Web 2 Ireland

Two great sources

Dave McClure

- Check out this slideshare presentation – Numbers not Napkins: Simple Startup Metrics
- also check Dave’s blog for great info @ startups, metrics, fund raising, etc.
- Dave is also behind the Startonomics Event

Andrew Chen

- check out this post on How to create a profitable Freemium startup (spreadsheet model included!)

Reminder for folks to apply for InnovateEurope

We blogged about this previously.

Update

- Dublin event – Feb 4th, 2009
- Apply Online

The founders of Havok, which was acquired by Intel, Hugh Reynolds and Steven Collins have recently taken on some funding for their new startup – New Game Technologies – according to the Irish Indo.

Hugh and Steven are two of the smartest gaming technologists in Ireland – and its great to see them back in startup land again.

Entrepreneur Dylan Collins, who previously founded Demonware, is busy with his new online gaming company – OMAC Industries.

OMAC Industries is building a portfolio of online games communities through development, partnership and acquisitions – with a primary focus on Persistent Browser Games (PBGs).

LegendsofZork.com will provide online gamers with a persistent online adventure, playable from any Internet browser. Players take up the role of a recently laid-off salesman and part-time loot-gatherer, as he explores the Great Underground Empire. Designed to provide gamers with a casual MMO game they can play on their laptop, desktop or Apple iPhone (in school, work or on the bus), there's nothing to download, just go to www.legendsofzork.com.

For more information, beta-registration, and game announcements please go to www.legendsofzork.com.

REVAHEALTH, (renamed to WhatClinic in August 2010) the health search engine RECEIVES €1.25 MILLION INVESTMENT FOR INTERNATIONAL EXPANSION, Led By Mianach Venture Capital and Supported by Enterprise Ireland.

“More consumers are going online to research their healthcare options. RevaHealth.com provides a valuable service that gives consumers an easy way to find and compare health clinics worldwide,” said Caelen King, founder and CEO of RevaHealth.com. “We now intend to take our proven business model to a wider market.”

RevaHealth.com is a search engine that helps users find and compare health clinics worldwide. Founded in 2006, it currently stores information on over 60,000 clinics in the UK, Ireland and 50 other countries worldwide. RevaHealth.com helps people take control of their healthcare choices and find the most suitable clinic and treatment for their needs.

Quite a few startup programmes seeking applications

DIT Hothouse

PDC – News – Call for applications for the 17th Hothouse Venture Programme. DIT Hothouse are now accepting applications for the 17th Hothouse Venture Programme which will commence in March 2009. The closing date for receipt of applications is Friday 20th February. For further information please contact Sara Hogan at sara.hogan@hothouse.ie or on 01 2401 307

Midlands & West Enterprise Programme (MWEP)

An Open Evening will take place in the Innovation in Business Centre(IiBC) at GMIT Castlebar on Wednesday 21st Jan from 5pm 8pm outlining the 2009 Midlands & West Enterprise Programme (MWEP), commencing in March 2009, for people interested in starting their own business. The one-year programme is a collaboration between GMIT and Athlone IT, and provides entrepreneurs with business skills, networks, facilities and supports necessary to navigate the business start-up process. It is delivered in GMIT's campuses in Galway and Mayo, and in Athlone IT. Applications are now being accepted.

Anyone interested in signing up for the course should ideally have a number of years industry experience and have the enthusiasm and drive necessary to develop and grow a successful business. The MWEP may also be of interest to expatriates who are hoping to return home to set up their own business in the West of Ireland. Participants may apply to Enterprise Ireland for CORD funding, which could provide up to 50 per cent of previous year's gross salary. The MWEP provides participants with business acumen, office desk space, mentoring, networking, facilities, and supports necessary to help them in establishing and running their own businesses. Participants should have a business idea with growth and export potential. For further details, please contact Maria Staunton who is the business incubation manager at GMIT Castlebar on 094-9043198 or maria.staunton@gmit.ie

2009 off to a flying start.

Orbiscom acquired by Mastercard for $100m according to
Irish Times article

Great turnaround by Orbiscom team – as they were written off a few years back.

Speaking at a press conference in Dublin Castle, Taoiseach Brian Cowen, announced a range of measures to boost the economy – through a new renewal programme – around “Building Ireland's Smart Economy -
A Framework for Sustainable Economic Renewal” – see press release and pdf document on report.

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Some interesting nuggets from the report

Up to €500 million will be generated to create a venture fund, known as 'Innovation Fund Ireland', to support early stage R&D-intensive SMEs. The capital will be divided into five venture funds of between €75-150 million; [see previous post on VC funding in Ireland]

More favourable tax treatment of the carried interest of venture capital is being introduced at a rate of 15% for partnerships and 12.5% for companies to encourage the availability of so-called 'smart capital' for investing in start-up innovative companies who will be the employers of the future;

Entrepreneurship, business start-ups and employment creation will be driven by a number of highly-favourable taxation measures including exemption from corporation tax arising in the first three years of operation for business start-ups, a tax abatement scheme for restricted shares, and a refund in the case of forfeited shares, to
assist companies, including start-up companies, in retaining key employees;

Venture capital investment is still relatively under-developed in Ireland. When defined as formal investment outside public capital markets, which represents total start-up, expansion and buyout investments, Ireland ranks 12th in the EU-15 in this regard;

Ireland ranks 4th across the OECD and 2nd in Europe for the proportion of early stage entrepreneurs with 8.2% of adults in Ireland engaged in entrepreneurial activity in 2007 up from 7.4% in 2006;

High concentration of leading high-tech multinationals many of which have facilitated a huge technological transfer from Silicon Valley to Ireland;

Ireland is ranked as 7th out of 182 countries as a place to do business; the 5th easiest place to establish a business; and the 3rd cheapest location for starting a business. Enterprise Ireland has a strong system to support high-potential start-up enterprises and a growing international presence;

'Smart capital' can be defined as (a) adequate levels of early stage funds for SMEs; (b) providing value-added networks to key decision-makers; and (c) experienced investment managers. European venture funds have performed relatively poorly in comparison to US funds and so it remains difficult to attract the best (Tier 1) VCs from the US. Nevertheless, it is these types of VCs that provide the best possible networks and management experience that can develop Irish-based companies.

Just as Ireland fashioned itself to become the destination of choice for multinational enterprises, the vision is to establish Ireland as The Innovation Island through: Continued substantial investment in science and technology infrastructure and research; A substantial investment in early stage venture capital to commercialise and capitalise on this investment, similar to the Israeli Yozma Fund; The attraction of experienced and top-tier venture partners (including those described as Tier 1 VCs) operating independently to manage to raise capital and focus on deal-flow creation;

To attract high-quality mobile entrepreneurs to set up businesses in Ireland and to assist start-up companies to retain employees, we are providing for a tax abatement scheme for restricted shares;

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Also check Irish Times coverage

Now for some community feedback – please comment on this new framework….

Techcrunch France editor – and LGiLab VC in Israel – Ouriel Ohayon has a great piece on Can governments become good VCs?

This topic came up in VC discussion at last week’s LeWeb – and Ireland was mentioned as an example.

Enterprise Ireland in a June press release provided an update on the 2007-2012 Seed and Venture Capital (VC) Programme

To date €148.75m has been committed to 8 Seed & Venture Funds.

Of these, 6 have completed first closings, including

- Delta Partners [100m fund]
- AIB Seed Capital Fund [30m fund]
- Atlantic Bridge Ventures
- Kernel Capital Partners [70m fund]
- Fountain Healthcare Partners – not for technology – life science fund.
- NCB Ventures – [75m fund] – closed its fund in November.

€275m funds readily available – and from EI press release – 8 funds [2 funds still to close] have succeeded in raising in excess of €500m for investment in early stage and growing companies.

Enterprise Ireland announced that €30m is remaining and is now available for co-investment – and a recent advertisement in the FT is targetting UK VCs for partnership.

Given the recent UK news @ Government funds for NESTA, the UK's National Endowment for Science, Technology and the Arts, will oversee a £1bn emergency venture capital fund aimed at pre-revenue technology start-up firms – and the follow on discussion – We’d like to hear from Web2Ireland companies who have raised monies from these EI backed funds [make sure you update your Crunchbase details]

I had a pleasure of attending LeWeb last week – and here are the top 10 takeaways

Meeting Irish in attendance
Very low Irish presence – Pat Phelan from Maxroam, Conor O’Neill from Loudervoice [who also covered event for ReadwriteWeb]
- Brian Bastible and colleagues from IDA

Connecting with People
Lots of great folks attending from the US, UK, Germany, France and Spain.

Old School is best school
Got to meet and chat with Dennis, Doc and JP.

Glimpse of future
Dave Morin – facebook connect, Marissa Mayer – Google, and Susan Wu – Virtual Goods

Startups – no Irish… come on !!
Startup Competition – some interesting startups – and very worthy winner – some Web2Ireland companies would have done well at this event….

Failure – true stories
Morten Lund was one highlight of the event – off the cuff – very honest in his story.

Funding is hard in Europe
Lots of VCs in attendance [none from Ireland] – and the VC panel was interesting – see video. Key themes – build products that VCs will use [Fred Wilson, Martin Varsasky, Jeff Clavier] – and they don’t really believe Govt intervention @ funding is key [more on that later] – and NO doesnt mean NO.

Go Big or Go Home
Lots of usual talk @ valley versus Europe and can we build a big European web company.

Annual LeWeb bitch fight
Great fun from the sideline

Next Year
Rumour has it that the International D Conference will happen in Dublin next year

And no doubt LeWeb 09 will be another enjoyable event.