Meet the Judges for IdeasLab’s Start100 Summer Accelerator Programme, 2024!

Start100, now in it’s third year, commenced on the 13th May with 10 teams setting out on a journey to develop their business ideas and prepare to take the next steps in their entrepreneurial journeys. Since that first day they have been introduced to the foundations of entrepreneurship, from tax to intellectual property, ideation to networking, and have met with industry experts and successful entrepreneurs who have shared their experiences and advice. Each team receives €4,000 in funding to enable them to develop their innovative ideas.

On the 20th June 2024, our teams will showcase their ideas and pitch to an expert panel of judges in the hopes of winning a further prize fund of €5,000 to progress their idea. The runner-up will receive a further €1,000. We are grateful to AskPaul.ie for sponsoring the total prize fund of €6,000 for the second year running.

Our judges play an important role each year in selecting the overall Start100 winner and runners-up. Each year, our judges are experts in their respective fields, with a wealth of experience in entrepreneurship, innovation, and venture capital.

Meet our 2024 Judging Panel:

John Brennan , CEO WestBIC , the Business & Innovation Centre for the West/North West Region of Ireland. He has accumulated over 20 years’ experience working with high-growth startups in the technology, medtech and medical devices sectors. John specialises in the provision of financial modelling support to startups and scaleups seeking investment funding to grow their business. He previously held the role of Financial Controller, WestBIC and regularly provides mentoring support to startups across the EU in support of various EBN - European Business & Innovation Centre Network (EBN) initiatives. John is also a member of the EBN Board and EUBIC certification panel.??

Méabh Conaghan , Regional Director, Enterprise Ireland , West & North-West Region.?

Méabh, a native of Gort a’Choirce in Co Donegal is a graduate of University of Galway with an honours BA. She achieved a first in a Masters in Marketing from the University of Ulster and a Postgraduate Diploma in Marketing for the Digital Age from Digital Marketing Institute.?

Méabh worked in London for several years in the financial services and marketing sectors and returned to Ireland to run the family hotel and retail business prior to joining Enterprise Ireland (EI).?

Roles in EI included working as a senior development advisor (DA) working closely with businesses across many different industry sectors including technology, food, beverage and consumer retail. Méabh has been heavily involved with start-ups including managing an accelerator to help new companies in the start-up ecosystem.?

Méabh is a fluent Irish speaker and has strong connections to the Irish language, culture and the arts. She is the current Chair of Féile Ealaíona an Earagail, an annual, multi-locational arts festival in Co Donegal.

At Atlantic Bridge Helen McBreen manages early stage investing and leads the University Fund which focuses on investing in early stage deeptech companies built from world class research generated at leading research institutions and universities.? The Fund has invested in over 40 deep tech companies that have raised over €350m in co-investment to date.

Portfolio companies attracting significant international investment include Galway based Neurent Medical and Siren.io and also investments in ProVerum Medical, Manna and Ireland’s first quantum computing company Equal1 .? The Fund ranks fourth within the world’s Top 5 collaborative University Funds and is a part of a growing trend of successful university funds located at international research hubs including Cambridge, Oxford, Stanford and Harvard.

Having successfully sourced and financed dozens of IP rich technology ventures in software (enterprise, cloud, mobile), hardware (robotics, semiconductors) and life-sciences (medtech, diagnostics), Helen brings over 15 years’ experience in early stage investing.

Helen is a Kauffman Fellow (Class 22, 2019), VP of TechTour Deep Tech (2021), Chairperson of SFI Research Centre IPIC, Board member of Knowledge Transfer Ireland (KTI) , Chairperson of UCD VentureLaunch Selection Panel and Advisor to NDRC, TechIreland and TechInnovate.

Prior to joining Atlantic Bridge, Helen was Sales Director at Celtrak Ltd (acquired by Thermo King, 2015) and prior to that senior technology roles in the ICT industry in Ireland and overseas.

Helen was awarded 1st Class Hons. Electronic Engineering Degree from UCD and was then awarded her PhD from The University of Edinburgh.

Helen is listed as one of the Top 100 Women in STEM in Ireland.

Expertise: Seed & Venture Capital Investment, Growth Equity, International Selling in Export Markets, Leadership.

Paul Merriman CFP? is considered one of Ireland’s leading financial advisors, is an internationally recognised CFP? (Certified Financial Planner), as certified by the Financial Planning Standards Board Ltd. (FPSB).?

Paul recently sold his financial planning firm, Pax Asset Management along with his technology company ClearChoice, to Fairstone Financial Management in the UK.?

He has over 20 years’ experience in the Finance sector starting out in RSA and Irish Life.? Paul is the CEO of Fairstone Ireland which he has grown from a two-man operation to one of Ireland’s top financial planning firms.??

Register now for the Start100 final on the 20th June IdeasLab: Start100 Final at O'Donoghue Centre for Drama, Theatre and Performance event tickets from TicketSource

Start100 is funded through the Government of Ireland ’s Human Capital Initiative, Pillar 3.