an Irish medical device company developing ‘ProVee’, an innovative treatment for Benign Prostatic Hyperplasia (BPH). Their technology offers patients a minimally invasive, highly differentiated treatment option from existing surgical and drug therapies. In 2021, ProVerum received FDA IDE approval to commence its pivotal US trial, and closed a €30 million Series A equity financing, to support the Company’s clinical programme and operating activities in pursuit of regulatory approval for their technology in Europe and the US.

Jim Joyce, Chief Executive Office, Co-Founder & Executive Director, HealthBeacon

Jim co-founded HealthBeacon with Kieran Daly in 2013. Prior to HealthBeacon, Jim was the CEO of Point of Care Health Services which he established and sold to Uniphar plc. Jim has held senior positions with Schering-Plough (now Merck & Co. Inc,) as General Manager of Ireland and Director of Finance for Europe, Middle East, Canada and the United States. Prior to the pharmaceutical industry, Jim worked in financial services for investment firms of Smith Barney, Brown Brothers Harriman and AG-Edwards. Jim holds a BA in Economics from Fordham University and an MBA from University College Dublin.

Mike McGrath, CEO & Co-Founder, Kwayga.com

Mike McGrath is CEO and co-founder at Kwayga.com, which is an online sourcing platform serving the European food and drinks sector. Mike has 15 years’ experience in sourcing and procurement and prior to Kwayga, Mike was Managing
Director of Arvo since he founded the company in 2010.

In 2012, Mike was appointed by the European Commission to the e-tendering Expert
Group (eTEG), which defined a blueprint for public procurement within the EU and previously founded the eSourcing platform “supply.ie”

Chris Burge is CEO of Spark CrowdFunding, an equity investment platform based in Dublin. The platform facilitates the equity investment into SMEs and start-ups through a blended mix of VCs, Angels, HNWs and ‘the crowd’. Chris has been an active investor in a number of businesses over the years and is a mentor for start-up businesses. Chris has started a number of successful businesses over the years. Earlier in Chris’ career he was an engineer and has worked across the world in countries in Asia, Africa, North America and Europe.

Niall Jones is the Head of Listing for Ireland and the UK at Euronext. Niall joined Euronext in 2019 with 15+ years of experience in corporate broking and investment banking in Dublin and London. Niall leads Euronext Dublin’s IPO ready programme and works with the domestic and international capital markets’ ecosystem to support existing and prospective issuers.

Martina Fitzgerald, CEO, Scale Ireland

Martina Fitzgerald is the CEO of Scale Ireland, the independent not-for-profit organisation which represents and advocates on behalf of Ireland’s tech start-up and scale-up companies. There are currently 2,200 indigenous tech start-up and scale up companies, employing 55,000 people across Ireland. Martina has almost twenty years senior level communications experience as a leading political journalist and best-selling author.

She is a board member of Dóchas, the Irish Association of Non-Governmental Development Organisations in Ireland and a member of Ireland’s independent National Screening Advisory Committee.

Conor McGinn, Co-Founder & CEO, Akara Robotics

Conor McGinn is a renowned robotics expert, with accolades including being named on the JCI Ireland Ten Outstanding Young Persons Awards (TOYP), MIT Technology Review on its Next Generation of 35 Innovators Under 35 list, and receiving the Engineers Ireland Excellence Award for Innovation. His work has been featured in Forbes and on the cover of Time magazine. Conor has been working on developing robots since he was a teenager, and in 2019 he co-founded Akara to pursue his vision to modernise public health through data-driven automation that improves room utilisation and makes buildings safer. Conor earned Bachelors and PhD degrees from Trinity College Dublin, before becoming the University’s first Robotics Professor and establishing the Robotics and Innovation Lab.

Lauren Sharpe, Investor, BGF

Lauren Sharpe is an Investor at BGF Ireland. BGF is the number 1 growth capital investor across Ireland and the UK, partnering with founders and management teams to accelerate expansion. Lauren’s role is to identify and execute minority investments, across a wide range of sectors. Lauren is a board member with portfolio investees Revive Active, Action24, Tigers Childcare and Winterbrook. Prior to joining BGF, Lauren worked with KPMG’s Corporate Finance team for eleven years. During this time she focused on equity and debt fundraising, mergers and acquisitions in Ireland, UK and USA.

Gavin Fox, Director, Martinsen Mayer

Husband and Father of 2 amazing girls and a son.
Director / Partner in Martinsen Mayer Technology Recruitment. Founder of Dublin Tech Talks; a leading meetup and podcast series.
A recruitment geek for nearly 15 years working with some of the biggest brands globally. Currently focused on building Martinsen Mayer focused on helping venture-backed organisations scale their teams.I am a specialist in technology hires, focusing on product-centric roles and strategic hires to help companies grow. I focus my efforts on building long term relationships allowing me to use my network to find unique candidates and the best talent for my clients allowing them to focus on their day job.

John is 37 years old and is from Killarney, Co Kerry. He has an honours BSc Finance degree from University College Cork, is a retired award-winning Army Captain and also has an MBA from Smurfit Graduate Business School in Dublin. John started out his career working as an Equity Analyst at Goodbody Stockbrokers where he was recruited and mentored by Colin Hunt. John then went on to join the Army Cadet School of the Irish Defence Forces, where he served for 9 years and completed one tour overseas with the United Nations in Lebanon. John founded Gigable in 2018 with the basic idea of using mobile technology to connect local freelance workers and businesses together for flexible shift work, underpinned by quick and easy payments systems. Since then, he has built the business to operate in IRL and the UK, with 600 Active Businesses and 6,000 Active Freelancers this year on the Platform, and supported by a global team of 25 employees. John has built his vision using capital from a combination of sources, from a Local Enterprise Office grant, to High Net Worth Angels, to Enterprise Ireland’s New Frontiers Programme, and crucially with Venture Capital from Delta Partners and Enterprise Ireland’s HPSU fund. Looking forward, John plans to raise further capital to help fund the international expansion of Gigable, while continuing to differentiate through innovative product development.

Raymond Hegarty, CEO, Intaval

As the World’s top IP coach, Raymond Hegarty coaches founders of growth-stage technology and life science companies on how to win investment by building intangible value and clearing IP risks to scaling. For six years, he was Vice President of Global Licensing for Intellectual Ventures, where he managed a portfolio of 40,000 patents. Prior to that, Mr Hegarty built IP-intensive businesses in Japan, Ireland and Luxembourg, developed teams and implemented processes and systems for IP exploitation. He has closed billions of dollars of patent and trademark transactions.

Mr Hegarty has been recognised by IAM Magazine every year since 2011 as one of The World’s Top 300 IP Strategists. He is the author of three bestselling books on IP strategy. He has served as an expert advisor to the European Commission, the OECD and policymakers in several countries on national and international innovation and intangible taxation strategies. He has a degree in electronic engineering, an MBA, a masters in IP law and a masters in artificial intelligence for medicine and medical research.

Ciara McGovern, Investor, Beach Point Capital Management

Ciara McGovern is an Investor with Beach Point Capital Ireland who offer debt solutions from €500k to €10m, funding growth capital, working capital, buy-and-build’s and sponsorless MBO’s/MBI’s across multiple sectors. Beach Point’s strategy in Ireland and the UK is to focus on entrepreneur led, high-growth companies, that are either too early stage or do not have the history of profitability required to secure debt funding from other lenders in the market. Ciara is focused on sourcing new investment opportunities and also manages her own Portfolio of existing investments. Prior to joining Beach Point, Ciara worked with Deloitte’s Corporate Finance team for ten years. During this time she focused the provision of financial and commercial due diligence to Irish corporates, lenders and investors.