The Week In Irish Startups
Kerry Firm Raises, Cloud - Zero To One & Head of Marketing Role
Newsletter 63
Hi folks,
Hope you’re enjoying the Bank Holiday. Here’s the main events, funding and hiring news this week that I thought you might find of interest in the Irish Start-up Ecosystem:
Funding/Investor News
Inspeq AI: The Irish Times reports that Irish artificial intelligence company and Founders programme alumni, Inspeq AI, has raised $1.1 million in funding as it focuses on its goal of helping global companies develop safe, secure and responsible generative AI applications. Inspeq has developed a platform to optimise the production and development phases of generative AI, putting guardrails in place to help reduce security and hallucination issues by up to 80 per cent and ensuring safety and ethical compliance. The round, which was led by Sure Valley Ventures (SVV), is the first investment by SVV’s AI-focused Irish Investment Fund. It also saw participation from Delta Partners, Founders at Dogpatch Labs, venture capital investor Plug and Play and a number of angel investors including Cork entrepreneurs Bill and Leonard Lynch.
Graphite Note: Kerry-founded machine learning data analytics platform Graphite Note has raised a seed investment round of €1.2 million, with the support of angel investors, led by Gerry Devitt, CEO Harvest Financial, and Enterprise Ireland. This investment will be used to achieve further global growth, in addition to expanding its team from its base at The RDI Hub, Killorglin according to TechCentral. Founded in 2020 by Hrvoje Smolic, CEO, and Vinnie Lynch, CRO, Graphite Note is a no-code machine learning platform that gives businesses around the globe access to actionable insights via unique analytics.
Habitus Health: Nick Webb reports that Lakeside Capital and Ray Nolan have backed the Cork founded NDRC Alumni company Habitus Health. Founded by Ed Hartnett and Breffni Allen, Habitus enables firms to ‘Easily assess, identify, mitigate, and manage risk in real-time to safeguard your company and prioritize employee wellbeing’. This includes providing Virtual Ergonomic Risk Assessments, and ISO 45001 reporting at the click of a button.
Events/Programmes:
Technical Founder Sprint: Join AWS and BoatyardX on Wednesday 19th of June in Dublin to learn the best practices to take your startup from zero to one in the cloud. The morning sessions are designed to give MVP-stage technical founders, CTOs and aspiring CTOs insight and guidance on building on AWS. You’ll learn 1. How to Choose the Right Architecture for your Startup, 2. Simplifying Cloud-First Product Builds, 3. The 10 Mistakes Founders Make when Getting Started on AWS and 4. Getting Started With Generative AI. You can register for free here. Places are limited.
Hiring
Medihive: Recently announced on Deloitte's Fast 50 list, Medihive is a healthtech organisation steeped in deep clinical and technical expertise. Reporting to the CEO, the role of Head Of Marketing will include playing a pivotal role in creating their integrated marketing & communications strategy, building and sustaining an impactful modern marketing function to support their growth and you will build, manage, coach and develop a high-performing marketing and comms team.
StoreHero: StoreHero is on a mission to revolutionise e-commerce analytics, and they’re looking to hire a highly motivated Business Development Representative (BDR). Storehero unify sales, marketing, and cost data, and are making it easier than ever for e-commerce stores to make data-driven decisions and not only grow but grow profitably. The BDR will work closely with their sales and marketing teams to qualify leads, set up meetings, and close deals that align with their goal of increasing MRR.
Best,
Ed