Web 2 Ireland

Guest Post: Paul Browne is a Development Advisor at Enterprise Ireland (EI), working with  Irish Software companies to increase exports, and export led jobs. A key area is Cloud and Software as a Service)

You may have already seen the posts on Enterprise Ireland’s BestConnected blog about the work that Enterprise Ireland and Microsoft are doing to help the Entrepreneur Community in Ireland. One of the companies benefitting from this approach is HR Locker

HR Locker is a  web 2.0 provider of HR Solutions to Business. That's HR as in Employee Records, TimeSheets and  compliance (making sure everybody has a suitable contract). Today, at the Microsoft Bizspark European Conference, John Dennehy from HR Locker got shortlisted into the Top 18 Startups in Europe.

As part of the prize, John got the chance to pitch the HR Locker Business to a panel including Brent Hoberman (founder LastMinute.com), Loic LeMeur (Seesmic), Stefan Glaenzer (former chairman Last.FM) , and 8 other seasoned VC’s and investors. On offer for the best business model / pitch from the 18 companies is a €10,000 cash prize.

Prior to founding HR Locker, John John has worked in the Internet sector for the past 14 years. He co-founded Upstart Games, a global developer and publisher of mobile phone games, which was acquired in Nov 2006. The company had offices in Tokyo, Beijing, New York, LA, Dublin and Cork.

Microsoft’s view on HR Locker and Enterprise Ireland

BizSpark Network Partner Enterprise Ireland is an excellent example of an organisation that is helping to nurture next-generation start-ups.  Microsoft and Enterprise Ireland collaborate to help entrepreneurs in Ireland to maximise the opportunities available to them. Outside the USA, Ireland is host to the largest BizSpark community.

One example is HR Locker, one of the finalists at this year's European Investor Summit.  HR Locker has benefited from being part of BizSpark and has received business and financial support from Enterprise Ireland (see separate profile).   Other BizSpark members that work with both Microsoft and Enterprise Ireland include TradeFacilitate and InishTech.

Gary Fallon, Country Manager, Enterprise Ireland France:

Microsoft have played a key part with Enterprise Ireland’s software clients, encouraging them to innovate and helping them to access new markets. Microsoft has consistently supported many of our software companies throughout their development and is a key platform for supporting them in developing new business opportunities in the French market.

Apply to Innovate!2010 to be named as one of The World's 100 Most Promising Startups and win a share of nearly $250,000 in prizes.

The Irish leg of the Pitch Slam takes place on March 8 after the BizSparkCamp program. Judges for the Dublin Pitch Slam include Brian Caufield, Martin Kelly, Cliff Reeves (MD of MSFT Emerging Business Team)

Readers of web2ireland can attend the Pitch Slam for FREE (thanks Microsoft & Enterprise Ireland!!) using the registration code: BZS2010 here

And startups can apply to the competition here – DEADLINE MARCH 1st

Innovate!2010 is a global competition to identify and promote the Innovate!100: a prestigious list of the world's 100 most promising technology, media and communications startups..

Produced by market intelligence firm Guidewire Group, developers of the G/Score proprietary assessment methodology for evaluating startups, Innovate!2010 will offer participating companies valuable training and promotion along with a chance to win a share of nearly $250,000 in sponsored prizes.

Partners and sponsors of the competition include market-leading companies like Best Buy, HP, Motorola, O2 Litmus, RIM, SAP, Sun, SWIFT and Verizon, dozens of early-stage investors, and marquee media partners.

Here's how the program works:
* Startups apply online to compete for expert feedback & validation, promotion and nearly $250,000 in prizes.
* Finalists are invited to pitch at one of over 20 networking events called Pitch Slams where they will deliver rapid-fire pitches to a panel of expert judges and an audience of local investors, entrepreneurs, executives and members of the media.
* After the Pitch Slam tour, the top-ranking startups will be named to the Innovate!100 list and will receive extensive promotion.
* A follow-on program called the Innovate! Connection Program offers the Innovate!100 finalists pre-qualified introductions to potential partners, investors and customers for a fee.

Ronan Geraghty who works for the BizSpark team in Ireland tweeted about the new CloudApp() developer challenge for both U.S. and International .NET & PHP developers creating cloud applications or services (hereafter “application”) on the Azure Services Platform.

Both U.S. and International winners will be featured on azure.com.

Signup here