A group of businesses in Buncrana are joining together to launch a new physical and digital gift card for the town in a bid to lock €500,000 into Buncrana in the first year.

The Visit Buncrana Gift Card is being led by Buncrana Businesses Together as an upgrade to their paper vouchers which were introduced in 2025 and generated over €100,000 revenue for the town in 9 months.

Funded by 10 key businesses in the town; Beyond Light Therapy, Callaghan Jewellers, Coyles Homevalue, Healthwise Tierney’s Pharmacy,HML Plant Hire and Construction, Inishowen Gateway Hotel, Lake Of Shadows Hotel, McDaids Bathroom Plumbing and Tiles, McKennas Londis Filling Station and PD Plumbing Supplies, the forthcoming Buncrana Gift Card will be accepted by over 60 Buncrana businesses, including shops, restaurants, hotels, pubs and services, making it suitable for locals and visitors alike.

Set to launch in the autumn, the Buncrana Businesses Together Gift Card will be purchased locally and online. Additionally, local employers will be able to use the gift card for employee bonuses to staff, tax free, using the Small Benefit Exemption which allows up to €1,500 to be given to each employee, each year, across up to five incentives

Donegal County Council’s night-time economy advisor, is collaborating with Buncrana Businesses Together on the forthcoming VisitBuncrana Gift Card as part of a new vision for Buncrana. The town is the smallest of 9 Irish places selected to participate in a night-time economy pilot funded by the Department for Culture, Communications & Sport, aimed at revitalising and expanding the town’s night time economy.

Paul Brogan, owner of Food For Thought in Buncrana, was instrumental in the formation of Buncrana Businesses Together and the paper vouchers. Paul said: “Buncrana is a vibrant, welcoming community where everyone works together. There is real pride in Buncrana and this was at the heart of setting up Buncrana Businesses Together and our paper vouchers. The vouchers have brought in €100,000 in local spend so far at a time when businesses needed real support but there was lots of work involved in the paper vouchers.

“When the Buncrana night-time initiative approached us about setting up a high-tech physical and digital Visit Buncrana Gift Card, it was a no-brainer. Our new Visit Buncrana Gift Card will be secure, convenient and easy to use. We have a €500,000 target for the card in the first year, ringfenced into our economy for the benefit of our businesses but the sky is the limit. Buncrana is on the up and the gift card will play a big part of our success as a town. We’re in it together.”

Sophie Gallagher, night-time economy advisor Buncrana for Donegal County Council, said: “We’ve had some big wins for Buncrana through the night-time economy pilot, including a 66% increase in evening programming for the local cinema, the One @ One night bus, and an array of night-time events for a range of ages. Buncrana has so much to offer for locals and tourists alike. Once launched, this giftcard will be able to be used at any time of day or night; we believe it will be a key driver for the town to maintain a strong night-time economy, and hopefully will give hospitality and night-time traders a much-needed boost.

“The Visit Buncrana Gift Card will be a welcome addition to help people experience all the town has to offer, and credit is due to thosebusinesses who have funded this initiative through Buncrana Businesses Together. This initiative proves the benefit of business collaboration for the future of the town.”

Jack of family owned Callaghan Jewellers in Buncrana is another of the businesses funding the forthcoming Visit Buncrana Gift Card. Jack said: “The paper vouchers were a real positive but they were cumbersome for businesses and easily lost by customers. Most people use card now so the physical or digital options for the Visit Buncrana Gift Card will bring ease of use for all involved. We have many good employers in the area who are smart people and know that if they give these cards as rewards at Christmas, their employees have the choice of over 60 Buncrana businesses and it will put feet on the street. Everybody benefits.”

The Visit Buncrana Gift Card will be part of the multi-award winning Town & City Gift Cards initiative which is active across Ireland. Over €17.4 million in Town & City Gift Cards sales were achieved across its network in 2025, driving an estimated 335,000 visits to Irish towns and cities this year.

Colin Munro, CEO, Miconex, said: “The Buncrana Businesses Together group has achieved significant spend through their paper vouchers. By utilising our friction free technology through the forthcoming Visit Buncrana Gift Card, the town will be able to unlock the next phase of shop local growth for their business community. Every Visit Buncrana Gift Card will be spent in person, driving real footfall and spend for Buncrana businesses.”

Mark Cunningham, business development manager for Miconex Ireland said: “Buncrana businesses joining together to launch a new physical and digital gift card for the town is a huge success story, and demonstrates the power of local business communities to transform our towns. As cards can only be spent in person, the card will guarantee increased local footfall for Buncrana merchants, locking spend into the town which will benefit the whole community.”

See more stories here.

Techies Go Green, the business sustainability network, has launched new research showing that 69% of business leaders would struggle to absorb another sharp increase in energy costs, while 43% say rising energy bills have already reduced profits. The findings come as three-quarters (76%) call for radical energy supports in Budget 2027.

As businesses navigate these pressures, Techies Go Green has launched the Smarter Energy Challenge, an eight-week programme created to help organisations turn energy uncertainty into practical action. The aim is to help businesses identify where they can reduce their exposure to energy costs and where investment is most likely to deliver real value.

The research, carried out independently by Censuswide, shows how these pressures are feeding through into wider business decisions, with 28% saying they have increased prices for customers.

The impact is also feeding into longer-term decisions. More than half (51%) have delayed or cancelled energy-related investment, while 18% say higher energy costs have delayed recruitment.

The commercial case is also becoming increasingly important in sustainability decisions. Almost two-thirds (65%) say cost savings are now a primary driver of sustainability investment, compared with 51% who cite environmental sustainability. For many organisations, the business case is increasingly the deciding factor in whether greener investment gets off the ground.

The differences are also clear across the island and between sectors. In Northern Ireland, 42% of respondents say they have increased prices for customers, compared with 23% in the Republic. Meanwhile, 89% of Food & Beverage respondents and 81% of those in Healthcare & Social Care say they would find another sharp rise in energy costs difficult to absorb.

Running from 21st September to 27th November, the Smarter Energy Challenge will help businesses get a clearer picture of their energy use and the options available to them. The eight-week programme combines online workshops with the Smarter Energy Planner, alongside opportunities to see cleaner energy systems working in real business environments through a series of case study visits.

A full-day conference on 14th October will tackle the big energy questions facing businesses, from rising costs and investment decisions to how the energy landscape is changing.

Organisations can register to take part in some or all elements of the Smarter Energy Challenge. The four case study visits will take participants inside Croke Park Stadium, Hibernia, Diageo Littleconnell Brewery and the Guinness Storehouse, with the final visit taking place in February 2027.

Registration is now open at: https://www.techiesgogreen.com/smarter-energy-challenge#register-form

Michael O’Hara, Co-Founder of Techies Go Green, said: “When seven in 10 businesses say they would struggle to absorb another sharp increase in energy costs, the pressure they are under is clear. But what’s also striking is that almost two-thirds now point to cost savings as a primary reason for sustainability investment. Businesses want to make progress, but increasingly they need to see a clear commercial return.

“That is what the Smarter Energy Challenge is built to do. We want to give business owners and energy decision-makers the practical knowledge they need to understand how their energy is being used, identify where money is being wasted, assess the technologies and finance options available, and make confident investments that lower costs, cut emissions and strengthen their business.”

SEAI has joined the Smarter Energy Challenge as Platinum Sponsor, adding further weight to the programme.

Fergus Sharkey, Head of Business Supports and Transport in SEAI, said: “Ireland’s energy transition will depend on practical action across the economy, and there is real value in seeing what is already working in practice.

“The Smarter Energy Challenge brings those examples together in a way that can help organisations understand the options available and build momentum around smarter energy use. We’re delighted to support Techies Go Green as Platinum Sponsor.”

See more stories here.

From a Dublin exhibition hall to a Casablanca platform

Morocco’s challenge may be matching talent with opportunity

An Irish brand abroad

Robot vacuum cleaners have moved on considerably in the last few years. Simply being able to navigate around a house and pick up dust is no longer enough at the premium end of the market, with manufacturers now concentrating as much on mopping, edge cleaning and reducing maintenance as they do on outright suction.

The new Eufy Robot Vacuum Omni E35 succeeds the E25 in Eufy’s range and, at first glance, there is plenty of familiarity between the two. Put them beside each other, and the family resemblance is obvious, although the E35 has been given a more modern appearance.

The more important changes are underneath.

Eufy has increased maximum suction from 20,000Pa on the E25 to 35,000Pa, introduced a new multi-cyclone dust separation system designed to maintain that performance over time, further developed its HydroJet roller-mopping system, and improved its ability to clean alongside walls and negotiate obstacles.

Design and Setup

Anyone familiar with the outgoing E25 will immediately recognise the E35.

The overall layout remains similar, with the robot accompanied by an Omni base station which takes care of much of the routine work that would otherwise turn a robot vacuum into another appliance requiring constant attention.

However, the E35 has received a visual refresh. Sitting the E25 and E35 side by side, the newer model looks, well, newer! There are straighter, cleaner lines on the base station and a higher-quality look to the robot.

The new unit looks neater, tidier and more compact, but the lineage is clear.

The station houses the clean and dirty water tanks as well as the dust collection system, allowing the E35 to charge, clean its mop and empty itself all in one place.

The whole unit takes up a pretty small footprint, so even smaller homes or apartments should be able to find a place for it, and its improved looks make it even easier to fit in!

Setup

Eufy have made it easy to assemble the base station and get your robot vacuum up and running. It is packaged really well, and there is minimal fuss to get set up. There are clear instructions showing you how to remove the packaging that keeps the unit safe while shipping and where to put each part. No tech skills are needed, and it could be completed by anyone.

The unit is app-controlled. Initial setup is completed through the Eufy app, which guides you through each step painlessly.

After connecting it to Wi-Fi, the E35 carries out an initial mapping run around the home. This gives the robot the basic layout of your home to begin cleaning. You can see the 3D map it is creating in the app, and as it cleans, it refines the map and adds all the details of each room.

It is impressive to watch and strikingly accurate. The app correctly identified each different space or room in my home, and it then allows you to name them, make edits and add no-go zones if needed.

Setup is quick. From opening the box to the first clean will take about 20 minutes, and what I loved about it was that it just worked, and it felt like someone had taken the time to create a simple setup user experience. There were no issues with the app, connecting to the device or Wi-Fi, and it has worked perfectly since.

AeroTurbo – 35,000Pa Suction

The headline specification of the E35 is its new AeroTurbo vacuum system, which produces up to 35,000Pa of suction.

That is a substantial increase over the E25’s already powerful 20,000Pa rating.

However, Eufy is making a bigger point about what happens to that suction after months of use.

The E35 uses what the company describes as an industry-exclusive multi-cyclone system. Rather than allowing all of the dust-filled air to reach the filter, the cyclone system separates more than 99% of the dust from the airflow before it gets there.

The idea is familiar from larger cyclonic vacuum cleaners: keeping dust away from the filter reduces clogging and therefore reduces the gradual loss of suction.

According to Eufy, competing robot vacuums can lose as much as 60% of their suction after 90 days, while the E35 retains 97% of its performance and can operate with a maintenance cycle up to six times longer.

Those long-term figures aren’t something that can realistically be replicated during a normal review period, but the design makes sense and reducing filter maintenance would be a useful improvement for anyone running the vacuum daily.

Cleaning Performance

Numbers on a specification sheet are one thing. What matters is whether 35,000Pa makes a noticeable difference on the floor.

The majority of our testing was carried out on porcelain tiles or wooden floors, with the only carpet being rugs. The porcelain tiles are light in colour and have a shiny finish, so they are ideal for testing something like this, as any dust or dirt left behind is immediately visible.

On hard flooring, the E35 is a clear upgrade to the E25. Even in the dirtiest of conditions, the E35 removed all visible dirt with each run, whereas with the E25, I often found that there was a lot of fluff on the ground after doing laundry; for example, it would struggle to remove all of it, especially if it was a little damp.

The E35 dealt with all different sizes of dirt and debris that kids leave behind in the kitchen or drag into the house from outside, and I have been impressed with its performance.

The great vacuuming results are also achievable without much need for the highest vacuum setting. The majority of our day-to-day cleaning testing was completed using the “Turbo” setting, which is the middle of three options. “Quiet” and “Max” being the other two. With the E25, the maximum setting was used a lot more to achieve comparable results.

HydroJet Mopping

Eufy’s HydroJet system was already one of the more interesting features of the E25, and the same basic concept continues with the E35.

Instead of attaching a conventional damp pad to the underside of the robot and dragging it around the floor, the E35 uses a 288mm roller mop.

The roller spans the full width between the wheels, which means the robot can mop the surface it has just driven over rather than leaving wheel tracks through a freshly cleaned floor.

More importantly, the E35 continuously cleans the roller as it moves.

Fresh water is supplied to the roller while dirty water is removed, so the robot isn’t simply using progressively dirtier water and spreading it around the room.

This is one of those features that makes considerably more sense once you think about how conventional robot mops operate.

The E35 applies 15N of uniform downward pressure to the floor, which Eufy says is almost twice the 8N pressure used by some competing systems.

Mopping Performance

Again, the porcelain tiles we used to check the performance of the E35 are a real test of mopping performance.

It has been quite dusty in the house with the recent dry weather, with the kids dragging clay and dust from the stones in our driveway back into the house. That has left the tiles looking quite dull at times, but it has also meant that you can see a clear line between where the E35 has mopped and where it still has to mop.

The E35 has done an excellent job of keeping the tiles clean during our testing. It is immediately clear where it has cleaned, and it is also simple to check for overlap and any missed spots.

For ordinary maintenance cleaning, one pass of the robot kept the floor clean and was sufficient for satisfactory results.

We also tested it against more difficult marks from dried-on foods and spilt juices which, when dry, become sticky on the floor. There is an option for deep cleaning an area to remove stubborn stains. This can be done on a schedule or on demand as needed. The robot will adjust its water use and perform multiple passes to clean the area.

With the kids running in and out of the house during the good weather, getting drinks, eating ice creams, and with the BBQs we had, our kitchen was in regular need of this feature several times, and it is a really helpful feature to have.

The robot will return to the base station to empty itself and clean the mop during extensive running, ensuring the mop is always in its best condition to leave your floors clean.

One useful indication of what the system is actually removing is the water returned to the dirty-water tank. While not the most pleasant task, emptying the tank makes it pretty evident how the mop has been performing and what it has been removing from the floor.

Compared to the E25, the E35 is clearly removing far more dirt with the mop. Without going into unnecessary details describing the differences in wastewater, I will just say it is clear the E35 removes more.

One of the really excellent features that stands out with the E35 is a much more granular water usage setting within the app for mopping. You can fine-tune the amount of water the robot dispenses on the floor and for porcelain tiles; this is a game changer. This type of tile easily leaves water stains, so if too much water is used by a mop, you get ugly white stains as it dries.  You can turn the amount of water down to a point where the tile is cleaned, but when dry, the water staining is unnoticeable.

Edge Cleaning and Corners

Robot vacuums have traditionally struggled with edges.

A circular or near-circular robot cannot physically place its main brush or mop directly into a square corner, while fixed side brushes and mop rollers inevitably leave a small strip alongside walls.

Eufy has put particular emphasis on addressing that problem with the E35.

A side-facing laser works alongside dynamic brush and mop extension systems, allowing the cleaning components to move outward as the robot approaches walls, furniture and other boundaries.

The intention is to provide genuine wall-to-wall cleaning rather than leaving a narrow strip behind.

With the E35, you now have edge cleaning for both vacuuming and mopping. The mop extends out to the right of the device when it is running along a wall, right to the skirting board, making sure all of the floor is cleaned.

Getting Over Obstacles

Another significant improvement is the E35’s ability to cross obstacles up to 30mm high.

The E25 was rated at around 21mm, so this is a meaningful increase rather than just a minor specification change.

That extra clearance should help with raised door thresholds, transitions between different flooring types and thicker carpet edges.

This may sound like a relatively small detail, but a robot vacuum that cleans brilliantly isn’t particularly useful if somebody has to rescue it every time it reaches a doorway or carpet edge.

When the robot is clearing an obstacle, you sometimes get notifications telling you it is not touching the ground, but by the time you go to look, it has resolved the situation itself and moved on. The E25 also performed well in this area, and that has continued with the E35, with no issues noticed during our testing.

Navigation and Obstacle Avoidance

The E35 uses its sensors and AI to avoid obstacles in its path and to slow it down when it comes to a wall or some furniture.

For anything in front of it, it easily picks it up, slows down and moves around it. Where E35 is better than E25 is for smaller obstacles to its side, which E35 handles better, but we found E25 would often run over.

The map in the app also gets updated with areas it has noticed obstacles such as rugs or where it has noticed electrical wires on the ground.

We haven’t had to untangle anything from the robot or rescue it from being stuck on something during all of our testing, and it has had plenty of obstacles and furniture, shoes and pets to avoid during that time!

The Eufy App

The Eufy app remains the control centre for the E35.

Once the initial map has been created, users can:

• Divide or combine rooms
• Name individual rooms
• Create no-go zones
• Create virtual boundaries
• Select individual rooms or zones for cleaning
• Adjust suction
• Adjust mopping settings
• Set cleaning schedules
• Configure carpet behaviour
• Change station settings
• View cleaning history
• Monitor consumables and maintenance

The app itself works reliably and is easy to use. The functions and settings are extensive, and after a few minutes of looking around, you are up to speed; it is straightforward from there.

For most users, the attraction of a robot such as the E35 is eventually reaching the point where there is very little reason to open the app at all. Once mapping, cleaning preferences and schedules have been configured, it should simply get on with the job.

The app notifies you if there are any issues or if the robot needs some maintenance, and when it does, it steps you through completing it.

The Omni Station

The robot itself gets most of the attention, but the base station is what determines how hands-off a modern robot vacuum really is.

Day-to-day interaction was largely limited to emptying the waste tank and refilling the clean water tank. The area where the roller sits to be cleaned in the base station tends to gather some debris, so it needs to be cleaned from time to time. The dust collection bag is also included internally and also needs to be replaced from time to time.

Any robot vacuum that has a mopping feature needs some maintenance. Parts need to be cleaned from time to time and eventually changed. Mixing water, dust and electronics means maintenance is key to the long life of the product, so please keep that in mind when purchasing.

The station isn’t maintenance-free – no robot vacuum is – but the E35 is about as fuss-free as you are going to get, and it needs less day-to-day maintenance than the E25, which is welcome.

Noise and Battery Life

Maximum suction of 35,000Pa inevitably raises questions about noise.

At max suction levels, the robot generates noticeable noise, but it is still quieter than most plug-in vacuum cleaners.

In normal cleaning modes, it is very quiet in operation. Sure, you will know it is cleaning, but it is not something that will cause you an issue at all.

We have three main areas in our home that we clean daily, and the robot can cover this without needing to charge. If it does need to charge, it will return to the base, top up the battery and then head back out again. I think you will need to have a very large home for battery life to become an issue with E35.

Eufy E35 vs E25

The E35 is best viewed as an evolution of the E25 rather than a completely different type of robot vacuum.

The two machines are visibly related, and HydroJet remains at the heart of the mopping system, but Eufy has concentrated on some areas where there was still room for improvement.

For existing E25 owners, the question is therefore likely to come down to how much value they place on stronger vacuuming, reduced filter maintenance, better edge coverage and improved obstacle crossing.

For somebody buying fresh, the E35 is clearly the more advanced machine on paper, and I would buy this unit over the E25 if it is within your budget.

Anker Eufy Robot Vacuum Omni E35 Verdict

The Eufy Robot Vacuum Omni E35 doesn’t attempt to reinvent the formula established by the E25. Instead, Eufy has concentrated on improving several of the areas that matter in everyday use.

The jump from 20,000Pa to 35,000Pa is significant, but AeroTurbo’s multi-cyclone dust separation may prove to be the more important development if it genuinely maintains that performance while requiring considerably less filter maintenance.

The mopping features have been improved, and there is more control over things like water usage.

The E35 has performed really well during our extensive testing, and I can’t really think of any issues we have had with it during that time. It has hit the ground running, so to speak, since it arrived and has gone about its daily cleaning without fuss, and for that, it gets a highly recommended verdict from us.

You can find out more about the Eufy E35 here: https://www.eufy.com/eu-en/eufy-robot-vacuum-omni-e35

Latest guest post by Declan Goodman, who is a digital transformation consultant, speaker and creator of the Digital Mythology® framework, which uses mythic storytelling to help leaders explain complex change in a more human way. 

In a world of AI agents, copilots and rapidly evolving digital platforms, organisations are finding themselves surrounded by more technology than ever before. Yet despite all this innovation, many leaders are still asking a simple question:

‘Why does digital transformation still feel so complicated?’

What Mythology Can Teach Us

After nearly 30 years working in digital transformation across different cultures, I’ve learned that successful transformation often fails because organisations struggle to connect all the moving parts in a way that people can understand, support and navigate with confidence.

This has become especially apparent in the Age of AI. Every week seems to bring another AI solution that promises to transform your enterprise. While many of these technologies genuinely offer great potential, the AI solution itself is not enough to deliver meaningful transformation or outcomes.

You also need a map – a way to understand where and how to use AI, both now and in the future. In other words, you need to find your way through the complexity, the promise and the hype.

This is where mythology offers a practical lens.

Across cultures and centuries, myths have helped people navigate uncertainty, confusion and difficult journeys. Few stories capture this challenge better than the ancient Greek myth of the Labyrinth.

The Labyrinth: Theseus, Ariadne and the Thread

In Greek mythology, King Minos commissioned Daedalus to construct the Labyrinth, a maze so intricate that once inside, very few people could ever find their way out. Deep within the maze lived the Minotaur, a creature representing danger, fear and uncertainty.

Yet the greatest threat was not just the Minotaur itself – it was becoming lost within the maze and never finding a safe way out, as many warriors had been lost to the maze in the past.

The hero Theseus entered the Labyrinth knowing that courage alone would not guarantee success. And like all great heroes, he had help. Before he entered, Ariadne gave him a simple ball of thread, which he used to trace his path into the maze. After confronting the Minotaur, that same thread allowed him to retrace his steps and safely find his way back into the light.

This is a powerful lesson for digital transformation.

Many organisations are now constructing digital labyrinths of their own. AI agents, copilots, automation platforms, dashboards, data initiatives and enterprise solutions are introduced with the best of intentions. Individually, they may solve genuine business problems, but collectively they can create fragmented operating models, disconnected data and increasing technical debt.

Over time, the organisation doesn’t become easier to navigate, rather, it becomes harder. Complexity itself becomes the modern Minotaur.

Like Theseus, every organisation needs a thread.

The thread organisations need today is a story. A story that helps people understand where the organisation is today, where it is trying to go and how individual initiatives contribute to that journey. This story becomes the thread connecting strategy to delivery, technology to business outcomes and individual projects to a shared purpose.

Three Practical Ways to Find the Thread

1. Simplify before adding more

Look for overlapping platforms, duplicated capabilities and unnecessary complexity before introducing new AI initiatives. Sometimes transformation means removing technology rather than adding more.

2. Connect AI investment to outcomes

Every AI initiative should connect back to a clear business outcome. The question should not simply be, “Where can we use AI?” Instead, it should be, “What are we trying to achieve, and can AI genuinely help us achieve it?”

3. Create a transformation story people can follow

People need to understand where the organisation is today, where it is heading and how their role contributes to the journey. Strategy may define the destination, but story helps people see the path.

Finding Your Thread

The mythical Labyrinth reminds us that organisations often lose sight of the path as complexity grows, priorities change and disconnected initiatives pull in different directions. That risk is increasing in the Age of AI. AI initiatives are emerging across business units, governance models are evolving and transformation programmes continue to expand in scale. Without a common narrative connecting these initiatives, people can easily become focused on individual technologies rather than the outcomes they are trying to achieve.

The organisations that succeed in the Age of AI will not necessarily be those with the greatest number of AI tools, rather they will be those organisations capable of simplifying complexity, creating alignment and giving their people a clear thread to follow.

In the end, digital transformation success isn’t about technology – it’s about people making sense of change together. A common thread, a story that binds them, gives people a greater chance of navigating the labyrinth without losing sight of where they are trying to go.

Be the Theseus of your own AI transformation journey. Write the story, the thread, that will lead your organisations through the complexity and find the light.

Declan Goodman

Helping leaders make sense of digital transformation through story, myth and meaning | Gartner Symposium Speaker | Founder, Digital Mythology®

Declan Goodman is a digital transformation consultant, speaker and creator of the Digital Mythology® framework, which uses mythic storytelling to help leaders explain complex change in a more human way. With nearly 30 years’ experience across digital strategy, transformation and enterprise architecture in Ireland, Europe and Australia, he hosts the Digital Mythology® podcast and delivers masterclasses on storytelling, leadership and digital transformation.

www.declangoodman.com | Socials | declan@declangoodman.com

See more breaking stories here.

Guest post by Jimmy Cockerton, who is the author of No Risk Side Hustle: BUILD your business in 60 days without quitting your job 

The corporate world is full of hidden entrepreneurs. Here’s how to know if you’re one of them

How many times have you had at least one of these thoughts?

• If I see another PowerPoint deck I’ll scream.
• I’m sick of working hard to make other people money.
• I’m done being told what to do and when to do it.

Well, these are all signs that moving from employee to entrepreneur could be just what you have been looking for.

If you look up the corporate ladder and have as much enthusiasm for climbing it as Jack did with his beanstalk, then that is definitely a sign your working happiness lies elsewhere. We spend about a third of our adult lives working. That is way too long to spend doing something we don’t enjoy.

The no Risk Side Hustle

And if you feel this way, you are in good company. When Gallup asked nearly 47,000 Americans whether they would rather work for themselves or for someone else, 62% said they would prefer to be their own boss. Only 35% preferred being an employee. In other words, corporates are full of entrepreneurs. Most of them just haven’t done anything about it yet.

How do you know you are an entrepreneur?

Most people fall into one of three categories when it comes to careers.

1. The forevers. Never leaving. The same job, or certainly the same industry, all their lives.
2. The hoppers. People that jump every 2 to 3 years but largely stay in the same space.
3. The explorers. They have done lots of different jobs across lots of different industries and stuck their nose in all over the business.

If you are reading this and thinking “I’m an explorer” then you are definitely the entrepreneurial type. You could still be one if you’re a hopper. And if you are a forever, you know you’re not going anywhere. And do you know what? That’s ok. I wasn’t the right fit for the corporate world, just as many aren’t the right fit for running their own business.

There are other clues. One trait that all entrepreneurs share is that they are happy flying solo. It doesn’t mean you have to conquer the business world alone. Even Batman had Robin. But all entrepreneurs can operate in isolation without a team around them. The team comes later. If you break out into a cold sweat wondering how you would cope without Dave in accounts and Shazza in marketing, then you may find entrepreneurship a bit too lonely.

People often tell me they have been called an “intrapreneur” at work, so they must be ready to be an entrepreneur. No, no and no again. I hate this term. An intrapreneur is someone who is slightly more innovative than the average employee, which isn’t innovative at all. There is much more to being an entrepreneur than simply innovation. It’s a good signal, but that’s all it is.

So how do you know if it’s really right for you? Well, the fun thing is you already do. You just haven’t done anything about it yet.

The ‘moment of truth’

It took me a couple of years to have my “moment of truth”, when I finally realised that I wasn’t the right fit for the corporate world and that I was going to do something about it.

My moment of truth came during what my wife tells me felt like the millionth conversation of me complaining about my seemingly perfect life. I had a great job at Microsoft, even better pay, I had just won the Bill Gates Founders Award, and I was a happy father and an average husband. But I had this little itch I just couldn’t scratch. I wasn’t unhappy, but something was missing.

Then my wife hit the nail on the head. “You are unfulfilled.”

I was relieved as I finally knew what I had to do. She was relieved as she hoped to never have to have this conversation again. And that was it. I knew I could live with trying and failing to start my own business, but I couldn’t live with not trying.

But it’s scary, right? Leaving your monthly salary, putting your family at financial risk, gambling your future?

Well, yes and no. I mean, worst case, if it all goes wrong, you could always just get another job!

Building a business

But to really make sure I wasn’t betting the house (literally!) I started out by building a side hustle. Testing things out and getting things going before I quit my job, and before I reached that all important “point of no return”. But that’s a story for another day. I’m clearly not the only one to have worked this out either. In the UK, 46% of adults now earn money from a side hustle, up from 39% just a year before.

All I can tell you is that the little itch has gone since I left the corporate world and started my own business, and I don’t think it’s ever coming back. And it won’t just scratch the itch. It will change your life for the positive in so many other ways too. You’ll become more resilient than you ever knew, and you’ll stop setting limits on what you can achieve. I just wish I’d done it earlier.

So here’s a little checklist. You might be an entrepreneur if:

• You see opportunity everywhere and in everything.
• The day to day bores you.
• You love the hustle.

If you read that list nodding along, you already have your answer. The only question left is, when does your hustle start?

Jimmy Cockerton is the author of No Risk Side Hustle: BUILD your business in 60 days without quitting your job is out now, published by Pearson, priced £14.99

See more breaking stories here.

Bitcoin closed August 2026 near $78,500–$79,000 after a sharp monthly rebound. The move from the low $60,000s produced a gain of about 24–25%. The longer view is less comfortable. Bitcoin remains roughly 28% below its level a year ago and about 37% under the 2025 peak near $126,000. Ethereum, at around $2,480, is down more than 40% year on year.

For someone using crypto as an investment while keeping money for sports betting on a 1xbetting site or another platform, those price moves create two layers of risk. A bet can win or lose, while the asset used to fund the bankroll can change value before the stake is even placed.

Late-August trading showed the difference. In one session, Bitcoin moved from above $81,000 toward $77,000 before recovering. That swing alone could alter the euro value of a crypto-funded bankroll without any betting activity.

Two Balances With Different Risks

A euro in a betting account and the equivalent value in a crypto wallet may appear on the same phone. Financially, they behave differently.

A sports bet has stated odds and a defined settlement. Crypto has no equivalent full-time whistle. A 5% overnight move can reduce the euro value of money intended for weekend betting without a single wager being settled.

The distinction matters when money moves between the two. Three figures can move independently:

• Crypto value: the euro value of Bitcoin or Ethereum can rise or fall before any bet is placed.
• Betting bankroll: a 1% unit on a €1,000 bankroll is €10, but the effective value changes if the bankroll simply follows the value of a crypto wallet.
• Betting result: the final return depends on the odds and outcome of the sporting event rather than on the movement of the crypto asset.

Keeping those figures separate makes it easier to see whether a change in the overall balance came from the investment or the betting side.

August’s Rally Does Not Erase the Drawdown

A monthly Bitcoin gain of 24–25% looks substantial. Against the 2025 peak, however, the asset remains about 37% lower.

Someone basing betting stakes on the value of a crypto portfolio at its 2025 high would therefore be working from a very different figure from its current euro value.

Shorter moves create the same issue. If a bankroll is effectively whatever a crypto account is worth that evening, a 6% decline in the coin becomes an accidental 6% reduction in the funds behind the planned stakes.

Live betting adds another variable. New information during a sporting event can change an in-play market within seconds. Simultaneous movements in Bitcoin or Ethereum introduce a second price change unrelated to what is happening on the pitch.

Payments Add Another Variable

Crypto-funded betting involves more than the price of the coin. Moving funds from a wallet or exchange to an entertainment platform can involve processing times, conversion costs and verification procedures.

Stablecoins reduce some of the price uncertainty. Their purpose is to maintain a relatively stable reference value, so a balance is less exposed to the 5%, 6% or 10% moves possible with volatile tokens between funding and use. Transaction costs, processing delays and platform verification can still apply.

The currency used to measure betting results matters too. A bettor can finish a weekend ahead on sports bets while the crypto asset funding the account falls by more over the same period. The reverse can happen during a rally.

Where Investment Ends and Betting Begins

Bitcoin’s August performance shows the difference: a 24–25% monthly rise, but a price still 28% below its year-earlier level and 37% below the 2025 peak. Ethereum is down more than 40% year on year.

Betting works on another clock. Stakes settle against individual sporting outcomes, while crypto positions remain exposed after the match has ended.

When the two balances overlap, a winning bet does not necessarily mean the combined position gained value. Looking at the betting result in euros separately from changes in the crypto holding makes it much clearer where the gain — or loss — actually came from.

UGREEN, a leading global consumer technology brand, today announced two new product lineups at a European launch event. The unveiling of the UGREEN HomeAgent series of agentic local AI hubs and a new MagFlow lineup, which we covered here today, marks UGREEN’s next stage of growth. Building on its established presence in digital accessories and smart storage, the company is now dedicated to a broader spectrum of intelligent consumer electronics designed to enhance everyday life.

UGREEN HomeAgent: Agentic Local AI Hub for Homes

At the center of UGREEN’s broader intelligent consumer electronics vision is UGREEN HomeAgent, a groundbreaking Agentic AI Local Hub unifying local storage, computing, and control into one device. It connects a growing ecosystem of UGREEN AIoT devices, including security cameras, smart speakers, and smart photo frames, as well as third-party devices.

UGOS Pro is UGREEN’s in-house operating system built on a Linux architecture, offering professional storage management, robust data security, easy backup and sync, and extensive expandability.

UGREEN HomeAgent is powered by the all-new UGOS Pro, combining NAS-grade storage and data management with integrated home security features, smart home capabilities, and natural language interaction to deliver a more complete all-in-one experience.

Traditional surveillance cameras usually only document bad news, and their footage is constantly overwritten, so the moments truly worth keeping quietly disappear. That’s why UGREEN set out to redefine the home camera system, not as a surveillance tool, but as a camera for life.

“HomeAgent proactively recognises moments that are truly worth remembering and organises them into a personalised daily briefing for every family. Moments that might otherwise be forgotten can return. We want to help families preserve the precious time they spend together.” – Samuel Zhang, CEO of UGREEN

As an agentic local AI hub integrating on-device intelligence, local storage, AI computing and smart-home control, HomeAgent serves as the AI brain of the connected home. Designed to keep data private and local, it enables intelligent file management, proactive home monitoring, voice-driven automation and unified device control.

The ecosystem includes the HomeAgent HA100 and HA100 Pro, the NVIDIA Jetson Thor-powered MasterAgent MA100, SynCare smart cameras, the UGREEN Smart Speaker for Uliya, and UGREEN Gallery smart frames, while remaining compatible with third-party Matter-enabled devices. Together, they deliver a private, expandable AI platform that helps users preserve memories, monitor their homes and coordinate devices through natural, context-aware interactions.

Pre-orders for the UGREEN HomeAgent HA100, HA100 Pro and UGREEN MasterAgent MA100 opened on September 4, 2026, via the UGREEN AIoT Official Store, and remain available until the official Kickstarter crowdfunding campaign launches on October 27, 2026. Other AIoT accessories will be introduced as part of the Kickstarter campaign beginning on October 27. During the pre-order period, customers can place a deposit starting at $50 to reserve the UGREEN HomeAgent HA100, HA100 Pro or UGREEN MasterAgent MA100 and secure 50% off with the Super Early Bird discount.

The Central Bank of Ireland today (Friday 4 September) published its annual Payment Fraud Statistics, which show the total value of fraudulent payments reported by Irish resident payment service providers increased by around 27% to over €179 million in 2025.

The publication shows in 2025:

• The total fraudulent payment value stood at €179.04 million (up 27.2 per cent from €140.80 million in 2024)

• Fraud affects approximately 1 in 10,000 payment transactions.

• While the number of fraud transactions rose only marginally, there was a significant increase in overall fraudulent payment value.

• Authorised push payment fraud (also known as ‘manipulation of the payer fraud’) – where fraudsters gain trust by using social engineering to deceive consumers into authorising payments—now accounts for 45 per cent of total fraud by value (€74.86 million), up from its share of 35.2 per cent in 2024. This fraud type is particularly prevalent in credit transfers, representing 67.2 per cent of all credit transfer fraud, up from 45.6 per cent in 2024.

• The average value of fraudulent payments varies according to the payment methods used. Despite a lower fraud rate, cheques recorded the highest average fraud value at €9,741. Credit transfers recorded the second-highest average fraud value at €2,412 in 2025. Payments made using E-money institutions ranked third with a notable spike from €692 in 2024 to €1,427 in 2025.

• Cross-border payments (payments sent to accounts located outside of Ireland) dominate payment fraud and accounted for 69.8 per cent of the total fraudulent payment value, amounting to €124.89 million. This marks an increase of 6.3 percentage points from 2024.

Deputy Governor for Consumer and Investor Protection Colm Kincaid said:

“Financial frauds and scams continue to be a key area of concern for the Central Bank of Ireland, as it is for regulators and law enforcement agencies all over the world. As we see criminals become ever more sophisticated in their approach, all actors in the system from financial firms to technology companies need to continue to improve their systems and controls to reduce the likelihood of these frauds occurring. And, where fraud does occur, firms need to provide appropriate and timely support to affected consumers. The Central Bank has work underway with the firms we regulate to improve customer service for fraud cases.

“Consumers can make it harder for the criminals by being cautious online, and there is information on the Central Bank’s website to assist in this. I also encourage anyone who falls victim to fraud to contact their financial service provider immediately. We know from our research published earlier this year that 38% of fraud victims never report their experience to their financial service provider or any authority. Fraud victims who report their experience are more likely to recover their money. By taking these steps and reporting fraud promptly, you protect yourself and help your financial service provider identify fraud patterns to protect other consumers.”

ClassCover, a leading Australian-based substitute teacher booking platform, today announces it has expanded its pilot programme amid growing demand from schools and substitute teachers. Having launched in Ireland late last month with the initial pilot set to take place in Dublin, the platform will now extend to Cork, Limerick, Galway, Tipperary, Meath, Louth, Wicklow and Kildare.

Irish schools have faced significant challenges accessing substitute teachers on short notice in recent years. According to a recent survey by the Irish National Teacher Organisation (INTO), 60% of schools were unable to source a substitute for an absence, leading to 283 people with no teaching qualification carrying out substitute work. Such difficulties have had real classroom consequences, including 735 days of disrupted learning from class splitting in the first six weeks of the school year alone.

ClassCover was built to address this issue. The platform aims to reduce the impact of teacher absences on children’s primary and secondary school education by enabling school principals to assess the availability of local substitute teachers and SNAs in real time. Previously, covering an absence often meant multitudes of phone calls or informal messages to social media group chats. ClassCover replaces that process with a single, transparent booking system – saving schools time and giving them a clear record of every booking.

Pilot schools will receive ClassCover Standard free of charge for two months, while schools outside the pilot regions can access ClassCover Lite at no cost. ClassCover Lite allows schools to bring their own list of trusted subs and SNAs onto the platform. Signing up will also be completely free of charge for substitute teachers and SNAs. The platform gives them control over which schools can see their profile, including the option to appear to schools searching for substitutes not yet on their list.

The platform also enables schools to attach lesson plans to booking requests, giving substitute teachers time to assess the needs of the class beforehand. Each school’s profile also includes onboarding information, helping new teachers feel prepared walking into an unfamiliar school and easing any first-day anxiety.

Ben Grozier, CEO, ClassCover, said: “We’ve heard again and again from Irish schools just how much time is lost trying to arrange cover. One Cork school reported having to make 39 phone calls just to fill a single day of absence, with cover handled through scattered contact lists and group chats. ClassCover consolidates all of that information into one single platform. With tiered plans, every school can benefit, whether they’re searching for new subs or simply managing the ones they already trust. We’ve seen how this platform has transformed the way in which schools in Australia navigate their teacher shortage and now it’s time to do the same for schools in Ireland.”

See more stories here.

Minister of State for Trade Promotion, Artificial Intelligence and Digital Transformation, Niamh Smyth will deliver the opening keynote address at the TechIreland National AI Meet 2026, taking place in Galway, on Thursday, 24 September.

Minister Niamh Smyth TD returns to the TechIreland National AI Meet for the second consecutive year, joining a growing programme of leaders from government, industry, technology, research and Ireland’s innovation ecosystem for a day focused on the practical adoption and impact of artificial intelligence.

The event is supported by lead partners Enterprise Ireland and European Digital Innovation Hubs (EDIH) Network, along with strategic partners InsTech.ie, Google Cloud, OpenAI and Manus, and supporting partners Technology Ireland ICT Skillnet, Sia Partners, Údarás na Gaeltachta, Skillnet Innovation Exchange and itag.

The TechIreland National AI Meet will also mark the culmination of the TechIreland National AI Challenge 2026, which attracted almost 1,000 registrations from across Ireland and Northern Ireland, making this the largest edition of the Challenge to date, and up almost 100% on the 2025 competition.

Over 90 teams are currently developing practical AI solutions to real industry and societal problems, supported by an all-island network of more than 13 regional hubs, mentors, technology providers, industry partners and community organisations.

Following Regional Hub Showcases on 14 September, the strongest teams will progress to Galway, where their solutions will be showcased throughout the TechIreland National AI Meet before the 2026 National AI Challenge finalists ceremony.

Ireland’s AI community comes together in Galway

The 2026 National AI Meet will bring together policymakers, technology leaders, researchers, entrepreneurs and organisations implementing AI in practice.

Alongside Minister Smyth, the developing programme includes Naoise O’Cearuil TD, Chair of the Oireachtas Committee on Artificial Intelligence and speakers and contributors from Enterprise Ireland, OpenAI, Google Cloud, IDA Ireland, Research Ireland, InterTradeIreland, Carne Group, Genesys, and CeADAR, as well as technology founders, AI practitioners and participants from the TechIreland National AI Challenge.

The programme will move beyond the potential of AI to focus on its implementation and will examine AI transformation, organisational adoption, leadership, innovation and real-world industry applications.

Sessions will explore the urgency of AI transformation for Irish businesses, the adoption of AI within existing organisations, AI and data leadership, innovation and practical industry case studies.

The programme will also connect Ireland’s established technology and business community with the emerging generation of AI builders coming through the TechIreland National AI Challenge.

From AI experimentation to implementation

The 2026 theme, “AI & Agents: Strategy, Processes and Roles,” reflects the rapid shift taking place as organisations move from experimenting with artificial intelligence towards embedding AI and increasingly capable agents into their operations.

For businesses, this creates questions that extend well beyond technology: where AI can deliver the greatest value, which processes should change, how roles will evolve, what new capabilities organisations require, and how adoption can be managed responsibly.

The TechIreland National AI Meet will bring those conversations together with practical examples of organisations already implementing AI and the new solutions being developed through the TechIreland National AI Challenge.

Niall Norton, CEO, TechIreland said:

“We are particularly delighted to welcome Minister Niamh Smyth TD back to Galway for the second consecutive year. Her return comes at a time when the TechIreland National AI Challenge has reached unprecedented scale, with over 90 teams formed and teams participating through more than 13 regional hubs across Ireland and Northern Ireland.”

“The collaboration behind this year’s programme has been extraordinary. The National AI Meet is where that community comes together and where we get to showcase what people across the island have actually built.”

Minister Niamh Smyth TD said:

“I am delighted to return to Galway to open the TechIreland National AI Meet for a second year. The pace of change in AI over the past twelve months has been remarkable. We have moved from rapidly exploring the potential of AI to the practical challenge of adopting it responsibly across our businesses and organisations. The TechIreland National AI Meet provides an important opportunity to bring together businesses, technology leaders and policy makers, with a strong focus on what organisations can do with AI today and how they can prepare for what comes next.

“I am particularly encouraged to see the growth of the TechIreland National AI Challenge. Seeing teams from across the island of Ireland developing solutions to real industry and societal challenges demonstrates the talent, ambition and innovative capacity that exists across the island.

“The TechIreland National AI Challenge and Meet comes at an important time, ahead of the International AI Summit on 14th October, where Ireland’s position as Europe’s premier AI innovation hub will be strengthened.”

Conor O’Donovan, Head of Startups at Enterprise Ireland, said:

“The National AI Meet has established itself as a key gathering for Ireland’s Artificial Intelligence community. The strong levels of collaboration and high numbers of AI projects being showcased this year reflects the strength of talent in Ireland and how central AI has become to businesses in all sectors of the economy.”

Mike Conroy, Ireland European Digital Innovations Hubs (EDIHs) Network, said:

“The EDIH network has been proud to support and shape the Tech Ireland National AI Challenge and Meeting since the beginning. It has helped inform thousands of EDIH services to hundreds of SMEs, while building sectoral AI and innovation ecosystem alliances countrywide. Also, as a member of DETE’s Enterprise Digital Advisory Forum, I have seen firsthand the Ministers’ commitment to continually challenge us to strengthen AI and sectoral ecosystem collaboration to incubate ideas and improve competitiveness. We’re delighted to have the Minister again this year to engage with the community at the TechIreland National AI Challenge and Meet.’’

See more stories here.

Making in all its forms

From AI and advanced manufacturing to traditional crafts, repair and community makerspaces, Dublin Maker 2026 attracted 20,000 people to Leopardstown Racecourse, with 100 exhibits showcasing the breadth of making in Ireland. Billy Linehan reports from the two-day festival on how learning by doing brings STEM and STEAM to life.

Speaking at the end of the festival, Dublin Maker Coordinator Amy Hassett described it as “two days of absolutely jam-packed making”, with busy workshops, strong crowds and visitors getting involved throughout. Watch Dublin Maker’s 2026 event highlights.

A weekend of making, Dublin Maker 2026

Good weather helped, with Leopardstown’s indoor and outdoor spaces allowing visitors to move easily between 100 exhibits, demonstrations and workshops.

There was plenty to do as well as see. Robo-battles gave people of all ages the chance to try their hand at robo-wars, while popular workshops included making with cardboard, creating synth music and learning how to quilt.

The Open Fashion Show brought another dimension, showcasing more than 50 outfits, from cosplay and animal costumes to traditional Romanian garments and grandmother-and-granddaughter creations. A quiet area also proved popular, giving visitors somewhere to take a break before returning to the busy festival.

Dublin Maker is supported by Research Ireland, Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown County Council, UCD and other sponsors and supporters, with TOG Hackerspace a core community partner. The event also draws on a long-standing group of volunteers who have helped build Dublin Maker over many years.

The breadth of making

What struck me most while talking to exhibitors and volunteers was just how broad that definition of making can be. A project combining assistance dogs and AI sat alongside biomedical and advanced manufacturing research, a student racing car, a Steampunk crafter, traditional French polishing and an uilleann pipe maker combining centuries-old craft skills with modern 3D design.

Underlying much of this was a common theme: learning by doing. Visitors were not simply looking at finished projects. They could meet the people behind them, ask questions and, in many cases, try making something themselves.

Learning by doing

One of the clearest examples of this came from Fingal Libraries Makerspace in Blanchardstown.

Librarian Anca Cerbu explained that the Makerspace offers activities including 3D printing, laser cutting, sewing, embroidery and repair workshops, with some workshops booking out within minutes.

Facilitator Andrew Carson described the Blanchardstown Makerspace as a place where technology and creativity come together.

“The Makerspace is kind of a space to explore creativity through STEAM, so science, technology, engineering, art and maths. My background, because it comes from art, is about empowering people through creativity.”

PawSense: AI, assistance dogs and epilepsy

At another stand I met Alan Smeaton, Professor of Computing at DCU, and the PawSense project, funded by Research Ireland.

PawSense brings together computing, AI, clinical expertise, analytical chemistry and trained assistance dogs. Smeaton explained that the dogs are trained to recognise the scent associated with an impending seizure and perform a particular movement detected by a sensor-equipped collar.

“The dog wears a collar which has got an IMU (inertial measurement unit) on it. It’s got a GPS and it’s got a SIM card. We basically built an AI algorithm onto the chip, and when it detects the motion, it then sends an alert with the GPS location saying, ‘Billy is about to have a seizure. This is the location.’”

The project is currently being used with three people who experience seizures, and the team is also learning from the dogs themselves.

The work also draws on expertise from the epilepsy clinic at Beaumont Hospital, Irish Dogs for the Disabled and analytical chemistry within DCU. Look out for PawSense at the National Ploughing Championship.

From 3D printing to biomedical implants

A few meters away, at the I-FORM (Advanced Manufacturing Research Centre) stand, Neha Agarwal and Merve Nur from DCU were demonstrating how additive manufacturing has moved far beyond the desktop 3D printers many visitors would recognise.

Among the components on display were examples connected with biomedical applications, including hip and knee implants. The researchers explained how additive manufacturing allows complex and highly customised components to be produced for medical applications, while the technologies are also being developed for aerospace, automotive and industrial uses.

This has particular relevance in Ireland, with its substantial medical-device manufacturing sector, connecting the accessible 3D printing seen elsewhere at Dublin Maker with sophisticated additive-manufacturing technologies being researched and used by industry.

Students putting STEM into practice

The UCD Formula Student team displayed the racing car that students have designed and built.

I spoke with Dara Alkhourie, who is studying Business and Law, Daniel Summers, who is studying Mechanical Engineering, and Rebecca MacDonald, who has completed a Master’s in Biomedical Engineering.

MacDonald is both a driver and powertrain engineer, describing the role as involving “a lot of electronic and electrical engineering and bits of everything else”.

The project demonstrates different disciplines working together around a practical challenge rather than remaining within separate academic subjects.

Passing on traditional skills

Dublin Maker is not simply about electronics, coding or advanced engineering.

At the Rediscovery Centre stand, Joanne Fetherston and Jason Clark were demonstrating French polishing and furniture restoration, skills they also teach through classes at the Rediscovery Centre.

“We do classes in the Rediscovery Centre. People will bring in an old piece of furniture, and it could be a piece that belongs to their parent or their grandparent. Then we go through the process with them. They do it themselves and we show them how.”

Repair and reuse also connected naturally with one of the wider trends identified by the Dublin Maker organisers this year.

Centuries-old craft meets modern design

That blend of traditional skill and modern technology was particularly evident at Kavanagh Irish Instruments, where I spoke with instrument maker Desmond Kavanagh.

“What I have trained in is making the uilleann pipes, the Irish bagpipes. I also make fiddles, I make bouzoukis, other string instruments on commission, and I do a lot of repair work too. For me, I love exploring design and making instruments that look as beautiful as they sound.”

Technology assists rather than replaces the underlying craft. Kavanagh uses 3D design to plan instruments and produce some of the tools needed to make them.

“Even though a lot of the methods to make these instruments have remained the same for hundreds of years, the tools have changed. So there are jobs that are made easier with modern technology.”

A full set of uilleann pipes can take at least three months to make, involving leatherwork, metalwork, woodwork, reed making and the skilled work of tuning and balancing the finished instrument.

Repair, sustainability and community

Repair and sustainability were among the trends noticed by the organisers.

“A lot of focus on repair and sustainability again this year. We saw that really take an uptake last year and it’s staying strong this year. I guess people are thinking about how they can use making as a way of preparing for the future.”

The community extends beyond individual projects. Makers travelled from Kerry, Clare, Sligo and Galway to take part, while the organisers also mentioned a family travelling from Spain.

The next generation of makers

Towards the end of the festival I spoke with Amy Hassett and long-term Dublin Maker volunteer Laura Tobin about what they had noticed over the weekend.

“One big trend I’ve noticed is a lot of makers have their kids at the stand,” Tobin said. “And the kids have their own projects. They’re not hanging around just with the parents.”

It illustrates one of the educational strengths of Dublin Maker. Children can see engineering, computing, crafts and science being practised, ask questions and frequently try something themselves.

The volunteers behind Dublin Maker

Dublin Maker began as an entirely voluntary effort. Funding has since allowed it to employ a full-time coordinator, but long-standing volunteers continue to play a major role.

Tobin described another, less visible function of the festival.

“I always say Dublin Maker is like a matchmaking service. Because you get people going, ‘Do you know who does this or that?’ Or I put people in touch because sometimes they don’t get to talk.”

That exchange of knowledge brings together researchers, students, craftspeople, hobbyists, educators, families and volunteers who may arrive with very different projects but are encouraged to share what they know.

Makers are everywhere

Dublin Maker is part of a much wider international maker community. Look out for further articles when Billy Linehan returns to Maker Faire Rome in October, following his previous coverage for Irish Tech News, to report on makers, researchers and innovators from Italy and around the world.

Billy Linehan

Billy Linehan is a freelance writer covering innovation, tech for good and entrepreneurship, and a regular contributor to Irish Tech News, covering events in Ireland and abroad.

See more breaking stories here.

UGREEN will unveil its new MagFlow lineup later today at IFA 2026, led by the world’s first Qi2 25W magnetic power bank with active micro-pump liquid cooling.

Moving from 15W to Qi2 25W raises charging power by nearly 70%, along with thermal demands. The lineup tackles a key challenge in wireless charging: heat. Heat buildup can trigger throttling, slow charging and affect battery health. UGREEN combines active cooling with passive heat-dissipation structures to help manage heat.

MagFlow Pro Magnetic Power Bank 10000mAh 25W

The flagship features UGREEN’s CryoPulse micro-pump liquid cooling. Widely used in high-performance systems, liquid cooling comes to a power bank for the first time. Micro-pump liquid cooling, VC copper heat-spreading foil and separated charging components help reduce heat buildup, while ThermalGuard adjusts power automatically and a transparent window shows coolant circulation. UGREEN testing shows iPhone 17 Pro Max peak temperature up to 10°C below a 48°C industry reference.

It supports Qi2 25W wireless charging and 45W max wired output via a built-in cable. UGREEN reports the iPhone 17 Pro Max reaching 50% in 40 minutes wirelessly. ATL high-density cells with Dymondcell 2.0 protection enhance safety, while a smart display shows real-time charging status.

MagFlow Pro 3-in-1 Magnetic Wireless Charging Stand 25W

Built for desks and bedside tables, the stand charges iPhone, Apple Watch and AirPods simultaneously. Its TEC Active Cooling System combines a TEC module with an ultra-quiet fan rated at 15dB or below. With cooling enabled, UGREEN testing recorded the magnetic surface centre at approximately 11°C.

It delivers up to 25W to iPhone and full-speed Apple Watch charging through an MFW-certified module. UGREEN reports 50% charge in 26 minutes for iPhone 17 Pro Max and 19 minutes for Apple Watch Series 11. A display shows power, temperature and cooling mode.

MagFlow 2-in-1 Foldable Magnetic Wireless Charger 25W

The foldable charger measures 60 × 72 × 27mm when closed, fitting into a pocket or bag. Open, it delivers up to 25W to iPhone and 5W to AirPods simultaneously, with ThermalGuard regulating heat. A wider anti-slip earbud pad simplifies placement, while a cool-touch glass surface improves comfort.

The lineup goes on sale Sept. 4 across Europe. MSRP is €119.99 / £109.99 for the power bank, €139.99 / £119.99 for the 3-in-1 stand, and €49.99 / £43.99 for the 2-in-1 charger.

For the first time, UGREEN will exhibit across two halls at IFA 2026: H3.2-153 for Communication & Connectivity and H2.2-135 for Smart Home. Under its “Smarter Living Starts Here” theme, UGREEN will showcase an expanding portfolio across both categories. As an IFA 2026 Charging Partner, it will provide complimentary charging at designated rest areas.

Latest article by David Stephen where he looks at possible techniques to help with postpartum depression.

There is a recent report on AP, Lindsay Clancy’s attorney says she was in a deep psychosis when she killed her 3 children, stating that, “Lindsay Clancy was in a deep psychosis when she strangled her three children in their Massachusetts home, her lawyer said Thursday, telling jurors that she had been a loving mother before her mental health spiraled.”

“Prosecutors contend that Clancy acted intentionally and sent her husband out on an errand before killing her young children and attempting suicide, rejecting her lawyer’s claims that Clancy was in the throes of postpartum psychosis, a rare mental illness linked to stress, sleep deprivation and hormonal changes following childbirth.”

Can biotech predict postpartum depression?

“Clancy’s mental state is at the center of the closely watched trial that has drawn attention to maternal mental health after childbirth. The debate has stirred deep divisions among the public over whether she should be held criminally responsible.”

“Clancy, who has pleaded not guilty by reason of lack of criminal responsibility, did not testify during the trial, now in its fifth week.”

“Clancy’s mental health is a key issue at her trial. Prosecutors have said she deliberately killed her kids, while her defense team has said she was experiencing postpartum psychosis and was unable to appreciate the wrongfulness of her actions.”

“The prosecution’s final witness, forensic psychologist Dr. Gregory Saathoff, testified on Wednesday that she had the “capacity to appreciate right from wrong” at the time of the killings.”

What is different in the brain whenever there is an episode of postpartum psychosis?

This is the sole question that the American Psychiatric Association [APA] should be asking amid the high-profile trial.

There are several established neuroimaging techniques that provide leads, but the clarity [that is] sought is not simply brain activity area, brain wave type or anything related, but what [the correlated] components of the brain are doing in those moments to decide psychosis – as an outcome.

In the brain, while every component is important, there are some that are more closely related to [or directly implicated in] functions, than others. These components have mechanisms that ultimately structure [or organize] functions into experiences.

Simply, some components and their mechanisms in the brain give functions. They can act in a certain way for one function and otherwise, for another.

What are they and how can they be displayed, at least, conceptually to bifurcate postpartum psychosis from others?

In general, the term postpartum psychosis is a psychiatric label. The explanation of what it is and does is a description. The quest is to move beyond labels and descriptions, to how the mind determines the condition.

The question, simply, is what exactly is different in the brain whenever there is an episode of postpartum psychosis? Seeking out an answer can change how the condition is understood, and how care is delivered.

Such that even if this is ambitious for contemporary neuroscience and psychiatry, it is possible to project postulates and then prospect answers, amid the urgency.

In part, because, in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fifth Edition, Text Revision [DSM-5-TR] this is not clear. So, the direction will be postulation in electrochemical psychiatry, a division of conceptual brain science.

In the brain, what components could be responsible for postpartum psychosis and why? Then how? The same can be asked about postpartum depression.

Conceptual brain science

Neuroscience has established thoroughly that all functions of the brain – for human life and experiences – involve neurons. But neurons do this, with their electrical and chemical signals. So, isolating biological factors for the human mind could include neurons and their electrical and chemical signals.

Now, neurons are cells, while they are adapted to information function, they are anatomically similar to other cells across the body. Cells are not as flexible to organize the large number of functions that the mind does. This means that because several functions of the mind are distinct, neurons will not be able to change in too specific ways to define one from the other.

This leaves the option as electrical and chemical signals. Signals are flexible enough to organize several types of functions of the mind. This means that the option for the components of mind and mental health are primarily electrical and chemical signals, conceptually.

But how would they do that? It is postulated that electrical and chemical signals interact, in sets, to specify functions.

Neuroscience has established that neurons are in clusters. Conceptual brain science says that in those clusters electrical and chemical signals are in sets or in loops. It is where they make specific interactions, to define one function from the next.

But what makes their interactions distinct? It is postulated that they have states at the time of the interactions that determine how much they interact. These states are sometimes ubiquitous, while others are special to an area.

So, electrical and chemical signals interact, their interactions have attributes or states that grade, measure or qualify how much they interact.

It is the attributes that can be used to display why postpartum psychosis is different from another mental disorder.

How should postpartum psychosis be measured?

If there is a loss of will, in postpartum psychosis, then what is will, intent or control in the brain?

It is postulated that in some sets of signals, there are spaces of constant diameter where certain functions are instantiated.

This means that when the hand is moved, or the legs or the body, the instantiation of it, is from respective sets. And those sets have that space of constant diameter. Other sets that do not have these spaces cannot be controlled. So, even while all functions at some instances can be operated autonomously, some can also use intent, to play out.

There situations that might make intent to fail: that is [for the space] to close out and be inoperable. For example, some pleasure can cause a deluge of chemical signals in a set and close the space or even some substances and so forth. It is also possible that in some mental disorders, some of those spaces will not be available. When the spaces are not available, heeding to caution can be tough. There is necessity for the space to be available, for balance, across many cognitive, motor and interoceptive functions.

Thoughts, for example, are sometimes from these spaces, imagination, speech, typing and so forth. Even when they might not be, the spaces can be used to hold some back or deviate. While some neuroimaging studies have shown similar brain activities between imagining and doing something, both are done with intent from the space.

It is possible to test intent, with this concept, in a case of postpartum psychosis, especially where some intrusive thoughts went and how they were either countered or safety barriers were forced to not allow them fester against intent.

Aside from the intent problem, for the hallucinations and delusions of postpartum psychosis, attributes like splits of electrical signals, sequences of relay [old/new], then volume variations from side-to-side may determine extents.

For postpartum depression, principal spot is a measure as well for direction of heaviness.

These attributes are extensive in the postulate in Conceptual Biomarkers and Theoretical Biological Factors for Psychiatric and Intelligence Nosology.

As Neutrogena is seeking answers towards how to support individuals experiencing postpartum depression after their statement about Hayden Panettiere, and also as the Lindsay Clancy trial and deliberations are finalized, the objective is to explore electrochemical psychiatry, as a new direction, ahead of outlook the distant view of seeking biomarkers for mental disorders, like the APA is exploring.

C-reactive protein and genetic risk factors are directions that American Psychiatric Association is seeking answers, but those may be longer term, as it is possible to use established biological factors, electrical and chemical signals, to be able to seek answers by as soon as September 9, 2026.

David Stephen does research in conceptual brain science and served as a visiting scholar in medical entomology at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. He did computer vision research at Rovira i Virgili University in Tarragona.

See more breaking stories here.

The Irish Minister for the Circular Economy, Alan Dillon welcomed the commencement of increased litter fines. From 1 September 2026, the fixed-payment, on-the-spot fine for littering will rise from €150 to €250.

Commenting, the Minister said:

“There must be consequences for littering. Those who drop litter impose costs on communities, local authorities and taxpayers. The increase in fines sends a clear message that littering is unacceptable and that the polluter must pay. Most people dispose of their waste responsibly. It is unfair that the actions of a small minority can spoil public spaces for everyone else.”
‘Bin it or bring it home’

Irish litter fines

Minister Dillon highlighted the ongoing nationwide anti-litter awareness campaign – ‘Bin it or bring it home’. The campaign is run by the Regional Waste Management Planning Offices, and supported by the Department of Climate, Energy and the Environment.

The Minister explained:

“Enforcement is important, but education and awareness are equally important. The message is simple: if there is not a bin nearby, take your litter home. The same applies to dog waste. Every one of us has a role to play in keeping Ireland clean.”
Supporting cleaner communities

Minister Dillon said the combination of stronger enforcement, targeted investment and public awareness would help drive further improvements in litter levels and support the Government’s wider circular economy objectives. He noted that cleaner streets, parks and beaches improve quality of life, support tourism, protect biodiversity and strengthen community pride. He concluded:

“Through higher fines, improved infrastructure and sustained public awareness, we are taking practical steps to build cleaner, healthier and more attractive communities throughout Ireland.”
The National Litter Pollution Monitoring System (NLPMS) has been operating since 1999 and provides annual data on litter pollution trends nationwide. The NLPMS generates, by means of local authority surveys (over 5,000 in 2025), reliable data to enable each local authority to measure, accurately over time, changes in the extent and composition of litter pollution in their functional areas, thus enabling more effective litter management planning. The 2025 NLPMS shows continued improvements in litter levels across Ireland.

Minister Dillon signed the commencement order for Section 36 of the Circular Economy and Miscellaneous Provisions Act 2022 in June 2026. The increased litter fine of €250 comes into effect today (1 September 2026).

Up to €250,000 will be made available from the Circular Economy Fund in 2026 to support local authorities in purchasing dog fouling infrastructure.

See more breaking stories here.

Almost 15 years after selling its first battery product, Anker Innovations today announced that its five brands will be unified under a single name, Anker. The company also announced the opening of its first standalone store in Berlin on Saturday and new products across charging, audio, home security, robotics and home energy.

Anker: A Unified Brand for the Next Era

Since its founding in 2011, Anker has grown from a charging company into a global consumer technology company serving more than 200 million customers in over 180 countries and regions. Along the way it built dedicated brands to move faster in distinct categories: Anker for charging, eufy for the smart home, soundcore for audio and entertainment, SOLIX for energy and eufyMake for creative tools.

As AI, robotics, local computing and connected systems bring once-separate technologies closer together, the boundaries between those categories are disappearing. Anker is bringing its products and technologies together under one brand to match.

“Category brands made sense when categories were separate. They no longer are,” said Steven Yang, founder and CEO of Anker Innovations. “One brand, one promise: Ultimate Innovation, now unified across everything we make.”
The change will be gradual. New products lead the move to the Anker brand and existing products transition over time. Warranty coverage, customer support and service remain unchanged.

Anker For You

The technology that moves through the day with you.

In May, Anker introduced its THUS AI chip, a Neural-Net Compute-in-Memory chip that runs AI processing on the device. Today it expands into a full line of new headphones and earbuds.

Anker soundcore AeroClip 2 and 2 Pro bring the THUS AI chip in a clip-on ear form factor: ultra-clear calls even in noisy environments, ergonomic design fitting 99% of users, open listening experience with 12mm driver and LDAC high-definition codec. Additional features include real-time AI translation, 8-hour battery life (33 hours with charging case), 10-minute fast charge for 4 hours of use, wireless charging and Bluetooth 6.0

AeroClip 2
Availability: September (at Amazon.ie)
Price: €169.9

AeroClip 2 Pro
Availability: November (at Amazon.ie)
Price: €229.99

The Space 2 Pro over-ear headphones bring the same best-in-class call quality using the THUS chip and built-in microphones and sensors, with 30 hours of battery life with ANC and 60 hours with ANC off, and plush earcups that keep them comfortable for all-day use.

Space 2 Pro
Availability: September (at Amazon.ie)
Price: €199.99

The Liberty Buds 2 in-ear earbuds feature an 8-sensor array for crystal-clear calls, while 9.2 mm drivers deliver detailed audio for music and video.

Anker has become one of the world’s most popular sleep earbud lines, and today expands that lineup with new earbuds and its first bedside speakers.

Liberty Buds 2
Availability: September (at Amazon.ie)
Price: €129.99

The Sleep 4 and Sleep 4 Pro build on earlier generations of sleep earbuds to block noise and help users fall asleep and stay asleep. The Sleep 4 Pro adds the world’s first Track-Assess-Adjustment system, monitoring PPG, heart rate and HRV while utilising BioSync data-driven dynamic audio to adjust audio content and help each user find their most effective sleep sounds. A charging case with a touchscreen and wireless charging lets users set an alarm, play relaxing sounds and check insights without their phone.

Sleep 4
Availability: October (at Amazon.ie)
Price: €199.99

Sleep 4 Pro
Availability: November (at Amazon.ie)
Price: €279.99

The SleepLab and SleepLab Pro introduce the company’s first pair of sleep-focused bedside speakers. SleepLab plays music and sleep sounds with a soft nightlight and alarm to set the mood for sleep. The SleepLab Pro uses 60 GHz radar for precise sleep sensing, tracking heart rate and breathing and analysing the four stages of sleep, then plays tailored audio to help users fall asleep and stay asleep, with no earbuds, ring or monitor required.

SleepLab and SleepLab Pro
Availability: November (at Amazon.ie)
Price: €199 & €349

Charging is where Anker started, and it introduced three products built around managing power rather than just delivering it.
The Anker MagGo Power Bank Pro 2 is the world’s fastest and coolest wireless power bank, the first magnetic power bank with a built-in cooling fan, certified by SGS. With 25-watt Qi2.2 magnetic wireless charging, it takes an iPhone 17 Pro to 50% in 25 minutes and recharges itself to 80% in 52 minutes. A patented fan algorithm, dual air ducts and graphene heat-spreading keep it below 36 degrees Celsius (96.8 F) throughout charging, and a smart display shows real-time power, temperature and time remaining.

Anker MagGo Power Bank Pro 2
Availability: October (at Amazon.ie)
Price: €119.99

The Anker Laptop Charger Pro recognises the connected laptop model and manages its battery health, with 100% recognition for Macs and more than 90% for Windows devices. Care Mode applies a dedicated charging curve and 80% charge limit to extend battery life by more than 40%, while the desktop app delivers over-the-air updates and monthly battery health reports. The 100-watt Max GaN charger reaches full charge in 55 minutes and is 38% smaller than Apple’s 96-watt charger.

Anker Laptop Charger Pro
Availability: 2027 Q1
Price: TBC

The Anker MagStand Charging Station replaces three bedside chargers with one device, combining a 25-watt Max magnetic pad, a retractable cable and a hidden USB-C port. Qi2 25-watt charging with active cooling takes an iPhone 17 Pro to 50% in 22 minutes, while Care Mode paces overnight charging to finish around your alarm. The station displays real-time wattage, temperature and time to full, and adds app-connected personalised screensavers.

Anker MagStand Charging Station
Availability: November (at Amazon.ie)
Price: €99.99

Anker for Home

The home that takes care of itself.

The upcoming Anker eufy TrackLight Cam S1 features an auto-tracking light and a 4K telephoto camera, helping the system track and respond to approaching people. The Video Doorbell S4 provides a 180-degree panoramic view, eliminating blind spots.

Anker eufy TrackLight Cam S1
Availability: 2026 Q4 (at eufy.com/ie & Amazon.ie)
Price: TBD

Video Doorbell S4
Availability: September 4th (at eufy.com/ie & Amazon.ie)
Price: €329.99 (15% pre-sales launch offer on eufy.com/ie from 4th Sept to 30th Sept.)

Anker eufy announced the launch of a new robot vacuum model and unveiled a new advanced robot lawn mower.
The Anker eufy Robot Vacuum Omni E35 brings deep cleaning that translates to a healthier home. Built to baby-grade standards, it has earned a TÜV certification as a “Maternal and Infant Cleaning Robot” for bacterial elimination, low noise levels, cleaning performance and self-cleaning capabilities. The Omni E35 is equipped with the HydroJet 2.0 Self-Cleaning Roller Mop and 35,000 Pa long-lasting suction power to remove dust, dirt, mites and debris from deep within carpets.

Anker eufy Robot Vacuum Omni E35
Availability: September 4th
Price: €1,099 (€100 off on eufy.com/ie, Amazon.ie, Harven Norman, DID Electrical, Euronics, Expert from 4th Sept to 30th Sept)

As part of its long-term innovation roadmap, Anker is developing Anker MindBase as a local AI hub platform for the autonomous home, with planned capabilities including unified cross-brand device connection, on-premise AI processing and private local household storage. Further details on MindBase commercialisation, regional availability and product lineup will be announced at a future date.

The Robot Lawn Mower S2 Max is the company’s first robot mower developed entirely in-house, aimed at bringing more advanced robotics and AI into lawn care. It is fully autonomous with no boundary wires or RTK and introduces true edge-to-edge cutting with an automatic extendable cutting arm. The S2 Max features all-wheel drive, tackles slopes up to 80% (38 degrees), and can map and mow up to 15,000 square meters (161,000 square feet). It launches in May 2027 in Europe.

Anker eufy Robot Lawn Mower S2 Max
Availability: 2027
Price: TBD

In home energy, Anker introduced a next-generation all-in-one system that integrates the inverter, battery and BMS into a single unit, Anker SOLIX XE. It is designed to remove the barriers that have kept home energy storage from the mainstream and bring energy freedom within reach of households across the UK and Ireland.

The XE offers 7 kWh of capacity per unit, expandable to a total system capacity of up to 126 kWh (three units in parallel), 15 kW of solar input across three MPPTs, and a choice of 5 kW, 6 kW or 8 kW power output. Its 314 Ah LFP cells are rated for 10,000 charge-discharge cycles and support two daily charge cycles, delivering the equivalent of 14 kWh of usable value per day from a single 7 kWh unit.

Whole-home backup can be easily achieved with a 0ms switchover when paired with Anker SOLIX Backup Auto Switch, while the built-in AI Energy Management System connects to over 870 European electricity suppliers, including Octopus Agile and Electric Ireland, automatically charges at the cheapest rates and discharges when it’s highest.

Anker SOLIX XE
Availability: 18 September, 2026
Price: TBD, via Authorised Installers

In portable power, Anker introduced a station built around long-lasting runtime. The Anker SOLIX S2000 provides 2 kWh of capacity with 1,500W rated output (3,000W peak), delivering up to 24 hours of essential home backup by cutting active idle draw to just 10W and pushing low-load efficiency above 86 per cent, verified by TÜV SÜD as the industry’s highest runtime rating.

Its 314 Ah LFP cells are rated for 6,000 charge cycles to 80 per cent capacity with a lifespan of up to 15 years, and the unit supports six charging methods including solar, generator and car outlet. At 208 × 282 × 323.3 mm and 16.2 kg, it also includes a built-in UPS with under-10ms switchover for essentials like routers and CPAP devices during an outage.

Servecentric, an Irish-owned cloud, data centre and connectivity services provider, has announced the expansion of its long-standing partnership with ROCTEL. The partnership sees ROCTEL double its infrastructure footprint with the data centre provider to support the continued growth of the company’s managed services business. In addition, the expansion will support the delivery of next-generation infrastructure, cybersecurity and AI-enabled customer platforms for the company.

The expanded agreement builds on a successful relationship and reflects ROCTEL’s continued investment in its managed services business, strengthening operational capabilities and enhancing the platforms that support customers across Ireland.

ROCTEL became the first Managed Service Provider (MSP) in Ireland to achieve Cisco Powered SD-WAN service provider status, marking a significant milestone in the Irish managed networking landscape. By doubling its infrastructure footprint with Servecentric, ROCTEL is increasing the capacity, resilience and scalability of the services it delivers to enterprise customers.

The expansion bolsters ROCTEL’s Network Management Centre (NMC), Security Operations Centre (SOC) and Firewall Management Centre (FMC). The additional infrastructure also enables ROCTEL to expand its engineering capabilities, enhance its managed services platform while accelerating HyperCloud development and pivotally, support regional growth.

Servecentric provides the secure infrastructure underpinning ROCTEL’s expanded managed services platform. The data centre provider delivers high-availability networking and resilient infrastructure facilities. This guarantees maximum availability of ROCTEL’s cloud infrastructure and AI capabilities.

Together, ROCTEL and Servecentric will continue investing in AI-driven service innovation, secure global connectivity and the expansion of managed service capabilities. The enlarged infrastructure footprint provides ROCTEL with the resilient platform required to support growing customer demand while enabling the delivery of secure, enterprise-grade managed services across Ireland and beyond.

Brian Roe, CEO, Servecentric, commented: “Servecentric has been a committed partner to ROCTEL for the past six years, building a trusted relationship based on resilience, security and shared ambition. The decision to doubleROCTEL’s infrastructure footprint with Servecentric reflects both the strength of our partnership and the growing demand for secure, always-on managed services. As ROCTEL continues to scale its business, we’re proud to provide the infrastructure that enables innovation, supports operational resilience and gives customers confidence in an increasingly complex digital landscape.”

Cormac Reid, Founder & CEO of ROCTEL, commented: “At ROCTEL, we’ve always believed in investing ahead of demand. Over the past three years, we’ve strengthened every aspect of our business – from our people and cybersecurity operations to customer infrastructure and the evolution of our managed service platforms.

“Having a trusted infrastructure partner such as Servecentric is an important part of that strategy. The partnership has strengthened the resilience of the services we deliver to our customers and provided a robust foundation for ourcontinued growth. By doubling our infrastructure footprint with Servecentric, this supports our expansion, enabling us to take on larger and more complex customer environments, and reinforcing the trust our customers place in ROCTEL.

“As organisations continue to prioritise cybersecurity, operational resilience, AI adoption and regulatory compliance, ROCTEL remains committed to investing in the people, technology and strategic partnerships that enable us to deliversecure, Cisco-powered managed services at scale.”

See more stories here.

Logicalis, the global technology service provider, has announced it has achieved significant progress against its responsible business strategy, which it launched in 2022.

Launching its Responsible Business Report for FY26, Logicalis has achieved carbon-neutral operations across Scope 1 and 2 emissions for the second consecutive year, marking an important milestone in its longer-term journey to net zero. Logicalis’ environmental strategy remains aligned with science-based targets validated by the Science Based Targets initiative (SBTi).

Furthermore, the company remains committed to reducing its absolute Scope 1 and 2 emissions by 50% by FY30. Logicalis strives to ensure 85% of suppliers by spend have science-based targets by its FY28, and achieving net-zero emissions across the value chain by FY50.

Since the roll-out of Logicalis own learning management system, Logicalis Learning Space, which has been designed to enhance employee training and development, 95% of employees are actively invested in continuous learning. Since completing its rollout in FY26, 4,129 employees have accessed learning through the platform, completing more than 3,000 days of learning. Additionally, more than 7,150 technical certificates have been achieved by employees across cloud, data, AI, networking and security disciplines.

Logicalis’ community strategy is centered on improving education and employment outcomes for women, young people and other underrepresented groups. Since FY22 the company has invested over €300,000 in community projects and charitable initiatives globally, representing a 51.7% increase year-on-year. 19 community projects around the world focused on STEM education and diversity in tech.

The achievements form part of Logicalis’ FY26 Responsible Business Report and demonstrate how sustainability, inclusion and community investment are creating long-term value and resilience for Logicalis, its employees and wider ecosystem.

Bob Bailkoski, CEO of Logicalis, said, “Responsible business is not separate from business success. It is how organisations build resilience in an increasingly complex world. Technology continues to create opportunities for growth and innovation, but the organisations best positioned to succeed are those that innovate responsibly, invest in their people, contribute positively to society and demonstrate environmental stewardship. Our FY26 results show meaningful progress against our climate commitments, alongside continued investment in our people and the communities we serve.”

Mairead Malone, Country Leader for Ireland, Logicalis UK&I said: “The launch of our FY26 Responsible Business Report is an important milestone as we demonstrate that sustainability can be both ambitious and practical when it is embedded into business strategy. As organisations increase investment in AI, cloud and data, considerations including energy efficiency, skills and long-term sustainability are becoming an increasingly important part of technology decision-making. Yet, responsible business is ultimately about creating long-term value.”

FY26 responsible business highlights

Logicalis reported significant progress across its environmental, social and governance priorities, including:

• 26% year-on-year reduction in Scope 1 and 2 emissions.
• Carbon neutral operations maintained for a second consecutive year.
• 42% renewable electricity usage, up from 22% in FY25.
• 77% of suppliers by spend now have science-based targets, supporting Logicalis’ ambition to reach 85% by FY28.

Logicalis’ 2026 CIO Report highlights that challenge. Just 39% of CIOs are extremely confident that their organisation actively measures and manages the environmental impact of its AI initiatives, while only 41% say energy efficiency is prioritised in AI deployment. With AI adoption accelerating, the findings highlight the need for organisations to consider environmental impact alongside performance, security and return on investment when making technology decisions.

See more stories here.

Energy Council will prioritise work to deliver sustainable, affordable and secure energy systems across the bloc

Environment Council will work towards a whole-of-society approach to building a climate-neutral, sustainable and resource-efficient economy

Minister for Climate, Energy and the Environment Darragh O’Brien presented Ireland’s EU Presidency priorities to the European Parliament committees with responsibility for energy and for environment.

Energy and environmental priorities for Ireland

This morning, Minister O’Brien highlighted Ireland’s commitment to progressing key bloc-wide energy priorities at the European Parliament Committee on Industry, Research and Energy (ITRE).

In the afternoon, the Minister addressed the European Parliament Committee on the Environment, Public Health and Food Safety, where he outlined Ireland’s priorities for its Presidency in relation to bloc-wide climate action and environmental protection.

Energy Council priorities:

Speaking to the Committee on Industry, Research and Energy (ITRE) Minister O’Brien said:

“During our Presidency, the Energy Council will prioritise work to deliver sustainable, affordable and secure energy systems across the European Union.

“Geopolitical instability continues to shape our energy landscape. The ongoing conflict in the Middle East has contributed to rising global energy prices and renewed market volatility, creating challenges for affordability, competitiveness, and security of supply across Europe.

“Lasting resilience requires structural change. Ireland shares the view of the European Commission that the only lasting way out of fossil fuel dependency is to modernise by shifting electricity generation to renewables and clean energy, and by electrifying the economy as rapidly as possible. Ireland therefore welcomed the Electrification Action Plan, published by the Commission in July, and we look forward to working with Member States, Parliament, the Commission and industry to translate policy into delivery. I look forward to further discussing how we can turn ambition into action when I host Energy Ministers from across the EU in Dublin later this month.

“Ireland is also hugely committed to the energy objectives in the One Europe, One Market Roadmap. In alignment with this, the Irish Presidency will drive the EU’s energy agenda forward: to reach agreement with the European Parliament on the Grids Package; to deliver a General Approach on the Network Charges proposal and to introduce and progress the upcoming Energy Security Framework. All of these important legislative files will lead to a more electrified EU with more affordable and secure energy for households and businesses.”

Environment (ENVI) Council priorities:

Speaking to the Committee on the Environment, Public Health and Food Safety Minister O’Brien said:

“During the Irish Presidency, the Environment Council will work towards a whole-of-society approach to building a climate-neutral, sustainable and resource-efficient economy.

“As we move towards 2030, there is an urgent need to accelerate and strengthen climate action. We know that ambitious climate action is also essential to maintaining and enhancing Europe’s competitiveness.

“We will give particular priority to the review of ETS and to the work on CO? standards for cars and vans. Our objective will be to reach a General Approach on both files in December, enabling interinstitutional negotiations to begin in early 2027. Building on the agreement reached last year on an EU-wide 2040 emissions reduction target, we will begin discussions on the implementation package, including the Post-2030 Framework. We will also advance work on the European Climate Resilience and Risk Management Integrated Framework.

“The Irish Presidency is committed to accelerating the transition towards a circular economy by developing, implementing and advancing effective and pragmatic policies. In this context, we look forward to the Commission’s publication of the Circular Economy Act later this year. We intend to facilitate an initial examination of the proposal so that we can make substantial collective progress on this important legislation in 2027.

“The protection and restoration of our marine and freshwater environments will also be an important priority. We welcome the Commission’s proposals for a European Ocean Act, as well as the planned revisions to the Marine Strategy Framework Directive and the Water Framework Directive.

“A significant focus of our work will be strengthening the EU’s international environmental leadership. Ireland recognises (UNFCCC) COP31 as an important opportunity for the EU to strengthen its position on the global stage as a trusted, pragmatic and constructive leader on climate action. We will seek to rethink and strengthen the way the EU approaches COPs by developing a considered, multi-annual approach to preparations, working closely with previous and future Presidencies and the Commission.”

Ireland’s Presidency of the Council of the European Union:

Ireland has taken on one of the European Union’s most influential roles – having assumed the Presidency of the Council of the European Union (from 1 July to 31 December 2026).

Until the end of the year, Ireland will be at the centre of EU decision making, steering complex negotiations that shape laws and policy for around 450 million people. This comes at a challenging time for the EU as Russia’s war in Ukraine continues, migration remains politically sensitive, competitiveness is under pressure, and the demand to meet climate targets is intensifying. Ireland has successfully held the Presidency seven times before, often during periods of significant change. The 2026 term offers another chance to steer the EU, relying on experience and diplomacy, and with a commitment to partnership.

This is the eighth time that Ireland has assumed the Presidency of the Council of the EU since its accession to the EU. The slogan of the Irish Presidency is the Irish phrase “Ní neart go cur le chéile”, meaning “Strength with unity”.

The Irish Presidency is centred around three key pillars: competitiveness – fostering prosperity and wellbeing; values – upholding the indispensable foundation of our Union; and security – protecting our citizens.

Environment Council meetings (Informal and Formal):

The Informal Meeting of Environment and Climate Ministers took place in Dublin on 23 and 24 July. Productive and constructive discussions held there will help to shape and guide work over the coming months.

The first formal Environment Council meeting under the Irish Presidency will take place in Luxembourg on 12 October. The Environment Council will meet again in Brussels on 11 December to conclude the Irish Presidency’s work and to welcome Lithuanian colleagues, as they prepare to assume responsibility for the Council Presidency.

Energy Council meetings (Informal and Formal):

An Informal Meeting of Energy Ministers will take place in Dublin on the 28 and 29 September.

The first formal TTE Energy Council under the Irish Presidency will take place in Luxembourg on 29 October, with the Council reconvening in Brussels on 10 December to conclude the work under the Irish Presidency and welcome Lithuanian colleagues, as they prepare to assume responsibility for the Council Presidency.

See more breaking stories here.

Latest guest post by David Stephen who looks at AI R&D innovation.

Having data centers were never the most valuable segment in the AI boom for any county.

The initial reception of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania and Gov. Josh Shapiro to hosting data centers were only cool as being business friendly, not because they were necessary to get PA to the top of advantage in the AI revolution.

AI R&D innovation

PA should want to be the center of start-ups and venture capital at the frontier of solutions in the AI advancement.

There should actually be a PA AI peak strategy office, where tactics on how and where to take advantage would be mechanized to have efforts follow.

If this existed, data centers would never have been included in the package.

That PA office would aim high, not seek crumbs.

For example, in the last year, there have been cheaper open-weights models from China, there are efforts to develop US alternatives, so why can’t those companies be in PA?

There have been recent reports of AI agents going rogue and several discussions about AI alignment and safety. Why won’t PA be the center stage of the startups that are trying to keep AI safe for all?

There are news about AI taking up more tasks at work, hence reducing the need to hire more people. PA can have a start-of-the-art labor economics research lab, to explore new directions against that. [In July of last year, there was the Pennsylvania Energy and Innovation Summit at Carnegie Mellon University, with over $92 billion in private sector investments for AI and energy infrastructure, announced.]

It is possible to develop AI for preventive health against different types of infectious and contagious diseases. [Pennsylvania Department of Health Provides Statewide Update on Measles Outbreak as Cases Reach 460 in 31 Counties. August, 2026]

Measles have been in national news for around a year, assuming a PA startup, some AI health lab or a research lab pursued a model desperately, especially to shape prevention and then care, it would have been helpful against the developing measles situation.

Recently, there have been several settlements from social media companies that violated child safety laws. Many are extending usage adjustments against addictions and to mitigate mental health affect.

Some people have argued that even with time-limits, it is similar to saying someone can use a substance for a short-time. Well, maybe what would be necessary is to show a parallel of what social media contents are doing to the mind, such that users are better aware of likely risks, especially with negative emotions.

This means that it is not just the restrictions of notifications or age, or time, or whatever, but a display of what happens to the mind that results in the grip of social media.

This answer as a dynamic flowchart can shape what to become of mind safety compliance, going into the future. It will use a dynamic flowchart, to show predictive outcomes, with certain contents, and then real-time outcomes in some sessions. It will come at a subscription, and could even become a regulatory or say duty of care mandate, towards safety in some jurisdictions and school districts.

Assuming that a PA AI startup can provide this, it would be a major solution that would be global, offering licenses even in major markets in Asia, Europe and other continents.

The same dynamic flowchart can be useful against AI delusion and psychosis as well as problem gambling. [Shapiro Administration Launches First-of-its-Kind Program Offering Housing, Transportation and Other Support for Problem Gambling in Pennsylvania. August, 2026]

While this is amazing, it is possible to go further by appending conceptual neuroimaging to gambling and sports betting applications.

Simply, what makes the mind susceptible to gambling applications in a way that’d have some lose much yet persist. Why do people still reserve intent or control in some experiences but lose it while gambling?

In the human memory, there are destinations for caution and consequences, conceptually. These destinations are often skipped, due to new sequences towards reward, while using a gambling application.

The objective of the dynamic flowchart is to show users a parallel what is occurring in the mind, for the possibility to increase intent or affective friction. Also, the dynamic flowchart could estimate usage extent, give risk scores, recommend care tips for the next session, alert loved ones and so forth.

The predictive aspect of wins and losses can be made by AI, so that when there are breaks from usages, it can show what happens after losing so much and deciding to try again and so on.

These and more can be done in PA, to benefit the State, grow revenue and influence. The dynamic flowchart is based on the postulate in Conceptual Biomarkers and Theoretical Biological Factors for Psychiatric and Intelligence Nosology.

The Pennsylvania Department of Agriculture just closed the Pennsylvania Sustainable Agriculture Program for projects in the EPA’s Most Effective Basins (MEBs) regions – August, 2026.

While this is great, the bigger ambition is how could PA lead the provision of global food security insurance, amid soaring natural disasters, like the floods in Nepal and the recent earthquakes in Latin America?

Cheaper food might mean agricultural subsidies. How do those places achieve it? It is possible to have them do food security insurance, where they can buy premiums, which would be used to subsidize agricultural necessities in their countries.

Irrigation, pesticides, fertilizers, farm machinery, seeds, storage, land, and transportation to market are some of the major agricultural necessities globally. In many countries, they have a number of staple foods. If some subsidies are applied to 1 – 2 of the crops, it can guarantee that there will be food, almost at any low price or situation.

Now, to make almost everyone buy into the insurance, there could be an initial raffle win for some, while everyone else who didn’t win can use their insurance to buy some cheap crops.

Simply, to pool money to fund subsidies for some crops. A PA AI startup can organize this. Coordinating the software, bringing a coalition that would include suppliers, deliveries, and others. It would even include some PA farmers, so that exports are possible to several places for some necessities.

Gov. Josh Shapiro needs to drive an encompassing AI strategy to win at the peak, for PA. Data centers are no longer the big deal, but there is still a lot more in the AI sphere for PA.

Treating this with haste, from September 4, 2026, or just after, PA can announce an encompassing AI startup strategy to win, against measles, problem gambling, social media addiction, global food insecurity and much more.

There is a recent [August, 2026] report on AP, Measles deaths reported in Pennsylvania spark fight among politicians and health officials, stating that, “The recent announcement of Pennsylvania’s first measles-related deaths in decades has ignited a public feud among politicians and health officials who disagree over the role of the contagious disease in the fatalities.”

“Independent experts say the conflict is a symptom of a social and political debate over how to frame a national surge in measles cases, the worst seen in more than three decades.”

“Pennsylvania officials this week reported that two unvaccinated residents died after being infected with measles, with Gov. Josh Shapiro stressing that vaccinations could have averted the deaths.”

“But the announcement quickly came under fire, as a clash erupted between Shapiro, a vaccine-promoting Democrat, and U.S. Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., a Trump administration appointee with a history of raising alarms about established vaccines. Kennedy said in a social post the deaths “may even have been altogether fabricated.””

David Stephen does research in conceptual brain science and served as a visiting scholar in medical entomology at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. He did computer vision research at Rovira i Virgili University in Tarragona.

See more breaking stories here.

Revolut Bank, the global fintech company with more than 80 million customers worldwide, today announced the launch of AIR (AI by Revolut) across Europe, including Ireland. AIR is a sophisticated in-app AI assistant designed to transform how millions of customers interact with their money, manage their lifestyle, and elevate investment and daily spending decisions.

Starting to roll out to customers from today, AIR moves far beyond traditional chatbots – acting as an intelligent assistant, deeply embedded in Revolut Bank’s ecosystem. It represents a fundamental shift in how customers can interact with their finances, ending the era of multi-step navigation and empowering customers to get a holistic view of their money.

AIR also takes the friction out of travel and rewards. Customers can describe their dream getaway – whether it’s a city break or an island-hopping escape- and let AIR curate recommendations, find and book Stays, and discover local experiences tailored to their budget. Additionally, AIR acts as a smart rewards guide, enabling customers to skip extra steps and redeem RevPoints directly for travel essentials and upgrades, such as eSIMs and lounge passes.

Key highlights include:

• Intelligent financial management: Master day-to-day spending with instant insights like “How much did I spend on groceries last month?”, manage subscriptions or freeze lost cards.
• Investment insights: Stay on top of your portfolio by asking AIR for quick check-ins like “How is Nvidia performing?” or “What are my investment earnings this month?”
• Smart trip planning: Build tailored multi-day itineraries, discover optimal travel dates, and recall past booking and spending history.
• Travel rewards and essentials: Never miss out on points again — just ask AIR the best way to earn and redeem RevPoints for your next getaway.
• Uncompromising privacy: Built with the exact same stringent protections as the core Revolut Bank app, AIR operates under a strict zero data retention policy. Customer data is never stored by third-party AI partners or used to train external models.

Julia Ponomareva, Partner and General Manager of CX and AI Products at Revolut, said: “We believe the era of navigating through endless tabs and menus is over. With AIR, we’re delivering a new level of money intelligence that’s both powerful and effortless. From mastering everyday spending to seamless, stress-free travel planning, AIR acts as a co-pilot that elevates everyday life, making financial management as easy and natural as sending a text. Crucially, Revolut customers also remain firmly in the driver’s seat, ensuring that money intelligence never comes at the cost of privacy.”

Customers can start chatting with AIR by simply swiping down from the middle of the screen, or go to Profile > Chats > AIR.

7 out of 10 UK and Irish enterprises have written an internal policy on how employees should use generative AI (GenAI), but only one in eight can demonstrate that those rules are being followed.

A new study of 100 enterprise technology decision-makers, commissioned by data and AI leader SAS and independently carried out by Coleman Parkes, reveals that writing guidelines for GenAI use has proved far easier than tracking what employees are actually doing with the technology. Just 12% of tech leaders describe their current AI governance framework as well-established and comprehensive, suggesting a clear gap between GenAI adoption and governance as binding obligations begin landing this year.

Governance gaps come under scrutiny as legal deadlines approach

For companies operating across borders, EU AI Act transparency obligations for deployers come into force on 2 August 2026 while obligations relating to certain high-risk systems have been extended to December 2027. Organisations running customer-facing AI systems, GenAI chatbots, or AI-assisted content at scale, may fall within the scope.

The financial penalties are significant for non-compliance. Under the EU AI Act, the most serious violations carry separate penalties of up to €35 million or 7% of worldwide annual revenue.

Despite these consequences, according to the SAS research, only 13% of tech leaders feel they will be fully prepared for current and upcoming regulation. In SAS’ equivalent 2024 research, that figure was 8%, suggesting that two years of investment and policy-writing hasn’t translated into greater preparedness or stronger governance capabilities.

Why is enterprise GenAI governance stuck in development?

A lot of this comes down to a false sense of security. The UK has deliberately maintained a flexible, sector-led approach to AI regulation to encourage investment, giving businesses what many assumed was long-term breathing room compared to the EU’s more prescriptive framework.

The data suggests businesses used this regulatory approach to prioritise speed instead. Over the last two years, the proportion of UKI firms with a formal GenAI policy rose from 59% to 77%. Yet while organisations drafted guidelines, most failed to build the systems needed to enforce them. The majority of tech leaders, 63%, say their governance infrastructure remains in development – up from 55% in 2024, suggesting progress has stalled.

“For years, responsible AI has lived comfortably as a promise,” said Dr Iain Brown, Global Head of AI & Data Science at SAS. “But as legal deadlines phase into force, that comfort is rapidly eroding. Many UK firms have likely treated the absence of a standalone AI regulation as an excuse to focus elsewhere, but the rules have been changing around them. The challenge now is being able to demonstrate that those policies are operating in practice.

“Organisations must avoid a situation where underlying data pipelines cannot track, log, or audit what information is entering and leaving a model in real time. If you cannot audit your software, you do not have governance.”

Exposure is highest where deployment has moved fastest

The risk is most acute where GenAI has already been deployed at scale. Nearly a quarter (23%) of UKI firms actively using GenAI have already integrated it into customer-facing or regulated decision-making workflows. These are the environments most likely to face transparency and audit requirements under emerging regulations.

Meanwhile, human oversight has not kept pace with deployment. Only 25% of active users are running GenAI systems with human-in-the-loop oversight. A further 9% are already operating AI autonomously across selected workflows, with only exception-based human intervention.

How do firms move policy to active governance?

For organisations looking to move their policy to active governance, Dr Brown says there are clear priorities:

“Most organisations don’t actually know where GenAI is running inside their business right now, which data it’s touching, which workflows it’s influencing. That’s the starting point.

“Everything else flows from the data layer: can you show what went into the model, what came out, and whether that was appropriate? That needs live telemetry. And the Omnibus delay on high-risk systems is not an excuse to put it to the bottom of the pile. EU regulators have been clear, use this time to build, because the bar in 2027 will be higher than the bar that’s been set this year. Governance has to become an operational capability.”

Doing these podcasts gives me a chance to meet some great Irish start-ups and one such start-up is ViveoAI. Based in Coleraine, ViveoAI is a voice AI receptionist built specifically for dental practices, and I recently caught up with Sean Higgins the founder of ViveoAI. Sean talks about his background, what ViveoAI does, creating a clone of a voice, AI receptionists and more.

More about ViveoAI:

The focus is on helping clinics answer missed calls, handle routine patient enquiries, and support appointment booking, rescheduling and cancellation workflows. Building the system around UK and Irish dental practices specifically, rather than using a generic US-style AI receptionist. This means local accents, Irish and UK phraseology, dental terminology, practice-specific workflows, and the kind of patient language people actually use when calling a clinic.

As AI has to be deployed responsibly in healthcare settings and because dental practices handle sensitive patient information, there is a careful GDPR tightrope to walk. This ensures ViveoAI has to be useful, while also being tightly bounded, transparent, and clearly administrative rather than clinical. You can find more info on LinkedIn.

See more podcasts here.

Technology Ireland, the Ibec group representing the country’s thriving tech sector, has officially opened entries for the Annual Technology Ireland Industry Awards.

Now in its 34th year, the Technology Ireland Industry Awards is one of the most prestigious events in the Irish technology calendar, celebrating companies and showcasing innovators leading change and setting the pace in tech. Applications are now open to Irish-based software and digital technology companies that have delivered standout achievements over the past year.

Speaking at the launch, Una Fitzpatrick, Director of Technology Ireland, said:

“We’re delighted to kick off this year’s Technology Ireland Industry Awards. Each year, the awards celebrate the incredible talent, innovation, and ambition within our sector. As Ireland holds the Presidency of the Council of the European Union, the critical role of our tech sector in driving Europe’s digital transition, competitiveness, and economic resilience is clearer than ever. It’s a fantastic opportunity to recognise the companies, both big and small, that are shaping the future of technology and strengthening Ireland’s leadership on the European and global stage. We can’t wait to see what the 2026 applications bring.”

With 11 award categories, the programme recognises both indigenous and multinational tech companies contributing to Ireland’s dynamic digital economy. From indigenous Irish innovators breaking new ground to established players leading international growth, the Awards showcase how technology is transforming industries, communities, and lives.

Marie Treacy, Partner at platinum sponsor EY Ireland said:

“We are proud to continue our longstanding support of the Technology Ireland Awards and to sponsor the Digital Technology Company of the Year category. At a time when the pace of change can redefine markets and industries in a matter of months, these awards recognise the organisations that continue to innovate, adapt and lead. Ireland’s technology sector has consistently demonstrated its ability to embrace emerging technologies and compete on a global stage, helping to drive growth, competitiveness and digital innovation across our economy. EY is delighted to celebrate the companies and individuals pushing boundaries, solving complex challenges and setting new standards for innovation and excellence.” 

The Awards are backed by a range of sponsors including EY Ireland, Fidelity Investments, IDA Ireland, OpenAI, Enterprise Ireland, FIT (the Tech Talent Pipeline), Technology Ireland ICT Skillnet and Technology Ireland Digital Skillnet.

Key Details:

Deadline for entries:30 September 2026

Entry fee: Free

Eligibility: Open to all Irish-based software and multinational technology companies

Submit your entry: [www.ibec.ie/technologyireland/industry-awards](https://www.ibec.ie/technologyireland/industry-awards)

Award Categories

Open to Indigenous (Irish-owned) companies only:

• Digital Technology Company of the Year
• Emerging Company of the Year
• Outstanding Achievement in International Growth
• Technology Innovation of the Year
• Digital Technology Services Project of the Year

Open to all (Indigenous & FDI):

• Tech 4 Good – Product/Service Award
• Tech 4 Good – Community Award
• Tech 4 Good – Sustainability Award
• Women in Tech Company Initiative
• Excellence in Talent Development
• Outstanding Academic Achievement

The winners will be announced at a black-tie gala event on Friday 20 November 2026, at the iconic Mansion House, Dublin 2.

See more stories here.

First intake in Veterinary Medicine and Pharmacy signals a dynamic chapter for the University and the South East.

South East Technological University (SETU) is entering a defining new phase, with more than 3,000 students expected to begin first year this September, including the inaugural classes in Veterinary Medicine and Pharmacy.

The five-year MVB in Veterinary Medicine and the five-year integrated Master of Pharmacy will each welcome their first cohort of 40 students, marking a significant expansion of professional education in the south east.

Commenting on this year’s CAO places, Dr Derek O’Byrne, Vice President for Academic Affairs at SETU, said, “The 2026 CAO intake demonstrates how SETU is becoming the university for the region: ambitious in scale, focused on performance and confident in its role as a catalyst for growth across the south east. Students will join a vibrant university community spanning Waterford, Carlow and Wexford, with access to expert teaching and modern learning environments, providing a strong foundation for their professional career.

“The arrival of Veterinary Medicine and Pharmacy at SETU represents a major step forward for higher education in the region. These new programmes further strengthen our portfolio of professional accredited degrees, complementing established offerings in Law, Engineering, Business Architecture and Psychology. As we prepare to welcome more than 3,000 new first-year students, this growth reflects the confidence that students, families and partners place in SETU,” Dr O’Byrne added.

Available places

Students who are still considering their options can also apply through the CAO Available Places facility, allowing them access to select programmes in Arts, Product Design, Business, Computing and Early Years Education in SETU. “We know that students are reflecting on their choices at this point in time so we will be offering some limited Available Places in important career disciplines such as IT, Product Design, Business and our very popular General Arts degree”, Dr O’Byrne added.

“We look forward to welcoming our newest students and seeing the impact they will make, both during their time at SETU and as the next generation of professionals, innovators and leaders,” Dr O’Byrne said.

Prospective students can view SETU programmes listed through CAO Available Places at cao.ie and find course information and applicant support at setu.ie.

Minister for Further and Higher Education, Research, Innovation and Science, James Lawless TD, has announced details of Science Week 2026, the theme of which is ‘Water: From Molecule to Ocean’.

Coordinated annually by Research Ireland and running this year from November 8th-15th with hundreds of events nationwide, Science Week encourages everyone to think more about and celebrate science in our everyday lives. The initiative directly engages an audience of approximately 200,000 people each year through in-person events and online engagement.

Announcing funding to support 43 Science Week festivals and events around the country, Minister Lawless said: “Science Week has become a much-loved part of our national calendar, giving people of all ages the opportunity to be curious, ask questions and dive into the science behind the world around us. This year’s theme captures that spirit of discovery perfectly. As an island nation, water shapes much of our landscape and many of our communities. I’m delighted to support this year’s Science Week programme with €960,830 in departmental funding, helping to bring fascinating activities to communities across the country.”

This year’s theme of Water is an invitation to look afresh at the substance that connects every aspect of life on Earth. We drink it, depend on it and are surrounded by it, yet water is far more than something that falls from the sky or flows from the tap. For Science Week 2026, Research Ireland is encouraging people to explore water – from the remarkable behaviour of a single molecule to the power of oceans, rivers and wetlands. It shapes our climate, sustains biodiversity, grows our food, supports our health and carries stories of our landscapes, communities and planet. Science Week will reflect on how water supports life, how climate change is altering the water systems we rely on, and how science can help us protect this vital shared resource for the future.

Dr Diarmuid O’Brien, CEO of Research Ireland, said: “Science Week is an opportunity each year for a national, intergenerational conversation on a topic of relevance to research and innovation. Water is both simple and complex, connecting so many aspects of our lives, from our health and the environment to energy, technology, and beyond. Understanding water better can help us make more informed choices about how we consume and conserve this vital resource today, tomorrow and beyond. As the national research and innovation development agency, Research Ireland is delighted to lead the discussion, and looks forward to the broad and busy schedule of Science Week activities planned around the country.”

Among the highlights of Science Week 2026 will be Ice Sculpture Installations by celebrated sculptor, Daniel Doyle; WATERLICHT ‘Dream landscape about the power and poetry of water’ by artist, Daan Roosegarde; North Dublin Science Festival – an inaugural celebration led by DCU; Chemistry UnCORKed, led by UCC School of Chemistry; Ripple Effect – a new cross-county Science Week Festival in Leitrim & Roscommon; Finn Valley Science Festival – an inclusive, accessible and calm festival in Donegal; and Midlands Science Festival, spanning counties Laois, Longford, Offaly and Westmeath.

Dr Ruth Freeman, Director of Research for Society at Research Ireland, said: “Science Week takes big scientific ideas and brings them into communities in ways that feel simple, relevant and engaging. The range of events and festivals inspired by this year’s theme does exactly that. The annual success and impact of Science Week is due to the energy and commitment of the people who bring it to life in cities, towns and villages. Across Ireland, organisers, researchers and volunteers will create opportunities for people to encounter science in new ways, and to see how research directly connects with the challenges and opportunities facing society.”

Visit www.scienceweek.ie for downloadable resources and more information on how to get involved in Science Week 2026.

See more stories here.

Guest post by Tara Gale, Client Solutions Country Lead at Dell Technologies Ireland

As students across Ireland make the move from secondary school to third level, it’s clear that AI is already becoming a part of how they study and learn.

The AI campus is no longer a future concept. It is already taking shape in lecture halls, libraries, dorm rooms, and group projects across Ireland. Students are using AI to research, summarise, translate, code, design, revise, collaborate and prepare for further education or the workforce. The question for education leaders is no longer whether AI belongs on campus. It is whether students are being prepared to use it well.

AI is becoming part of learning in the same way the internet once did: first as an external tool, then as an everyday layer of academic life. The difference is speed. Generative AI (GenAI) is intuitive, widely accessible, and increasingly embedded in the tools students already use.

In Ireland, the Central Statistics Office (CSO) in December last year found that 66% of students have used Generative AI tools like ChatGPT and Copilot. Among 16- to 29-year-olds, 65% used GenAI. Of those who had used the technology, 28% said they had used it for educational purposes.

While the Department of Education published its Guidance on AI in Schools and the Higher Education Authority (HEA) published a national policy framework on generative AI in teaching and learning, further efforts will be required to ensure that the next generation is prepared to graduate ready for an AI-shaped economy.

Building AI literacy, not just AI use

The opportunity is significant. Used well, AI can help students ask better questions, test ideas, receive feedback, explore subjects from different angles, and create more confidently. The OECD Digital Education Outlook 2026 highlights how generative AI can support personalised learning, tutoring, feedback, and teacher productivity when it is guided by clear pedagogical principles.

But the same report also warns that using AI simply to produce answers can weaken deeper learning if students outsource too much of their thinking. That is why AI literacy must become a core part of the student experience. AI literacy is not just knowing how to write a prompt. It is understanding how AI systems work, when outputs can be trusted, how bias and hallucination appear, how to protect data, how to cite or disclose AI use, and how to use AI ethically without losing original thought. Students need to learn not only how to use AI, but how to question it.

This matters across EMEA because the region is still working through a broader digital skills challenge. European Commission data shows that 43% of 14-year-old students in the EU do not reach the basic level of digital skills, far from the target of reducing low achievement below 15% by 2030. Similarly, Eurostat reported that 74.6% of young people aged 16 to 24 in the EU had at least basic digital skills in 2025, meaning one in four still did not. These figures show that AI readiness cannot be assumed simply because students are young or digitally active.

Ireland has a strong foundation on which to build. The European Union’s State of the Digital Decade 2026 ranked Ireland second in the EU for basic digital skills and fifth for generative AI adoption. However, broader European trends show why continued investment matters. European Commission and Eurostat data indicate significant digital skills gaps among young people across the EU, highlighting that AI readiness cannot be assumed simply because students are digitally active.

Developing AI literacy will be essential if Ireland is to maintain its competitive advantage and prepare the next generation for an AI-powered economy.

Make AI part of the student experience

Institutions therefore need to make three shifts.

First, move AI from informal use to guided use. Many students are already experimenting with AI outside formal learning structures. The risk is that usage becomes uneven, uncritical or dependent on shortcuts. Clear guidance can help students understand where AI supports learning, where it crosses academic integrity lines, and how to use it as a thinking partner rather than a substitute for thinking.

Second, treat AI literacy as employability. The future workplaces that students will be entering will expect them to collaborate with AI-enabled tools, evaluate outputs, protect information, and solve problems creatively. AI literacy should therefore sit alongside communication, research, digital fluency, and critical thinking. It is not a specialist skill for computer science students alone. It is becoming a baseline capability for business, healthcare, engineering, design, finance, creative industries, and public services.

Third, close the access gap. A modern learning environment depends on reliable connectivity, inclusive digital platforms, and devices capable of supporting AI-enhanced research, collaboration, and content creation. The European Commission’s Digital Education Action Plan notes that 20% of low-income households lack access to computers and broadband.

For Ireland, the question of access also sits within the wider digital education agenda. The Department of Education’s Digital Strategy for Schools to 2027 sets out the importance of embedding digital technologies in teaching, learning, and assessment. Through this strategy and further investment in school technology and infrastructure, the Government is supporting schools in embedding digital tools across teaching, learning, and assessment.

Building an AI-ready generation

The back-to-school period is therefore more than a buying cycle. It is a moment for institutions and families to reset expectations around how students will learn, collaborate, and use AI responsibly. The right learning environment should help students move from AI experimentation to AI confidence, with access to tools that support research, creativity, critical thinking, and secure digital habits.

As Ireland seeks to deliver on the ambitions set out in its National AI Strategy and strengthen its position as a leader in the responsible adoption of AI, education will play a critical role. The AI Campus is already taking shape across lecture halls, libraries, classrooms, and student accommodation. The challenge now is ensuring students are equipped not just to use AI tools, but to think critically about them, innovate with them and apply them responsibly. Success will ultimately depend on whether Ireland can develop AI-literate graduates ready to contribute to the economy of the future.

Ireland’s online payment economy is entering a more sophisticated phase, with figures showing that digital transactions are becoming more frequent as the technology behind them becomes faster.

The Central Bank of Ireland recorded 4.96 billion payment transactions through Irish payment service providers during 2025, representing an 8.8% annual increase. Payment value reached €12.16 trillion, and transaction volumes grew much faster than value, pointing towards more frequent lower-value payments through digital channels. Card payments posted strong growth, with total card transaction volume rising 9.8% to 3.30 billion.

Online card payments grew particularly quickly, increasing 18.1% in volume and 35.5% in value during the fourth quarter. For you as a consumer, that growth means payment technology is becoming an important part of online life.

Why payment choice is expanding

Payment choice is expanding across Ireland, so your online checkout can now involve several familiar routes depending on the service. Cards remain firmly established, as digital wallets and bank-based transfers are becoming increasingly integrated into everyday spending.

Bank of Ireland reported that e-commerce contactless card transactions increased 10% year on year during the fourth quarter of 2025, with digital wallets such as Apple Pay and Google Pay contributing to that activity.

If you want a practical guide to one widely recognised online payment option, you can read our full guide to PayPal casinos in Ireland, explaining how PayPal works within online casino payments. The wider trend is significant, as consumers increasingly expect payment methods to feel convenient, familiar and closely connected to services they already use regularly.

Instant payments become mainstream

Instant payments are becoming one of the most important developments in Irish banking, as European rules accelerate their availability across the euro area. From 9 October 2025, banks and relevant payment service providers in Ireland became required to facilitate outgoing SEPA instant credit transfers in euros at a customer’s request.

These transfers can reach the recipient within ten seconds, with the service operating around the clock throughout the year. For you, that change can make moving money feel more immediate, particularly when you need to transfer funds outside traditional banking hours.

The technology also supports a wider shift towards account-to-account payments, where money moves directly between bank accounts. As instant transfers become familiar, expectations around speed can rise across online commerce too, creating pressure for smoother payment experiences.

Banks compete on digital convenience

Mobile banking is also becoming a bigger part of how Irish consumers manage payments, with banks adding functions that previously required separate services. Bank of Ireland recorded more than 1.45 million mobile banking app logins on its busiest day in the first quarter of 2026, as ATM transactions fell 8% year on year during the same period.

Zippay also launched through participating banks from March 2026, giving customers at Bank of Ireland, AIB and PTSB a way to send, receive, request or split payments using a mobile number. For you, that means routine transactions can become much simpler when your bank already provides the tools inside its app.

Competition between established banks and specialist payment providers can also encourage faster development of useful digital services for customers.

Security has to keep pace

Security has to keep pace with this growth, as every additional digital transaction creates another opportunity for fraud attempts and payment errors. Irish banks are therefore combining stronger customer authentication with transaction monitoring and improved verification processes, so customers can complete legitimate online payments with confidence.

Bank of Ireland reported that biometric mobile banking logins increased 20% year on year in the third quarter of 2025, highlighting growing use of security features built directly into banking apps. Strong customer authentication also remains an important part of European online payment rules, requiring additional verification for many electronic transactions.

For you, the best payment experience can feel simple on the surface, even when several security controls operate underneath. That balance matters as faster payments become increasingly normal for Irish consumers.

Cross-border payments gain importance

Cross-border payments add another dimension to Ireland’s digital payment growth, with Irish consumers and businesses operating within a highly connected European market. The Central Bank recorded 1.02 billion payments to other EEA countries during 2025, representing a 9.9% increase in volume, as their value climbed 10.5% to €3.22 trillion.

Payments outside the EEA also reached 484.48 million transactions worth €4.17 trillion, with the UK accounting for €2.75 trillion of that value. For you, this connectivity can make international purchases and transfers feel increasingly routine, particularly when payment services operate across compatible systems.

For businesses, the implications extend into settlement, fraud controls, compliance and customer experience. Payment technology therefore supports commerce across borders as well as the everyday purchases made at home.

What comes next for Irish payments?

The next phase of Ireland’s online payment boom is set to focus on infrastructure that you barely notice, as the most successful technology can make complex transactions feel straightforward. Instant euro transfers, mobile wallets, contactless payments and integrated banking services are converging around expectations of speed, reliability and clarity.

The Central Bank’s 2025 figures show strong growth in online card activity, as the 2026 banking data points towards continued digital engagement among customers. For you, the visible result could simply be more choice at the checkout and faster movement of money between accounts.

For businesses, payment performance can affect conversion, cash flow, trust and international reach. Ireland’s payment story is therefore becoming a story about digital infrastructure, with everyday transactions increasingly reflecting how quickly financial technology is advancing.

Gas Networks Ireland has connected College Group’s new €30 million biomethane facility in Nobber, Co. Meath, to Ireland’s national gas network, enabling the business to transform waste into renewable gas.

The biomethane produced at the facility will not only increase the amount of renewable gas on the network but will also be used to power College Groups own operations and bioCNG1 vehicles.

College Group is the second major biomethane producer to connect directly to the gas network this month and the move highlights the growing momentum behind Ireland’s indigenous biomethane sector. It also demonstrates a circular energy model in action, with College Group producing renewable gas from food waste and other organic materials and using a portion of that biomethane to both power its own facility and fuel its newly acquired bioCNG vehicles.

Speaking as she officially launched College Group’s connection to the gas network, Minister for Foreign Affairs and Trade, Helen McEntee T.D. said: “It is fantastic to see a business from my own constituency at the forefront of Ireland’s transition to renewable energy. College Group has been an important part of the Nobber community and economy for more than 35 years and its continued investment in innovation, renewable energy and new technologies demonstrates the contribution that ambitious Irish businesses can make to our national climate and energy goals.

“This facility is a great example of the circular economy in action, taking food and agri-food by-products and transforming them into a valuable source of renewable energy. It is also an important investment in the local economy, supporting jobs and demonstrating that the transition to a lower-carbon economy can deliver real opportunities for communities across Ireland.

“Projects such as this also have an important role to play in strengthening Ireland’s energy security. Producing more of our own renewable energy here in Ireland from resources generated within our own economy, means greater resilience and less reliance on imported energy.”

The facility, which received support through a Government capital grant of €2.4m, has an annual production capacity of up to 75 GWh of biomethane, takes food and agri-food by-products and transforms them through anaerobic digestion into renewable biomethane gas.

Gas Networks Ireland’s Chief Executive Officer, David Kelly said: “This is the second biomethane facility to connect directly to the national gas network this month and is a powerful signal of the momentum now building behind Ireland’s biomethane industry. What makes College Group particularly significant is the circularity of their energy model of converting waste to gas to fuel their facility, as well as entering the national network.

“This is important not just because of the volume of gas being produced at this facility, but because of what it represents for the wider market. The connection of another producer demonstrates that Ireland has the capability to develop, connect and utilise indigenous renewable gas at scale. It sends a strong signal to potential producers and investors that biomethane has a significant place in Ireland’s future energy system.

“Biomethane will help strengthen Ireland’s energy security by providing an indigenous source of renewable gas, while also supporting the decarbonisation of sectors where gas continues to play an important role. Gas Networks Ireland is committed to facilitating the development of the infrastructure needed to enable Ireland’s biomethane sector to grow.”

College Group’s new facility uses anaerobic digestion to transform primarily commercial food waste, alongside material from its wider operations into biomethane.

The development is a strong example of the circular economy in action, transforming organic material that would otherwise require disposal into a valuable source of renewable energy.

College Group’s Commercial Director, John Paul Gilroy said: “This is a hugely significant milestone for College Group and for our business in Nobber. We have been operating here for more than 35 years and have always looked at ways of creating value from what would otherwise be considered a waste stream.

“Our new anaerobic digestion facility takes that approach to another level, transforming food and agri-food by-products into renewable gas. Having that gas now connected to the national network is a major achievement for our team and demonstrates what can be achieved through continued investment and innovation.

“What makes this particularly exciting is that we are not only producing renewable energy but also finding ways to use it within our own business, including in our vehicles. It is a great example of how the circular economy can work in practice.

“The plant is also the newest addition to our circular economy park here in Nobber. Across the site, waste products are transformed into renewable fuels and energy – together delivering close to 200,000 tonnes of CO? savings every year.

“We are proud to be a local employer and to continue developing new opportunities here while contributing to Ireland’s renewable energy ambitions.”

College Group has an offtake agreement in place with Flogas for biomethane to be used as BioCNG to fuel heavy goods vehicles, providing a lower carbon alternative to diesel and supporting the decarbonisation of the transport sector.

College Group’s Nobber facility has an annual production capacity of up to 75 GWh of biomethane and the addition of a biomethane production plant represents a significant additional investment by the company.

College Group, which has been operating since 1989, now employs more than 150 people and has developed into one of Ireland’s leading integrated circular bioeconomy platforms, converting agri-food and organic waste streams into high-value, low-carbon products.

Gas Networks Ireland is working to facilitate and assist the expansion of Ireland’s biomethane sector and has connection agreements with seven producers. Together these seven contracted producers represent almost 13% of the State’s target of having 5.7 terawatt hours (TWh) of biomethane production by 2030. The delivery and commissioning of these facilities will play an important role in supporting Ireland’s national target.

Structurally identical to natural gas, biomethane is a carbon neutral renewable gas that can be made from farm and food waste through a natural biological process known as anaerobic digestion.  It is fully compatible with the existing national gas network and can seamlessly replace natural gas to reduce emissions in heating, industry, transport, and power generation.

In addition to producing biomethane, the anaerobic digestion process also creates a nutrient-rich biofertiliser known as digestate which can be used to replace chemical fertilisers and recycle nutrients back into the food production system, with significant positive circular economy and environmental benefits.

Connecting the College Group facility is part of Gas Networks Ireland’s wider programme to facilitate the development of Ireland’s renewable gas sector and connect indigenous biomethane producers to the national gas network.

As Ireland’s economy continues to grow and demand for energy remains strong, the development of indigenous renewable gas can help diversify the country’s energy supply, reduce reliance on imported fossil gas and provide a route to decarbonise sectors where alternatives to gas are more challenging.

See more stories here.

Climb Channel Solutions, (“Climb” or the “Company”), an international specialty technology distributor and wholly owned subsidiary of Climb Global Solutions, Inc., has announced the expansion of its longstanding partnership with HPE as it becomes an official distributor for HPE Networking in Ireland.

This appointment builds on Climb’s established position as a HPE Aruba Networking distributor, now enabling partners to access the full breadth of HPE’s next-generation networking portfolio through a single, experienced distributor. This follows HPE’s acquisition of Juniper Networks and the integration of Juniper’s channel programme into a unified HPE partner ecosystem.

Building on its established success with HPE Aruba Networking, Climb’s portfolio expansion simplifies partner engagement, providing a scalable foundation for growth across the combined HPE Networking portfolio. This approach will help partners identify new cross-networking portfolio opportunities, accelerate adoption and unlock greater customer value through a unified networking strategy.

Climb continues to invest in networking expertise, partner enablement and market development, helping Irish partners build and grow successful networking practices across the HPE portfolio.

Brian Davis, VP of Sales UKI, Climb, comments: “Today is a significant milestone for Climb as we mark the next evolution of a networking heritage that spans from Aruba to HPE Aruba Networking and now HPE Juniper Networking. This is a pivotal moment as we bring our partners into a single HPE Networking practice that combines the strength of the HPE portfolio under one coordinated model. This creates new opportunities for partners to grow faster, expand into adjacent networking markets and better support customers as networking, security and AI continue to converge.

“For many years Climb have helped partners develop successful networking businesses in Ireland, and this expansion allows us to bring that same expertise, investment and support to partners looking to capitalise on the opportunities created by HPE’s combined networking portfolio.”

Neil Dover, Country Sales Leader for Ireland at HPE said: “Climb has been a trusted HPE partner for many years, helping partners across Ireland grow their networking business and deliver great outcomes for customers. This expanded relationship gives partners easier access to HPE’s networking portfolio through a distributor with strong expertise and local market knowledge, helping them grow their business and support their customers’ changing needs.”

See more stories here.

There will be up to 84 new public drinking water fountains by the National Federation of Group Water Schemes (NFGWS) under the Public Drinking Water Fountain Scheme. This is an important contribution towards the Government’s commitment to improve public access to free drinking water and encourage the use of reusable water bottles. To date in 2026, a significant number of schemes have applied for grant aid to install drinking fountains, with a target of 84 by the end of 2026. The schemes that have applied so far cover 19 counties across Ireland.

Public water fountains to help with sustainability

Speaking about the schemes, Minister Dillon said:

“Drinking fountains are a vitally important part of reducing waste by providing the public with option to refill their reusable bottles at convenient locations across the country. They are also a real asset to local communities, not only creating a civic amenity, but reducing plastic bottle waste in our towns, on our beaches, and across our countryside. This expansion builds on the hugely successful existing scheme, which saw 43 fountains installed last year and I look forward to its continued growth across Ireland.”

The Public Drinking Water Fountain Scheme supports Ireland’s transition to a circular economy, by making it easier for people to choose refillable alternatives to single-use plastic bottles. Increased access to free drinking water helps reduce waste, prevent litter, and promote more sustainable consumption habits in communities across the country.

Supported by €610,000 from the Circular Economy Fund, the scheme is helping to put practical circular economy principles into action while supporting national efforts to reduce plastic waste and improve resource efficiency. The Department acknowledges the work of the NFGWS and its partners in delivering these installations and looks forward to the continued rollout of drinking water infrastructure that will benefit communities and the environment alike.

The Circular Economy Fund provides essential financial support annually – across a wide range of initiatives, as prescribed for under Section 8 (9) of the Circular Economy and Miscellaneous Provisions Act, 2022, including the Circular Economy Innovation Grant Scheme, EPA Circular Economy Programme, Anti-Dumping Initiative, Irish Environmental Network and Food Circle project.

In addition, funds have been allocated to support the introduction of designated waste collection systems for our legacy fishing gear, textiles and hazardous waste.

The Circular Economy Fund has funded 43 drinking water fountains to date, available across Ireland. Details of the schemes funded by the programme in 2025 are attached.

By the end of July 2026, 57 schemes had applied for funding. The 57 schemes cover 19 counties below. The numbers are based on the preliminary survey and are not a reflection of the total. Exact locations will be become available later in the year, when surveys and assessments of suitability have taken place.

Cavan 4
Clare 2
Cork 2
Donegal 1
Galway 11
Kilkenny 1
Laois 1
Leitrim 2
Limerick 4
Longford 1
Louth 1
Mayo 7
Monaghan 4
Offaly 4
Roscommon 1
Sligo 2
Tipperary 6
Wexford 2
Wicklow 1
Total 57

See more breaking stories here.

Minister for Climate, Energy, and the Environment, Darragh O’Brien today announced another major milestone for solar energy in Ireland, with installed solar capacity passing the 3 GW (GigaWatts) milestone for the first time. The roll-out of solar energy – from rooftop solar all the way up to utility-scale solar farms – continues to accelerate at pace.

The latest milestone comes just days after a new record for peak output from utility-scale solar farms was set on the national grid. At a point on Monday of this week, generation from utility-scale solar farms on the grid surpassed 1.3 GW – supplying one third of the country’s total dispatchable electricity generation at that time.

Solar capacity in Ireland continues to grow

Commenting on these developments, Minister O’Brien said:

“This week we have seen two major milestones for utility-scale solar – reaching 3 GW (GigaWatts) of installed solar capacity and establishing a new record for peak utility-scale solar farm generation [1.3 GW] at a given time on the grid. At times on Monday of this week, we saw utility-scale solar energy exceeding a third of the total electricity mix on the national grid. These milestones highlight just how rapidly solar energy, including the growing rooftop revolution, is becoming a major part of our energy system.

“With continued investment in solar – across homes, farms, businesses and large grid-scale projects – Ireland is building a growing source of homegrown, clean electricity, and strengthening our energy security.”

Nicholas Tarrant, Managing Director, ESB Networks, added:

“This milestone underlines the growing role solar energy is playing in Ireland’s journey to a low-carbon future. The contribution of both domestic solar panels and major renewable developers delivering large-scale projects has been instrumental in passing the 3 GW threshold.

“ESB Networks is currently delivering a major programme of investment in the Irish electricity network under Price Review 6 to enable the further growth of renewables and support Ireland’s transition to a clean electric future.”

Ireland’s first grid-scale solar farm was energised in April 2022, and a rooftop revolution is already well underway across Ireland.

Over 200,000 homes across Ireland have installed solar panels

Over 120,000 homes have received Solar PV grants since the PV support scheme began.

Data from the CSO shows that over 200,000 homes across Ireland have installed solar panels – many with SEAI support and some without.

SEAI received over 31,000 applications for Solar PV in 2026 (to the end of July). This is a 76% increase on the same period in 2025.

Moreover, free solar panels have been provided to 2,000 schools across Ireland.

Where excess energy is produced, it can be sold into the grid under microgeneration.

Suite of support schemes

Government schemes such as the Renewable Electricity Support Scheme (RESS), the Small-Scale Renewable Electricity Support Scheme (SRESS), and the Microgeneration Support Scheme (MSS), incentivise the development of solar energy from households, communities, and large-scale developments.

Minister O’Brien continued:

“The successful solar growth in Ireland has been underpinned by clear Government policy and targeted support schemes and measures. Through initiatives such as the Solar PV grant, and our various renewable electricity support schemes, solar deployment is supported at every scale. We are committed to funding the Solar PV grant for the lifetime of this Government, up until 2030.

“Looking at renewable electricity as a whole, we now have over 8 GW (GigaWatts) of generation capacity connected to the network. To put that into perspective, we have added approximately 5 GW (GigaWatts) of new renewable electricity generation capacity in just ten years. That includes a doubling of our wind energy capacity, along with establishing a strong solar energy supply. Just over 10 years ago there were 2 MW (MegaWatts) of solar in Ireland. Now there are over 3,000 MW (MegaWatts).”

To support solar deployment, the Government has introduced a range of measures, including the Microgeneration Support Scheme (MSS), the Small-Scale Renewable Electricity Support Scheme (SRESS), and the Renewable Electricity Support Scheme (RESS). These schemes are helping households, businesses, farms, and communities to participate in Ireland’s renewable electricity transition.

Further information on the Domestic Solar PV grant is available at: Solar Electricity PV Grants | Home Energy Grants | SEAI.

See more breaking stories here.

Guest post by Justin Pennington, who is a global transformation executive and author of The Intrapreneur Leader: A Playbook for Next-Generation Human Leadership

An invisible battle is raging inside today’s organisations. On one side is the indisputable need to innovate. On the other side are cultural systems designed to preserve the status quo. Increased customer expectations, technological disruption and changing regulations intensify that conflict.

Yet many leadership practices and structures were built for a different era — one that favoured expertise, predictability and control. They remain anchored in a simple axiom: leaders decide; others execute.

The Intrapreneur Leader

In pursuit of innovation, organisations turn to familiar structural solutions: external consultants, transformation programmes, innovation hubs and new technology. These are not wrong, but they are insufficient. Innovation cannot simply be installed through a structure or imported from outside.

Every organisation already contains people with experience, talent and ideas,  but talent alone is not enough. Human potential needs the right conditions to flourish, and  leaders must encourage curiosity, protect initiative and allow experimentation before certainty. The greatest untapped source of innovation is therefore not simply people, but what people become capable of when the conditions around them change.

In 1968, 3M scientist Spencer Silver developed an adhesive that appeared to have failed: it stuck lightly, could be removed and left little residue. Years later, colleague Art Fry saw its potential when bookmarks kept falling from his church hymnal. Using Silver’s adhesive, he created the Post-it Note. This breakthrough emerged because 3M gave employees room to explore ideas, experiment across boundaries and pursue value before certainty existed. Talent mattered. But so did the environment that allowed a failed adhesive and a falling bookmark to find each other.

The corporate immune system

Like their entrepreneurial counterparts, intrapreneurs begin as anthropologists. They observe how customers, colleagues and systems really behave, and notice opportunities others miss. They mobilise people around ideas from inside an organisation, often across boundaries and without relying on formal authority.

If this capability already exists, why does it so rarely surface?

Gifford and Elizabeth Pinchot, early proponents of intrapreneurship, called the forces resisting unfamiliar ideas the “corporate immune system”. Like any immune system, its purpose is protective: to preserve stability, manage risk and defend performance. But organisational immune systems can mistake novelty for threat, suppressing the very capability the organisation needs in order to adapt.

Hierarchy remains the organising principle in many workplaces. Managers manage, specialists specialise and thinking becomes separated from doing. Organisations equate leadership with control, confidence and predictability. Even in a world of probabilities, uncertainty becomes socially dangerous — and conformity becomes the safer choice.

Conformity may feel safe, but it teaches people to wait: for permission, for certainty, for sponsorship, for the “perfect time”. Good ideas remain hidden or die before they have evolved. Good ideas remain hidden or die before they mature. What protects today’s performance can quietly weaken tomorrow’s.

The age of agency

There are moments we rarely acknowledge. You see something clearly — a risk, a flaw or a new possibility — and then pause. Then, conformity tightens its grip. Perhaps you should not be too bold. Perhaps someone else knows better. Repeated often enough, self-censorship stops being a moment and becomes the culture.

This matters even more as AI makes information, analysis and technical expertise increasingly accessible. As knowledge becomes more abundant, human judgement becomes more valuable. Competitive advantage increasingly belongs to people who exercise curiosity, experiment, synthesise and mobilise others.

Intrapreneurship isn’t a role; it’s a capability: seeing what is wrong, imagining what is possible and mobilising others to turn possibility into progress. Intrapreneurs make sense of interdependent situations, connect ideas that do not naturally belong together and translate opportunities for different stakeholders. Without formal authority, they build horizontal support, test assumptions and take the smallest responsible step forward.

Intrapreneurship is not freedom from responsibility. It is the freedom to take action before every uncertainty has been removed. Because innovation rarely arrives fully formed, intrapreneurs cannot always prove an idea’s value in advance. They need enough freedom to discover what the answer might be.

A junior colleague once questioned whether intrapreneurship was feasible in hierarchical or regulated environments. It was a fair challenge. But regulators, like senior leaders, often define the what, not the how. Compliance establishes boundaries; within those boundaries, choice remains. There is still room to redesign a process, improve a customer experience or find a better route to the required outcome. Constraint does not eliminate innovation. It gives innovation a problem to solve.

This creates the central tension: the people closest to the opportunity are often the least authorised to act — and too often, that is where the idea stops.

Create the conditions for experimentation

Innovation programmes can help. But the more effective answer is to make experimentation routine and creativity as a process that people can practise and develop.

Leaders can make it safer to question, simpler to test and easier to find sponsorship. They can reward intelligent initiative and treat learning as valuable even when an experiment does not scale.

Employees, in turn, do not need to wait for a new title or formal invitation. They can observe more closely, identify who benefits, frame a credible opportunity, find allies and design a small, bounded experiment that produces evidence.

The organisation retains the discipline required for effective execution, but creates enough agency for invention to emerge. The result is not a business filled with uncontrolled entrepreneurs. It is an organisation populated by responsible intrapreneurs: people who notice what others miss, connect what others keep separate and act before certainty arrives.

The result is not a business filled with uncontrolled entrepreneurs. It is an organisation where responsible intrapreneurs notice what others miss, connect what others keep separate and act before certainty arrives.

Justin Pennington is a global transformation executive and author of The Intrapreneur Leader: A Playbook for Next-Generation Human Leadership

See more breaking stories here.

Selio Medical, the Guinness Enterprise Centre-based MedTech company reducing lung collapse, a dangerous complication caused by lung biopsies, has announced that it is embarking on a €5M Series A fundraising round. The fundraising round follows €15M+ already raised by Selio Medical and will help the company to drive commercialisation in the US following FDA clearance of its first product.

Biopsies are an essential diagnostic procedure for lung cancer patients and in the US, Selio Medical’s primary market, more than 400,000 lung biopsies are conducted each year. Pneumothorax – a collapsed lung – is the number one complication in the procedure, and the costliest to treat. Occurring in up to 35% of biopsies, it can be life-threatening for patients and incurs more than $750M in annual costs for medical providers in the US.

Selio Medical developed a novel biodegradable hydrogel sealant to form a pre-biopsy sealing plug, designed to prevent air leaks from the lung when the biopsy is carried out. The sealant is delivered through a single-use, pre-filled syringe and is compatible with existing biopsy equipment.

The patented device, called Pre. B Seal Lung Biopsy Plug System, will be used in patients for the first time in Q4 2026. The Series A funding round will drive its commercial launch in the US, where the addressable market for the device is more than $450M per annum, and where it already has pre-launch agreements in place with large hospitals in New York. Selio Medical anticipates annual US sales to reach 100,000 devices by 2031, with expected revenues reaching $30M.

Central to this is Selio Medical’s manufacturing site: a custom-built clean room in the Guinness Enterprise Centre. Representing the first of its kind in the Guinness Enterprise Centre, the clean room ensures Selio Medical follows stringent quality and regulatory requirements for manufacture of medical devices. All devices sold in the US will be developed in the Guinness Enterprise Centre.

To support its US launch, Selio Medical will hire five people in the next two years in the areas of sales, marketing and operations. The new hires will be based in Dublin and the US. In addition to its US commercialisation ambitions, the wider team will also help Selio Medical to progress its platform technology development for new indications in other large cancer markets.

Colm McGarvey, co-founder and CEO, Selio Medical, said: “Pneumothorax has been an accepted risk of lung biopsy for decades, but it doesn’t have to be. We have built a patented device that seals the lung before a biopsy is even carried out, rather than reacting to a complication once it has happened. That single shift has the potential to make biopsies safer for patients, more efficient for clinicians and more financially sustainable for hospitals.

“With FDA clearance secured and our first human cases planned for later this year, we are at an exciting point in our 10-year journey as we prepare to witness the real-world impact of our device. Along with the vital base and support provided by the Guinness Enterprise Centre ecosystem, this funding will let us bring that to US hospitals at the scale the problem demands.”

Clare Meehan, Operations Manager, Guinness Enterprise Centre, said: “Selio Medical is a great example of what can happen when a life sciences company is given the space and support to grow at home. At the Guinness Enterprise Centre, we are dedicated to giving start-ups the best chance of success. For Selio Medical, this included building a dedicated clean room as the company’s manufacturing needs evolved.

“We are extremely proud to be on this journey with Selio Medical and look forward to seeing the company’s hard work pay off.”

See more stories here.

Guest post by Rachel Johnson, who is CEO of PiXL (Partners in Excellence) and author of Box Clever, shortlisted for Business Book of the Year 2026.

I have a confession to make. I am obsessed with quadrants. Not the polite, dip-in-and-out kind of obsession, but the sort where you start seeing four-box grids everywhere you look. It is a niche thing to be fascinated by, I know. But over the years, working with leaders across thousands of schools and organisations, I have come to believe that this simple shape holds one of the most useful tools we have for making sense of leadership right now.

How to Box Clever

For most of the last decade, “thinking outside the box” has been the default advice for anyone trying to lead well. Be disruptive. Be innovative. Break the rules. It is a nice idea, and sometimes it is exactly right. But it also assumes the box itself is the problem, when actually, most leaders I meet are not short of ideas. They are short of a way to work out where they currently stand, and what to do about it. That is where in-the-box thinking comes in.

A quadrant takes two ideas and places them against each other, creating four positions you can see and understand at a glance. That is it. No complicated model, no fifty-slide framework. Just two axes and four boxes, and suddenly something that felt abstract and slippery becomes something you can point to and say, “that is where I am, and that is where I want to be.”

I trace this obsession back further than I would like to admit. As a thirteen year old, I remember sitting through assembly after assembly about bullying, or litter, or crime, and thinking, fine, but what am I actually meant to do about it now? I have always loved big ideas, but if a big idea does not leave me with something to do, I get restless. Where am I? Where do I want to be? How do I get there? What do I need to change? Those questions have shaped how I think about leadership ever since, and quadrants are the portal I keep coming back to answer them.

This matters more than ever for anyone leading a team or a company today. Leadership is rarely about knowing what good looks like in theory. It is about diagnosing where you actually are, right now, in this context, with this team, and deciding whether that is where you need to be. That is not a fixed destination. It changes as we change, and as our circumstances change. Deliberate leadership means constantly asking “is this where I need to be right now?”, rather than drifting on autopilot.

The title of my book, Box Clever, plays on the old definition of the phrase, which is about being clever enough to get an advantage over other people. I want no part of that half of the definition. The leadership I am interested in is about giving an advantage to ourselves and to the people we lead. It is about working out what to dial up and what to dial down, depending on where we find ourselves, so that everyone benefits, not just the person holding the framework.

None of this means a box can ever fully capture a person. You are more complex than four labelled corners will ever allow, and that is worth remembering that every time you use one. The value is not in being filed neatly away. It is in the conversation a quadrant starts, the debate it provokes in your own head, and the small, deliberate change it might nudge you towards next.

So the next time someone tells you to think outside the box, my advice is simple. Get back in it first. Work out exactly where you are standing. Only then will you know which direction is actually worth breaking out towards.

Rachel Johnson is CEO of PiXL (Partners in Excellence) and author of Box Clever, shortlisted for Business Book of the Year 2026.

See more breaking stories here.

Latest article by David Stephen who looks at social media addiction and mental health challenges arising. 

There is a recent analysis on Johns Hopkins Medicine, Social Media and Mental Health Among Children and Teens, stating that, “According to the advisory, evidence suggests that social media has potential to harm the mental health of children and adolescents. The advisory noted that frequent social media use could be associated with changes in parts of the brain related to: Impulse control. Social behavior. Emotional regulation. Sensitivity to social punishments and rewards. Social isolation. Lack of healthy activities. Lack of sleep. Exposure to bullying. Increased social comparisons.”

Social media addiction and tackling mental health issues

“Learning to have a healthy relationship with social media is as important as learning to have healthy relationships with food or exercise,” explains Vidal. “Delaying the purchase of smartphones until the child is ready is a good first step. But it’s also important to instill healthy habits in children’s use of screens given that technology — and social media in particular — will be present throughout their lives.”

“Katzenstein adds, “It’s important for parents to model healthy social media use and discuss social media citizenship behaviors with our children, to ensure we are not posting anything we wouldn’t say directly to someone in the ‘real world.’”

Dynamic flowchart of conceptual neuroimaging

What happens in the mind when social media has a negative effect on mental health?

This is the question that should be at the center of care, even as other answers are sought amid the evolving, complex problem.

There are already several advisory and technical approaches that are designed to mitigate the negative effects of social media on mental health. However, even when recommendations are adhered to, and usages are within technical limits, risks may emerge from aspects that are not covered by both.

This means that it is still necessary to know what the mind might be doing, at least a conceptual parallel, to estimate for the users and for loved ones, some proximity to risks.

Simply, showing how contents may be relaying across areas of the mind could result in the possibility to apply better caution, as well as increase intent to pause the current session or take heed in the next.

This will also give regulators, school districts, guides, social media companies better caveat architecture, against allowing an absolute flood of negative mental health that may precipitate from a session.

How? It is postulated that the human mind has four major categories of functions: memory, emotion, feeling and regulation of internal senses. These categories have several subcategories. Memory can be defined as the destination for interpretation, or where information is organized for several sensory inputs, more or less. So, sight, auditory, gustatory, touch and olfactory senses are interpreted by memory.

Memory is where social media contents get interpreted. Most contents often do nothing after interpretation. But for others, they are passed on to destinations of emotions or feelings.

It is when they get there that they can become what is experienced as negative or positive. While the same contents can be seen by many, it will be nothing for some and might be intense or heavy for others.

So, after interpretation – in memory – most times social media contents often attempt to relay to emotion or feeling areas. It is what gets there with certain attributes that may decide if the effect is positive or otherwise.

Already, most social media apps have complex recommender systems, showing people what they like. Sometimes too, they throw in random stuff. Now, looking at what people mostly like, it is possible that for some, their likes may determine how they are happy or their preferences. So, outside of their likes, there could be contents that are counter, which could cause some emotional or mind distress.

Also, especially when people post, with comments, views, likes and so forth. It is possible to place where the mind might go. For example, displeasure, because likes are low or something like that.

Now, making it possible to have destinations and relays of mind as a dynamic flowchart — so that subcategories of functions are displayed then relays between and across them are shown in real-time, with possibility of some estimates — could become a channel of mind safety whenever social media is used.

Simply, what are all the possible combinations for what social media might be or do to the mind: if there are negative comments, or if there is an attack on a favored group or if there is some low interest, or if people pile on someone, or other stuff?

This dynamic flowchart will have two types, a real-time display and then a predictive display, so that some people may go to it, after the fact to see what the mind may be doing, ensuring to find how to take care.

This dynamic flowchart is rooted in electrochemical psychiatry, a division of conceptual brain science that defines the human mind by electrical and chemical signals. Neuroscience has established that electrical and chemical signals are involved across functions.

Conceptual brain science uses what can be proven, to state the human mind and that electrical and chemical signals organize functions. It is expressed in the postulation in Conceptual Biomarkers and Theoretical Biological Factors for Psychiatric and Intelligence Nosology.

It is possible to build a minimum viable product for the dynamic flowchart within a month, say to be ready by September 15, 2026. And then make it a commercial possibility as Q4 begins.

It is expected to have subscription tier, which will be extra from the free tier. The free tier can be paid for by school districts, states, counties, social media companies and others.

The opportunity is to give conceptual neuroimaging – or express a parallel of the mind – to ensure that social media users are better aware of what is happening to avoid negative mental states.

The future is also moving in this direction already, with several lawsuits and settlements. So, the objective is to make this a staple of mind safety compliance, amid burgeoning risks from problematic internet use.

There is a recent [August, 2026] report on Kiowa County Press, Texas researchers study link between social media and mental health, stating that, “Excessive social media use could be harmful for people in their late teens and early 20s. A report from a team at the University of Texas Health-Houston School of Behavioral Health Sciences found higher social media use is associated with increased levels of anxiety, depression and suicidal thoughts among young adults.”

“Study participants who used social media for more than six hours a day reported the most symptoms. Temple added the research could not determine if social media use contributed to the mental health problems or if people with mental health issues spent more time on social media.”

“Temple stressed social media is here to stay, and as a society, we need to learn how to regulate it.”

There is a recent [August 2026] analysis in The Independent, I’m a doctor and this is how I came off antidepressants without going on a downward spiral, stating that, “A new report has found that a record 9.1 mil­lion patients were given the drugs by their doc­tor in the last 12 months, an increase of more than 15 per cent in five years. There is a stark regional divide, with anti­de­press­ant use highest in North Cum­bria and South York­shire, and almost double the rates seen in afflu­ent parts of Lon­don.”

“Or specifically, what happens when they try to stop taking SSRIs – selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors – the most common type of antidepressant. This class of drugs – you might recognise citalopram and fluoxetine (Prozac) – is prescribed not only for depression but for anxiety disorders, post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) and even chronic pain.”

David Stephen does research in conceptual brain science and served as a visiting scholar in medical entomology at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. He did computer vision research at Rovira i Virgili University in Tarragona.

See more breaking stories here.

Ireland’s Built Environment Joins Forces to Accelerate Gender Equality

A coalition of leading organisations from across Ireland’s built environment sector has today launched Constructing Equality Ireland. This new industry-led initiative, facilitated by Business in the Community Ireland, aims to accelerate progress on gender equality and increasing the representation of women at all levels across the construction industry.

Gender Equality

Established by Founding Partners from across the construction sector, Constructing Equality Ireland will bring organisations together to develop practical, evidence-based solutions that collaboratively increase the attraction, retention and progression of women. The initiative is backed by the Construction Industry Federation (CIF) and Women in Construction Ireland (WICI), who sit alongside the Founding Partners on the Steering Group.

While individual organisations have made important progress in recent years, women remain significantly underrepresented across the sector. Recent data highlights the scale of the challenge, with women accounting for just 10.9% of the construction workforce in Ireland, while holding only 9.1% of board positions and 15.2% of senior leadership roles across the sector.

Recognising that many of the barriers facing women in construction are shared across the industry and cannot be solved by organisations acting alone, Constructing Equality Ireland will take a collaborative approach, bringing together industry expertise, lived experience and evidence to identify practical actions that can drive meaningful and lasting change.

As an initial pilot programme, Constructing Equality Ireland will host a series of industry roundtables focused on early career recruitment and the retention of women in construction. Open to organisations of all sizes across the built environment sector, these discussions will inform the development of an industry-wide Gender Equality Action Plan, providing practical and scalable actions that organisations can adopt regardless of their size, resources or level of maturity. The first roundtable will be held on 6th October 2026, and more details will be released soon.

Tomás Sercovich, CEO of Business in the Community Ireland (BITCI), remarked “At a time when the built environment sector is growing and infrastructure projects are becoming more ambitious, we cannot afford to leave half of our population behind and excluded from the immense and diverse employment opportunities available. BITCI is privileged to bring its expertise on facilitating a multi-sector collective action campaign to truly move the dial and make fulfilling careers a reality for women in the built environment sector. Coalitions like these require significant leadership and long-term perspective and we commend the Founding Partners for their ambition, innovation and systemic approach.”

Amy Martin, EDI Partner at Sisk, and Chair of Constructing Equality Ireland said: “As a woman working in construction, I’ve experienced first-hand the progress our industry has made and the barriers that still exist. Many of the challenges facing women in construction are not unique to one organisation. They are shared across our industry, and lasting change will only happen when we move beyond isolated efforts and work together. It requires collaboration, commitment and action.

Constructing Equality Ireland creates a platform for collective action, bringing organisations together to share experiences, turn shared challenges into shared solutions, and accelerate progress for women across the built environment. No single organisation has all the answers, but together we have an opportunity to drive meaningful and lasting change for the future of our industry.”

Andrew Brownlee, Chief Executive at the Construction Industry Federation (CIF), highlighted “Building a more diverse construction industry is essential to attracting the talent, skills and leadership Ireland will need to deliver its future housing and infrastructure. While progress is being made, the continued underrepresentation of women across the sector shows that no organisation can address this challenge in isolation.

Constructing Equality Ireland provides an important platform for industry to work collectively, share evidence and develop practical actions that support women to enter, remain and progress within construction. CIF is pleased to support this initiative and looks forward to helping ensure that the resulting Gender Equality Action Plan is relevant, scalable and capable of being implemented by businesses of every size across the sector.”

See more breaking stories here.

Epomaker have sent us their NEX Pro Wireless Gaming Mouse to take a look at, and we have been putting it through its paces for everyday desktop use and, of course, gaming.

We have looked at a number of Epomaker products previously, including the HE68 Lite Hall Effect gaming keyboard and the TH80 V2 mechanical keyboard. Price vs performance has been the standout so far with products from Epomaker, so we were very interested to try out this gaming mouse to see if that continued.

The NEX Pro is aimed firmly at the gaming market, combining a lightweight 65g design with a high-end PixArt PAW3950 sensor, up to 42,000 DPI and an 8000Hz polling rate. It also offers three different connection methods, a magnetic RGB charging dock and browser-based configuration software.

At the time of writing, the EPOMAKER NEX Pro is priced at $79.99.

What’s in the Box?

Inside the box, you get:

• EPOMAKER NEX Pro wireless gaming mouse
• Magnetic charging dock
• Detachable USB-A to USB-C cable
• Multilingual user manual

NEX Pro Design and Features

The NEX Pro is a right-handed ergonomic gaming mouse designed primarily for medium-to-large hands. It measures 12.2 x 6.5 x 4.2cm and weighs just 65g without the charging dock.

The casing is made from ABS, and the NEX Pro currently comes in a silver finish. Despite packing in a battery and wireless hardware, Epomaker has kept the overall weight reasonably low.

The mouse feels well-made, and the materials used have a nice quality to them. It feels like it will stand up to vigorous gameplay!

Some of the main specifications and features include:

• PixArt PAW3950 optical sensor
• Up to 42,000 DPI
• Six selectable DPI stages: 400, 800, 1600, 3200, 8000 and 42,000 DPI
• 8000Hz maximum polling rate over 2.4GHz wireless or USB
• 750 IPS tracking speed
• 50G acceleration
• Adjustable lift-off distance of 0.7mm, 1mm or 2mm
• Nordic54L15 MCU
• Tri-mode connectivity
• 2.4GHz wireless
• Bluetooth
• USB wired connectivity
• Five programmable buttons
• Switches rated for 100 million clicks
• 500mAh rechargeable battery
• Magnetic RGB charging dock
• Browser-based configuration software
• Windows, macOS and Linux support
• PS4 and PS5 compatibility

One of the headline specifications is the PixArt PAW3950 sensor. The sensor supports up to 42,000 DPI, although realistically most users are going to operate the mouse at a small fraction of that figure.

The polling rate can be set to 125Hz, 250Hz, 500Hz, 1000Hz, 2000Hz, 4000Hz or 8000Hz when using the mouse through its 2.4GHz wireless connection or USB cable. Bluetooth operates at 125Hz.

The Nex Pro is fast and accurate to use. We had no concerns with it during our testing, and the many options for different rates allow you to fine-tune to your system and taste.

Buttons and Scroll Wheel

The NEX Pro follows a fairly conventional gaming mouse layout, with the main left and right buttons, scroll wheel and additional buttons positioned around the body.

Five buttons can be programmed through Epomaker’s software, while the primary left-click function remains reserved.

The buttons have a nice click action. They respond well to the pressure of your finger and activate as you would want. The buttons are rated for millions of uses, and they feel like that in reality.

The mouse also works well for general productivity on a PC, and while some of the options may be overkill for that, it does mean you can fine-tune how it responds very well for this use case too.

Connectivity

The NEX Pro supports three different ways of connecting to your devices.

For gaming, the 2.4GHz wireless connection is likely to be the main option, offering up to an 8000Hz polling rate and a claimed latency of 0.24ms.

You can also connect directly using USB, which allows the mouse to be used while charging, or use Bluetooth when maximum performance is less important.

The Bluetooth option also makes the NEX Pro considerably more flexible if you want to move it between a desktop, laptop or tablet.

Epomaker lists compatibility with Windows, macOS and Linux along with PCs, laptops, tablets and phones. PS4 and PS5 consoles are also supported.

During our testing, the mouse worked well with all connectivity options. For dedicated gaming, a wired connection will clearly be best as it gives you the full feature set, but the mouse works well with the two wireless options too.

Performance and Gaming

On paper, there is certainly no shortage of performance available from the NEX Pro.

The combination of the PAW3950 sensor, 750 IPS tracking, 50G acceleration and up to 8000Hz polling puts the core specifications firmly into high-performance gaming mouse territory.

Tracking, aiming, and movement in general are lightning-fast and accurate, and the positive action of the buttons makes rapid clicks easy.

I passed the mouse over to my teenage son to put it through its paces, and he was happy overall with the Nex Pro’s performance for all of his games, with the only comment being that he felt the mouse got a “little sweaty” with extended heavy use.

Overall, just like the keyboards, the performance is impressive for the relatively low price of the mouse.

Charging Dock and Battery Life

Another interesting addition is the magnetic charging dock.

Rather than having to connect a cable every time the battery gets low, the mouse can simply be placed onto the dock when you have finished using it.

The dock also includes RGB lighting, which doubles as a charging indicator. It flashes red when the battery is low and displays purple while charging. The lighting switches off when charging is complete.

Lighting effects can be changed using a touch-sensitive control on the dock, while a long press switches the lighting on or off.

Positioning the mouse of the dock correctly takes some muscle memory building, but it is a nice solution overall, and the lighting is a nice addition.

The mouse itself contains a 500mAh battery.

Epomaker claims up to 350 hours of battery life when operating at 125Hz, falling to around 50 hours when running at the maximum 8000Hz polling rate. A full charge takes approximately 1.5 hours. I think most people will keep it topped up on the dock when not in use, so you should never have to worry about charging.

There is also an automatic power-saving mode which puts the mouse to sleep after more than a minute without activity.

Software

One area where the NEX Pro is a little different is its software.

Rather than requiring another application to be installed on your computer, Epomaker provides browser-based configuration software.

A Chromium-based browser is recommended, and from here you can change settings including:

• DPI
• Polling rate
• Sleep settings
• Button assignments
• Macros
• Sensor settings

The browser-based approach is potentially a welcome one. Gaming peripherals have a habit of filling your computer with individual applications running in the background, so being able to configure the NEX Pro without permanently installing another piece of software is a nice idea.

It is pretty straightforward to connect to the device. You go to a web link, which can be found on the product page on the Epomaker website and connect your device. I had to allow some permissions on my Mac when I tested it, and from there you have a web UI for changing all the settings mentioned above. You can also create profiles and export the settings.

It works well and is easy to use, and it is handy to be able to access this from any browser and not have to install software.

Conclusion

This is another great product from Epomaker at a very affordable price for gaming equipment.

There is certainly a lot of hardware on offer for the money. The PAW3950 sensor, up to 8000Hz polling, tri-mode connectivity and magnetic charging dock give the NEX Pro a specification list that compares well with considerably more expensive gaming mice.

There are plenty of connectivity options, and the mouse is suitable for all types of use, not just gaming, and its ergonomic design lends itself to comfortable extended use.

At $79.99, it is an easy recommendation from us if you are looking for a high-spec mouse which won’t break the bank.

You can find out more about the NEX Pro and purchase it directly from the Epomaker website.

Salesforce and Anthropic are announcing Claudeforce, an expanded strategic partnership bringing Claude’s intelligence and reasoning together with Salesforce’s trusted enterprise harness to make its data, workflows, business logic, actions, and governance securely accessible to power agentic experiences wherever work happens.

The Claudeforce partnership launches with Salesforce in Claude, a Plugin with 37 prebuilt sales skills that enable sellers and agents to reason over live revenue context, automate pipeline updates, and take governed action right from Claude, with the power of Salesforce directly where sellers work. The companies plan to introduce more integrations across Claude, Salesforce, and Slack, expanding each company’s use of the other’s technologies.

Salesforce in Claude is made possible by AIforce, Salesforce’s trusted enterprise harness that brings all your business data and workflows to any agent through MCP servers, APIs, and CLI tools, without complicated and costly integrations.Salesforce in Claude marks a new era of enterprise AI. For decades, enterprise software required users to manually navigate static UI to get work done. Now that agents can access the data, workflows, and rules directly, software is a system that powers every interface.

“We’re bringing together the world’s #1 AI and #1 CRM, the best of both worlds. Today, we’re launching Claudeforce, running directly on top of Salesforce via our new AIforce UI harness, Headless 360, Data 360, Tableau, and Slack. Here,the UI is the AI, allowing you to build custom apps dynamically and answer any enterprise question. Probabilistic intelligence alone doesn’t run a company, and deterministic systems don’t reason. By fusing Claude’s extraordinary reasoning with the trusted data, workflows, and governance every enterprise runs on, we’re delivering a dynamic interface that thinks, reasons, and acts. This is how every business will run.”  said Marc Benioff, Chair & CEO, Salesforce.

“We believe frontier intelligence should be safe, trusted, and deeply capable, which is why the world’s leading businesses turn to Claude for their most important work. Salesforce in Claude brings this same frontier intelligence into the systems where much of the world’s commercial activity happens. Through this partnership, companies can point Claude at the customer information and business context that they’ve been building in Salesforce for decades, and use it to actually run and grow their businesses.”  added Dario Amodei, CEO & Co-Founder, Anthropic.

One partnership, intertwining AI built with data built on trust

The Claudeforce partnership brings together the best of both worlds — Claude brings intelligence and judgment, reasoning, adapting, and deciding in real time. Salesforce provides the data, rules, and trusted workflows that turn that judgment into enterprise-ready action. The partnership contains:

Salesforce inside Claude

The Claudeforce partnership launches with Salesforce in Claude, a Plugin that understands the sellers’ entire revenue cycle and acts on it, giving them an AI CRO —  with 37 prebuilt sales skills including meeting prep, deal health review, and pipeline review.

These skills were built by Salesforce and Anthropic, engineered specifically to draw on Claude’s reasoning, agentic tool use, and generative UI — not generic CRM prompts wrapped around an API but the capabilities that extend what Claude can do. This includes an onboarding experience that reads a seller’s enterprise context — Salesforce, Slack, and any connector in Claude — to stand up a tailored dashboard with their accounts, pipeline, and live data surfaced in interactive views Claude generates.

No two companies run sales exactly the same, so Salesforce in Claude routes actions through Salesforce to help ensure business rules are always enforced when an action is taken. Setup is seamless. An admin connects Salesforce in Claude a single time, with authentication and permissions managed centrally, and every seller on the team gets access from day one — no per-user setup, no new permissions model to build, no re-auditing account by account.

Claude inside Salesforce

Claude combines multistep reasoning and complex task execution with Anthropic’s rigorous approach to safety and interpretability. Claude is available in Agentforce — serving as a reasoning model for the Atlas Reasoning Engine, powering Agentforce Vibes and Agentforce Coworker by default, and available in Agent Builder.

Through Amazon Bedrock, Claude is available within the Salesforce Trust Boundary, allowing customers, including those in regulated industries, to deploy domain-specific AI while keeping data and AI workloads secure.

Slack: Where humans and agents work together

Slack, the multiplayer work OS, brings people and agents together in the flow of work. By embedding Claude directly into Slack — the central workspace where teams already operate — Salesforce is bridging the gap between team dialogue and autonomous enterprise action.

Through this expanded partnership, Claude is the default model for Slack and serves as the intelligent backbone across every layer of the Slack experience: powering Slackbot to supercharge personal productivity by default, augmenting team decision-making via Claude Tag, and accelerating multiplayer coding as a founding partner for Slack Code. Rather than managing disparate tools, teams can now reason through complex decisions alongside Claude in Slack and instantly execute governed, high-value actions in Salesforce — all without ever leaving the flow of work.

A partnership built on mutual adoption

Salesforce and Anthropic are also strategic customers of one another. This reciprocal adoption makes each company both a builder and a customer of the hybrid architecture they are bringing to market together.

Salesforce is Anthropic’s preferred CRM and connects communication, workflows, and agents through Slack, its preferred multi-player work platform for internal teams. Salesforce Shield, Backup, and Sandboxes support security, resilience, and development. Building on that foundation, new capabilities, spanning headless experiences, connected data, and automation, will power stronger scale across customer engagement.

Claude is the AI model powering Slackbot for Salesforce customers and employees. Internally, Slackbot has transformed how Salesforce employees work, with Slackbot driving 8.1M hours of annualized productivity gains, up over 2x quarter-over-quarter. Claude is the default model for Slack AI, Slackbot, Salesforce in Claude, Headless 360, Agentforce Coworker, and Claude Code across Salesforce’s engineering organization. Salesforce will make Claude Code and Claude Enterprise available to all of its developers and knowledge workers as the company’s preferred AI assistant and productivity tools, and Claude is the first LLM provider fully integrated within the Salesforce Trust Boundary.

Availability

Salesforce in Claude is available to select pilot customers now and expects to launch in open beta in September 2026.

Additional prebuilt skills will begin launching in late 2026.

See more stories here.

Integrity360 has acquired leading Identity specialist CyberIAM, a well-established and highly respected cybersecurity Identity services company operating from the UK and South Africa.  The terms of the transaction were not disclosed. The acquisition which is part of Integrity360’s continued global expansion plan, establishes an additional and significant new Identity cyber services and solutions practice within the group.

CyberIAM, founded in 2016, is a highly respected cybersecurity services and solutions specialist focused specifically on all aspects of Identity including “IAM” (Identity Access Management), “IGA” (Identity Governance and Administration), “PAM” (Privileged Access Management) and “CIAM” (Customer Identity and Access Management). The company employs approximately 120 highly skilled professionals across offices in Chester and London in the UK, and Cape Town in South Africa. It provides identity services to a broad range of enterprise customers across multiple sectors including financial services, retail, healthcare, insurance, energy, legal, and public sector.

In the AI era, identity has become the new security perimeter. Every employee, customer, application, device and AI agent represents an identity that must be authenticated, authorised and governed. As organisations increasingly deploy AI across their business, the ability to control who, what, and now which AI systems can access critical data and systems becomes fundamental to cyber resilience. This acquisition significantly strengthens Integrity360’s Identity capability in one of the fastest growing and most strategic areas of cybersecurity, enabling the group to help customers harness the power of AI while maintaining trust, security and governance.

CyberIAM has deep expertise and a long track record in the world of Identity including design and architecture, assessment, remediation, integration, deployment, strategy development, and training in addition to a wide range of support and managed services. It also has in-depth expertise, experience and accreditations in all of the world’s major Identity platforms including CyberArk (now Idira from Palo Alto Networks), SailPoint, BeyondTrust and Saviynt having advised, designed and deployed, and supported and managed such solutions for multiple global enterprise organisations. Integrity360’s existing Identity services and resources will be integrated with the CyberIAM team and Identity managed services will operate from the group’s one global SOC operation.

CyberIAM, led by its current CEO Michael Ribaudo, will form a new strategic services practice within Integrity360, sitting alongside the group’s existing 7 other practices – Offensive Security, Governance, Risk and Assurance, Incident Response and Forensics, Payment Compliance, Operational Technology, Security Technology Consulting, and its Gartner recognised Managed Services and Managed Detection and Response services which are delivered from its one global SOC operation encapsulating over 7 physical SOCs and more than 225 skilled analysts, consultants and engineers.

The global SOC operation delivers Integrity360’s highly comprehensive suite of managed services, including EDR (Endpoint Detection and Response), XDR (Extended Detection and Response), and MDR (Managed Detection and Response) solutions for business organisations across multiple continents.

CyberIAM customers will benefit from access to Integrity360’s extensive and complementary cyber services portfolio and Integrity360’s customers will benefit from a significantly enhanced range of Identity services delivered by the new practice. The addition of CyberIAM adds approx. €18m of revenues to the group taking total revenues to a run rate of approx. €230m with a team of approx. 900 employees operating across 3 continents.

Ian Brown, Executive Chairman at Integrity360 commented: “We could not be more delighted to be welcoming Michael and the whole CyberIAM team to Integrity360. Having known each other for some time, both organisations recognised a growing strategic alignment, making this combination a natural next step for both our customers and employees. Identity is now the primary control plane for cybersecurity, and by strengthening our Identity capabilities, we are helping customers build the secure foundation they need to embrace AI with confidence. We are looking forward to working closely with the team to rapidly expand their operations, capability and global reach over the coming years.”

Michael Ribaudo, CEO of CyberIAM commented: “This is a really significant moment for us. Myself and the whole CyberIAM  leadership team are really pleased that CyberIAM is joining Integrity360 to continue the growth journey we started a decade ago. Thanks to the support of our customers and employees, CyberIAM has grown to become one of the leading experts in Identity services helping businesses control and protect human and machine identities. With the backing of Ian and the considerable resources, capability, and track record of the entire Integrity360 team we are excited about what we can further achieve for our customers, and our employees, and we look forward to expanding further into international markets.”

See more stories here.

Almost 60 new jobs were created by ACORNS participants during the latest cycle of the programme, which is funded by the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine.

The combined annual turnover of the ACORNS 11 early-stage female entrepreneurs grew from €4.1m to almost €6m during the six months of the free programme.

Nine of the 53 female entrepreneurs based in rural areas started trading for the first time while on the programme with another four becoming exporters while on ACORNS.

Jobs created via ACORNS

The statistics highlight the positive impact of the programme as applications are now being sought for the next cycle – ACORNS 12. The call was opened by Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine Martin Heydon with the deadline for applications set at midnight on Friday, September 18th.

Feedback from ACORNS 11 also showed that all 53 participants said they would recommend ACORNS to others. Some 98% felt closer to achieving their business ambitions following the programme and 94% said their participation had brought about practical change within their business.

ACORNS, which stands for Accelerating the Creation of Rural Nascent Start-ups, is in its 12th year and some 600 female entrepreneurs have participated. It is funded through the Rural Innovation and Development Fund by the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine. The programme, which was developed by Fitzsimons Consulting, is based on the belief that early-stage entrepreneurs learn best from their peers.

Participants interact with each other in the monthly round table sessions, which are facilitated by a Lead Entrepreneur with first-hand experience of starting and successfully growing a business in rural Ireland.

ACORNS 12 will run from October 2026 to April 2027. It is open to early-stage female entrepreneurs living in rural Ireland who have generated sales no earlier than the end of June 2023. There are up to 50 places available. Those wishing to apply must first register their interest via the website (www.acorns.ie). They will then be sent an application by email.

There is no charge for those selected to participate in ACORNS 12, thanks to the continuing support of the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine and the voluntary contribution of time by the Lead Entrepreneurs.

This year’s voluntary Lead Entrepreneurs are Alison Ritchie, Polar Ice (Laois); Geraldine Jones, Skin Formulas (Tipperary); Karen Kerrigan, Kerrigan’s Mushrooms (Meath); Larissa Feeney, Kinore (Donegal); Mary B Walsh, Ire Wel Pallets (Wexford); Orla Leahy, Ireland Chauffeur Travel (Tipperary); and Triona MacGiolla Rí, Aró Digital Strategies (Galway).

ACORNS Lead Entrepreneur Karen Kerrigan of Kerrigan’s Mushrooms, says:

“Running a business can sometimes feel lonely, but ACORNS creates a supportive environment where women encourage one another, share experiences and realise they don’t have to face challenges on their own. The enthusiasm, honesty and generosity within ACORNS has kept me motivated and reminded me that we’re all continually learning, no matter what stage we’re at in our business journey.”

ACORNS Past Participant Kel Galavan of Mrs Smart Money, says:

“I will forever be grateful for the opportunity to be part of this fantastic programme. The ACORNS structure has provided clarity around every aspect of my business. I met so many inspiring, intelligent women on this journey who have been pillars of support and encouragement. Having them to lean on through the process has been fantastic, and I know that we will be there for each other in the future.  If you get the opportunity to be part of ACORNS, take it in both hands and run!”

ACORNS Past Participant Carina Rosingrave, of Burren View Farm, says:

“Participating in ACORNS definitely helped my business because I was surrounded by likeminded people, who all wanted to get a business up and running, and you weren’t on your own. We’re still connected and still support each other now. I also had great support from the ACORNS team and our Lead Entrepreneur. They really focused my mind on the business. I feel much more confident.”

www.acorns.ie

About ACORNS

ACORNS, which stands for Accelerating the Creation Of Rural Nascent Start-ups, is in its 12th year. It is funded through the Rural Innovation and Development Fund by the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine (DAFM). The programme was developed by Fitzsimons Consulting.

Eligibility Criteria for participation on ACORNS

To be considered for ACORNS, applicants must:

• Have set up a new business which has generated sales no earlier than the end of June 2023 or be actively planning a new venture and have made good progress towards getting the new venture off the ground. Indicators of actively planning a business would include organising the start-up team, sourcing equipment / facilities, money saved for the start-up, writing the business plan, etc.
• They must own or part-own the business and be living in a rural area, that is in an area outside the administrative city boundaries of Dublin, Cork, Galway, Limerick and Waterford.
• If selected, applicants must be available to attend the launch Forum and first round table session on October 19 and 20, 2026.
• They must expect to become an employer within three years.

See more breaking stories here.

Title image : Babu Mon Melethil Gopinathan Pillai from Cherrywood

A couple silhouetted against the glow of the aurora on a remote Galway beach. Ancient monastery walls emerging from fog beneath a sky dusted with stars. A distant nebula, thousands of light-years from Earth, glowing against the darkness of space.

These are just some of the breathtaking scenes captured by the winners of this year’s Reach for the Stars astrophotography competition, organised by the School of Cosmic Physics at the Dublin Institute for Advanced Studies (DIAS).

Astrophotography, Ireland’s Best Night Sky Photographs

Drawing more than 140 entries from photographers across Ireland, the competition showcases extraordinary images of the night sky, revealing the beauty of the cosmos through the lens of both amateur and experienced photographers.

Among this year’s winners was Ekaterina Moskovskova from Renvyle, Co. Galway, winning in the Night Sky in Your Hand category. Her image As Above, So Below captured a couple standing on a moonlit beach beneath the glow of the aurora.  Reflected in the wet sand below, the stars and Northern Lights created what judges described as a striking mirror between earth and sky.

In the Out of this World category, John Walsh of Sallins, Co. Kildare was the winner, impressing the judging panel with his image Horsehead & Flame Nebulae, an intricate image revealing one of the most recognisable regions of the night sky.  Set amongst clouds of glowing hydrogen gas and coloured reflection nebulae, the image captures detail in a celestial object located hundreds of light years from Earth.

The judges also recognised two runners-up in the category. Anthony Lynch from Dublin 7 was commended for Comet R3 Panstarrs, a striking image of the comet photographed from the cliffs at Portrane, Co. Dublin, while David Mackie from Athenry, Co. Galway was commended for A Bubble in Outer Space, capturing the Bubble Nebula, a glowing shell of gas located approximately 10,000 light-years from Earth.

Closer to home, Babu Mon Melethil Gopinathan Pillai from Cherrywood, Dublin was named the winner in the Back on Earth category with his image Celestial Coast. The image depicts bioluminescent waves washing ashore Ireland’s rugged Copper Coast, Co. Waterford, while the Milky Way arcs high above the ocean. The photographer described the scene as “fleeting harmony between ocean and cosmos; a landscape where science, chance and beauty align.”

The judges selected two runners up for this category, Tom O’Donoghue from Malahide Co. Dublin, and Matthew Kelly from Lahinch, Co. Clare. O’Donoghue’s image, Copper Coast Milky Way, was taken at Kilfarrisay Beach, Co. Waterford with the milky way visible in night sky between two prominent rocks. Milkyway Beach, Kelly’s image, was taken at Ballydwan Beach, Co. Waterford depicting the Milky Way arching above the horizon.

The public also cast their votes to select a favourite from the shortlisted entries, with Karthik Swaminathan, based in Dublin 7, taking the Public Choice Award for 12 Panel Mosaic Moon. Constructed from multiple images, the photograph reveals the Moon in remarkable detail, transforming it from a familiar object in the night sky into a textured and ancient world.

The winning photographers will be recognised at an awards ceremony at DIAS HQ, Burlington Road, Dublin 4 in the coming weeks. Their photos, alongside a selection of shortlisted images, will go on public display in a special exhibition at a later date, giving visitors the chance to explore some of Ireland’s most spectacular night sky photography up close

Commenting on this year’s competition, Dr. Eucharia Meehan, CEO and Registrar of DIAS, said: “Each year, Reach for the Stars reveals a new perspective on Ireland’s night skies.  The photographs submitted this year showcase not only incredible technical skill but also creativity, curiosity, and a deep appreciation for the natural wonder above us. Whether capturing ancient monuments beneath the stars, the colours of the aurora or distant galaxies far beyond our solar system, these photographers have given us a glimpse of a universe that is both vast and beautiful. We are delighted to celebrate their achievements.”

This year’s winners were selected by an expert judging panel, including Dan Dennison, Visual Editor, Irish Times; Dr Donncha O’Driscoll, President of the Irish Astronomical Society; Professor Peter Gallagher, Senior Professor and Head of Astronomy and Astrophysics at DIAS; and Dr Niamh Shaw, Scientist, Engineer, and one of Ireland’s leading Science Communicators.

Speaking on behalf of the judging panel, Professor Peter Gallagher said, “What struck the judging panel this year was the storytelling behind the photographs. These images capture fleeting moments that most of us would never see with the naked eye, from the glow of the aurora reflected on a Galway beach to distant nebulae hidden deep within our galaxy. They remind us that moments of extraordinary beauty can be found both above our heads and in the landscapes around us. The technical standard was exceptional, but the winning images stood out because they sparked a sense of wonder. They encourage us to pause, look up and appreciate the universe we are part of.”

DIAS’ Reach for the Stars competition is run in partnership with The Irish Times and is sponsored by MKC Communications and the Astronomical Observatories of Ireland. The Irish Astronomical Society are initiative supporters.

DIAS Reach for the Stars:

Photographs taken between 03 June 2025 and 10 May 2026 were entered in three categories:

1. Night Sky in Your Hand – Images taken with a smartphone only, without telescopes, capturing an astronomical scene.
2. Out of this World – Images of astronomical objects, including the Sun, Moon, planets, and deep-sky objects such as nebulae, star clusters, and galaxies.
3. Back on Earth – Images that depict astronomical features alongside landscapes, landmarks, nature, buildings, or heritage sites.

DIAS’s ‘Reach for the Stars’ competition is being run in partnership with The Irish Times and is sponsored by MKC Communications and the Astronomical Observatories of Ireland.

Dublin Institute for Advanced Studies (DIAS):

As the world’s second and Ireland’s only, Institute for Advanced Studies, DIAS is a globally recognised research institution, attracting scholars and academics from around the world.  It conducts and publishes advanced research across three areas: Celtic Studies, Theoretical Physics and Cosmic Physics (encompassing Geophysics, and, Astronomy and Astrophysics). DIAS also leads Ireland’s participation in a number of international research endeavours and infrastructures. It is the custodian of Dunsink Observatory, the first building on the island of Ireland specifically constructed for scientific research, which was built in 1785.

www.dias.ie

See more breaking stories here.

Global venture capital investment in AI reached an all-time high of approximately $430 billion in the first half of 2026 alone, surpassing $254 billion invested across the whole of 2025 and more than four times as large as the total investment just three years ago. That’s according to the latest EY Ireland AI Investment Trends report for the first half of 2026.

The scale of spend is striking against the backdrop of persistent talk of an AI bubble, with spending in the April to June quarter alone exceeding the entirety of 2025, according to an analysis of global investment data by EY Ireland’s Technology Media & Entertainment and Telecommunications (TMT) team.

In addition, spending plans from hyperscalers Amazon, Alphabet and Meta are expected to total between $490 billion and $520 billion in 2026 alone. The figure puts the industry on track for an annual run-rate of close to $1 trillion, a level of spend that was viewed as an alarming three-to-five-year projection as recently as two years ago.

Looking ahead, investment in data centres, advanced chips, networking and cloud capacity is projected to reach $2.9 trillion between 2025 and 2028, as a growing share of investment is directed towards the foundational technologies and assets that make AI deployment possible.

At the funding level, deal concentration continues; more than 40% of total H1 2026 deal value came from just four major transactions, with frontier model providers OpenAI, Anthropic and xAI collectively raising $172 billion. Other key deals included Sierra (US$950 million), valuing it at more than $15 billion; Replit (US$400 million) and several European deals, including Helsing (US$1.8 billion), Neura Robotics (US$1.4 billion), Advanced Machine Intelligence (US$1 billion) and Mistral (US$830 million).

Semiconductor VC funding also remained a distinct area of strength, with $5 billion invested across 84 transactions in Q1 2026, the second-strongest quarter on record for the segment.

Meanwhile, sovereign wealth funds are forecast to deploy more than $100 billion into AI and digitalisation this year, up from $66 billion last year, led by Middle East funds including Abu Dhabi’s Mubadala Investment Company, the Kuwait Investment Authority and the Qatar Investment Authority.

Grit Young, EY Ireland Partner and Technology, Media and Telecoms Lead, said:

“In spite of the continued discussion of an AI bubble, the total VC investment in Generative AI in the last quarter alone exceeded the whole of 2025. Two years ago, alarm bells were ringing at the prospect of $1 trillion of industry spend over three to five years; today we’re nearly at that figure in a single year from the hyperscalers alone.

What is driving this is a rapid maturing of the sector, with AI investment moving beyond frontier models and consumer applications to one that increasingly encompasses infrastructure, sovereignty and energy. Continued AI advancement depends on sustained infrastructure investment, while nations and trading blocs are increasingly focusing on the need to ensure sovereign capability in AI.

The defining question for the next decade may be less about who develops the most capable AI models and more about who can finance and build the computer layer and infrastructure that sit beneath enterprise AI adoption, and increasingly, can ensure sovereign control.”

Investment accelerates in Europe and Ireland

The increased focus on sovereign AI is particularly pronounced in Europe, where the political backdrop for cross-border technology deals involving cloud services, IT infrastructure and hardware continues to shift. Globally, national authorities and regulators are signalling that they are increasingly prepared to intervene where technology assets touch on strategic interests, competitive sensitivities or critical infrastructure.

The EU has adopted a set of interlocking initiatives as part of a coordinated effort to build European AI infrastructure and enhance Europe’s AI competitiveness. This encompasses a range of strategies, as well as significant investment in AI Factories across the bloc. In addition, AI research funding will be increased through the Horizon Europe programme, which aims to double annual AI investment to more than €3 billion. This pan-European approach is very welcome, as catching up with the leading nations is beyond the capacity of any individual Member State.

There are signs that these policies and instruments are beginning to pay off. Direct funding into European AI enterprises reached €21.3 billion in the first five months of 2026, surpassing the full-year 2025 total. As a result, AI companies now account for roughly 40% of all venture transactions across the continent.

Against this global backdrop, Ireland continues to build its own AI capacity. Ireland’s AI industry continues to attract investment across a diverse range of sectors, from fintech and quantum computing to healthcare, space technology and AI infrastructure. Notable deals include Fonoa ($110m), Equal1 ($60m) and CameraMatics (€49m).

Irish companies working in the development of Data centres have also witnessed significant Private Equity investment, with H&MV recently announcing an investment that valued the firm north of €1 billion. H&MV joins a long list of Irish engineering firms to benefit from the data centre boom globally including E&I, Winthrop Technologies, and Echelon.

Enterprise AI adoption more than doubled between 2023 and 2025, rising from 8% to 20% of businesses – in line with the EU average, though behind leading markets such as Denmark (42%) and Finland (38%). Adoption also rises sharply with company size, reaching 58% among large enterprises compared with 29% for medium-sized businesses and 17% for small enterprises.

“Ireland already has or is actively building many of the capabilities required to benefit from the continued growth in global AI investment. These include skilled talent, energy and digital infrastructure, a vibrant AI R&D sector, strong industry-academia collaboration, and a growing AI start-up community. When you add some of the world’s leading data centre engineering and construction companies to that mix, Ireland has all the ingredients for success. The challenge now is to go faster and further in supporting the incredible entrepreneurial talent that we have in Ireland,” said Grit Young.

Ireland has the opportunity to transform its economy, reduce dependence on overseas investors and raise an initial €1 billion to back indigenous SMEs, without material Exchequer cost, according to the Irish Venture Capital and Private Equity Association (IVCA) in its pre-budget submission published today.

The association calls for a government-convened fund-of-funds designed to pool investment in order to minimise risk and boost institutional backing, including pensions, into domestic firms. It says that this would also be an ideal vehicle in which to channel a modest share of savings from the proposed Personal Investment Account into productive domestic investment.

“And this can be implemented quickly as we have an off the shelf working example in the Danish Dansk Vaekstkapital model which has pumped more than €1.5 billion into domestic companies,” said Richard Watson, chairperson, IVCA.

“Foreign Direct Investment will continue to be a core pillar of the Irish economy but the rapidly changing international environment and global political uncertainty make it increasingly urgent to strengthen indigenous enterprise,” said the IVCA chairperson.

He added: “Ireland has a good track record in getting start-ups off the ground thanks to government initiatives through EI (Enterprise Ireland) and ISIF (Ireland Strategic Investment Fund), but the gap in institutional scaling finance means that these companies usually have to go overseas to raise the capital necessary to grow into major employers.”

Sarah-Jane Larkin, director general, IVCA said that quarter one data highlighted the extent of the challenge facing Irish tech SMEs looking to raise funds. “VC investment in the quarter fell by almost 60% to just over €221 million with 85% of the capital raised coming from international investors. That combination points to a market with strong companies and real investor interest, but one that remains heavily dependent on external capital conditions.”

The IVCA pre-budget submission says that the economic impact of boosting institutional investment including pension funds into the domestic economy could be transformative. “Public policy choices in the past such as the expansion of free education and the establishment of the IDA reshaped the country’s economic trajectory for generations. A framework to mobilise domestic institutional capital into Irish venture and growth investment could be similarly important.”

Sarah-Jane Larkin said: “At a time when all government departments are facing spending pressures, crucially, this can be done without material Exchequer cost. The objective is not to create a new spending commitment, but to use a limited portion of existing ISIF capital strategically to convene, structure and catalyse much larger pools of private investment.”

She added: “This would help create the financial foundations for more indigenous companies to scale from Ireland, deepen domestic ownership of innovation, and build a stronger base of employers over time. This is therefore not only a response to a funding gap, but a time-sensitive opportunity to strengthen the long-term structure of the Irish economy.”

The IVCA warns that Ireland is already falling behind other European nations in mobilising institutional backing for the indigenous sector. The association states:

“Other countries have moved quickly to direct pension and institutional capital toward domestic innovation. France, Denmark, the UK, Germany, the Netherlands, and pan-European initiatives are all developing structures that improve the risk-return profile for long-term investors and channel greater capital into venture and growth finance. Ireland should now take deliberate policy steps to ensure that it is not left behind. The opportunity is real, but it will not be captured through policy inertia.”

The IVCA pre-budget submission may be downloaded from: https://www.ivca.ie/research-publications/

Soft2Bet is an international technology company that integrates responsible gambling into its platform architecture, operational processes, and corporate standards. Today, responsible gambling represents a comprehensive approach that combines technological solutions, internal procedures, player interactions, and corporate governance to create a safe user experience alongside transparent operational processes and effective control mechanisms.

At Soft2Bet, this approach is implemented through a broad range of player protection tools, including know your customer (KYC), anti-money laundering (AML), identity verification, self-exclusion, self-limitation, and deposit limit mechanisms. Together, these features form a comprehensive framework for responsible interaction with the platform.

Soft2Bet views responsible gambling as an ongoing process rather than a standalone feature. It encompasses monitoring technologies, internal standards, player support, transparent communication, and continuous product development, ensuring that the principles of responsible gambling remain integrated into the company’s day-to-day operations.

Responsible Gambling in Modern iGaming: More Than Just an Industry Requirement

Today, the concept of responsible gambling is much broader than a set of mandatory control tools. The modern approach involves integrating responsibility into every stage of a platform’s operations. This approach is based on the idea that a safe environment is created by a combination of interconnected processes. That is why responsible gambling today combines identity verification, KYC procedures, AML mechanisms, player protection tools, and self-exclusion, self-limitation, and deposit limits systems, which function as a unified control model.

Soft2Bet emphasises that responsible gambling must be an integral part of business processes. This allows for the development of platforms where responsible gambling is supported simultaneously by technology, internal procedures, and corporate culture.

Prevention is an equally important component of a modern approach. Increasing attention is being paid to the early detection of behavioural changes that may indicate the development of a gambling addiction. Thus, responsible gambling relies on analytics, automated monitoring, and preventive mechanisms for interacting with users.

Why Responsible Gambling Is Strategically Important for Platforms

For modern platforms, responsible gambling is an integral part of long-term development. A responsible approach helps maintain transparency in operations, ensure player protection, and establish clear rules for interaction between the operator and the user.

At the same time, an effective responsible gambling system is impossible without KYC and AML procedures. Identity verification, financial transaction monitoring, and internal oversight ensure process accountability and help maintain an appropriate level of control at every stage of the platform’s operations.

Self-control tools are particularly important. Deposit limits, self-limitation, and self-exclusion allow users to manage their own activity, which is a key element of the modern concept of responsible gambling. These mechanisms complement technological solutions and help reduce the risk of developing a gambling addiction.

For Soft2Bet, responsible gambling is an integral part of the overall platform management model. Therefore, responsible gambling is integrated into user interactions, technological solutions, operational processes, and internal operating standards. This comprehensive approach allows Soft2Bet to view responsible gambling as an ongoing process that encompasses all key stages of the platform’s operation.

Soft2Bet and Responsible Gambling: Principles and Approach

Responsible gambling is now an integral part of the modern model for managing iGaming platforms. This involves complying with specific requirements and creating an environment where safe interaction with the product is built in from the development stage. Soft2Bet demonstrates this approach by integrating responsible gambling principles into its technological solutions, operational processes, and internal company standards.

Soft2Bet notes that responsible gambling is an integral part of the entire platform, rather than a separate functional module. Together with KYC, identity verification, and AML procedures, as well as player protection tools, this forms a unified control system aimed at supporting transparent interaction between the operator and the user.

Responsible Gambling as a Fundamental Operating Principle

For Soft2Bet, responsible gaming is not separate from other business processes. It is integrated into the platform’s architecture, decision-making mechanisms, and daily operational procedures. This approach ensures consistent control standards. Key principles of responsible gambling at Soft2Bet:

—  Prevention through awareness and education. Soft2Bet promotes responsible gambling by providing players with clear information about gambling-related risks and the tools available to manage their gaming activity. Guidance is available through the company’s responsible gambling resources and is reinforced with in-platform reminders that help users set and adjust responsible gaming controls.

Internally, Soft2Bet conducts regular training and awareness programs for customer support, product, and marketing teams to ensure they can recognise potential risks and communicate responsible gaming principles effectively. Through continuous education and proactive awareness, Soft2Bet aims to reduce the likelihood of gambling-related harm before it occurs.

—  Early detection and intervention. Soft2Bet uses its own monitoring system to analyse user behaviour and identify changes that may indicate potential risks. If such signals are detected, an additional assessment of the account’s activity is conducted, taking into account previous interactions and, if necessary, available information regarding the user’s financial capacity.

—  Player empowerment and control. Soft2Bet provides a comprehensive range of responsible gambling tools that enable players to manage their gaming activity according to their individual preferences. These include deposit limits, loss limits, self-limitation, time-outs, reality checks, and self-exclusion, all of which are easily accessible through the responsible gambling section. Soft2Bet also promotes the use of these features through in-platform communication and continuously enhances the user experience by considering player feedback and following established responsible gaming best practices.

This means that Soft2Bet views responsible gaming as an ongoing management process in which each element complements the others.

The Balance Between User Engagement and Safe Gaming

Soft2Bet combines modern user interaction mechanics with a system of safeguards that help users maintain control over their own activity.

Every platform strives to provide a convenient user experience, but a responsible model requires that the entertainment aspect not conflict with safety principles. That is why Soft2Bet focuses on ensuring that its technological solutions combine ease of use with the ability to control one’s own activity.

Responsible gaming encompasses technical restrictions and transparency in interactions. Users must have access to clear information about the rules for using the services, the conditions under which restrictions apply, deposit limit mechanisms, self-limitation options, and self-exclusion procedures.

Soft2Bet and Responsible Gambling: Regulatory Compliance

For platforms operating in different jurisdictions, responsible gambling cannot be a one-size-fits-all feature that is applied uniformly everywhere. Soft2Bet integrates regulatory compliance and player protection requirements into every stage of product development rather than treating them as a final step before launch. Internal policies and compliance standards are established centrally, while market-specific specialists adapt local regulatory requirements to product functionality, payment systems, marketing activities, CRM processes, and customer support. Every product update follows a structured workflow that includes risk assessment, technical testing, compliance verification, and documented approval before deployment.

To maintain high compliance standards, Soft2Bet continuously monitors key controls, maintains audit documentation, and conducts regular internal reviews to identify and address potential issues at an early stage.

Despite differences between jurisdictions, Soft2Bet maintains a unified philosophy of Responsible Gambling. This philosophy is based on several common principles:

• mandatory player protection;
• transparency of KYC and Identity verification procedures;
• monitoring of financial transactions through AML mechanisms;
• availability of self-limitation, self-exclusion, and deposit limits tools;

Thanks to this combination, Soft2Bet views responsible gaming as an integrated platform management model, where technology, user verification, financial controls, and self-control mechanisms function as complementary elements of a unified system.

The Technological Foundation of Responsible Gambling at Soft2Bet

The effectiveness of responsible gaming depends largely on how seamlessly the relevant mechanisms are integrated into the technology platform. If responsible gaming tools exist separately from the core system, they are often used only as a formality. That is why Soft2Bet takes a different approach, in which responsible gaming is an integral part of the platform’s overall architecture.

For Soft2Bet, responsible gaming encompasses every stage of interaction with the platform – from account creation to the use of self-control and support mechanisms. An important component of this system is identity verification. Identity verification helps confirm that the user meets the established requirements and also lays the foundation for other security mechanisms to function. Together with KYC and AML procedures, it forms a unified control system that ensures the platform’s transparency.

At Soft2Bet, player protection tools are integrated into the product’s core functionality. This allows users to quickly set deposit limits, use self-limitation features, activate self-exclusion, or view their activity history without having to perform any complicated additional steps.

Another guiding principle at Soft2Bet is the accessibility of responsible gaming features. Users should be able to access them exactly when they need them. Therefore, responsible gaming tools are designed to be intuitive and seamlessly integrated into the familiar user interface.

User Behaviour Analytics and Monitoring

Advances in digital technology have enabled the industry to shift from reacting to problematic situations to detecting them early on. Soft2Bet places special emphasis on analyzing behavioral patterns as one of the key components of responsible gaming. The modern platform is capable of analysing various metrics of user interaction with the service. This helps identify atypical behaviour patterns, assess changes in activity, and promptly implement player protection mechanisms.

Based on behavioural analysis, users can receive reminders about the duration of their gaming sessions, information about available self-limitation tools, recommendations on using deposit limits, or the option to use the self-exclusion feature. This preventive approach aligns with the modern concept of responsible gaming, in which risk prevention is the top priority.

For Soft2Bet, the use of analytics also means the continuous improvement of player protection mechanisms.

As a result, Soft2Bet is building a digital environment in which responsible gaming is supported by specific features and the platform’s overall design. This helps strengthen player protection, support the prevention of gambling addiction, and create a safer environment for users.

Responsible Gambling Tools for Players

One of the key principles of responsible gaming is giving users the ability to independently manage their own gaming activity. Soft2Bet integrates tools into its platform that help users make informed decisions, manage their time and spending, and maintain a responsible approach to gaming. The main self-control mechanisms include:

• Self-limitation – allows users to voluntarily set individual limits based on their own needs and playing style. Combined with deposit limits, this tool helps users more effectively manage their gaming activity and is an important component of the player protection system.
• Deposit limits – allow users to set their own maximum deposit amount for a selected time period. This helps control spending and promotes responsible use of the platform.
• Self-exclusion – a mechanism that allows users to temporarily or for a longer period restrict access to their account. For Soft2Bet, this tool is an integral part of the responsible gaming concept, as users should be able to quickly decide to take a break from gaming.
• Time-outs are a feature that allows you to temporarily suspend access to the game without completely closing your account. This feature lets you take a break, reassess your activity, and return to the game only when you’re ready.
• Reality checks are informational reminders that notify users of the duration of their current gaming session. They help users better manage the time they spend on the platform and support the principles of responsible gaming.

At Soft2Bet, all these tools operate as an interconnected player protection system, complementing identity verification, KYC, and AML procedures.

Transparency and Accessibility of Responsible Gambling Tools

The effectiveness of any responsible gaming mechanism depends on how easy it is for users to use it. That is why Soft2Bet focuses on the accessibility of responsible gaming tools and ensuring they are easy to use. Users should be able to quickly find information about available features, understand how they work, and activate the necessary settings without undue difficulty. This applies to both deposit limits and self-limitation and self-exclusion mechanisms, which are important components of player protection.

Transparent communication is particularly important. Information about the platform’s terms of use, as well as KYC, AML, and identity verification procedures, must be presented in clear language. This helps users better understand why certain checks are necessary and how they contribute to the safe use of the platform.

Internal Processes and Responsible Gambling Teams

Integrating responsible gambling into the company’s operations requires technological solutions and clearly organized internal processes.

For Soft2Bet, it is important that responsibility for the safe use of the platform be shared across different areas of the business. This promotes coordinated work across all elements of the system and helps maintain consistent Responsible Gambling standards.

Training and Internal Standards

The effectiveness of responsible gambling tools depends largely on how well internal teams understand the principles of it. That is why Soft2Bet focuses on developing a corporate culture in which responsible gambling is an integral part of everyday work processes.

Internal standards cover compliance with AML procedures, fulfilment of KYC requirements, the use of identity verification mechanisms, and support for player protection tools. As a result, various teams operate according to uniform principles and maintain a consistent approach to responsible gambling.

Of particular importance is the regular updating of internal knowledge in line with changes in regulatory requirements and technological developments. This approach allows Soft2Bet to continuously improve its processes and maintain high standards of responsible gambling without compromising the development of its own products.

Responsible Gambling and Customer Support

Technological solutions are an important component of responsible gambling, but the effectiveness of this system also depends to a large extent on high-quality communication with users.

One of the hallmarks of Soft2Bet’s approach is multilingual customer support. The company provides support in more than 20 languages, enabling it to promptly provide information about the platform’s operation, available features, and responsible gambling tools, regardless of the customer’s language.

Customer support helps users:

• get information about self-limitation and deposit limits tools;
• learn how to activate self-exclusion or time-outs;
• receive clarification on identity verification procedures;
• understand KYC and AML requirements;
• quickly find information about responsible gambling principles and available player protection mechanisms.

This approach helps make interactions with the platform more transparent and understandable. If a user has questions about self-control features or verification procedures, they can obtain the necessary information through customer support. For Soft2Bet, it is important that communication remains professional, clear, and focused on user needs. This helps build trust in the platform and supports the overall concept of responsible gambling.

Results and Impact of Soft2Bet’s Responsible Gambling Approach

Integrating responsible gambling principles into products and internal processes creates long-term value for users and for the company itself. For Soft2Bet, responsible gambling is an investment in the stability of the digital ecosystem, where technology is combined with transparent business processes.

A comprehensive approach to player protection helps maintain a high level of platform security. At the same time, tools such as self-limitation, deposit limits, and self-exclusion empower users to independently manage their own activity. Implementing responsible gambling principles contributes to:

• developing an effective player protection system;
• continuously improving Soft2Bet’s internal processes.

Another equally important outcome is the strengthening of trust in the platform. When responsible gambling mechanisms are systematically implemented, users have clear rules for interaction, transparent self-control tools, and access to information regarding player protection. For Soft2Bet, this means maintaining a stable operating model in which responsibility is embedded in every stage of interaction with the user. For Soft2Bet, responsible gambling is an integral part of its long-term strategy for developing products and services.

Continuous Development of Responsible Gambling Approaches

The field of responsible gambling is constantly evolving alongside advances in digital technology, changing industry requirements, and user expectations. For Soft2Bet, responsible gambling is an ongoing process of improvement that encompasses both technological solutions and internal operational procedures.

One of the key areas of development remains the refinement of monitoring tools. Soft2Bet is constantly developing mechanisms for analysing user behaviour to promptly identify potential signs of gambling addiction and ensure more effective use of responsible gambling tools. In doing so, special attention is paid to maintaining a balance between process automation and the transparency of decision-making.

Improving the accessibility of responsible gambling tools remains a separate area of focus. For Soft2Bet, it is important that self-control mechanisms are easy to use, understandable to users, and easily integrated into the overall user experience on the platform. That is why improving responsible gambling is viewed as a continuous process encompassing technology, analytics and internal standards.

Responsible Gambling as the Future Standard for iGaming Development

The modern iGaming industry increasingly views responsible gambling as an integral part of high-quality platform management. Whereas responsible gambling was previously often associated solely with meeting specific requirements, today it is integrated into product design processes, platform architecture, and day-to-day operations. Soft2Bet exemplifies this very approach, where responsible gambling becomes an integral part of the entire management system.

The future development of iGaming is linked to an increased focus on transparency, security, and control. That is why responsible gambling is increasingly viewed as one of the fundamental criteria for building modern platforms.

The development of responsible gambling increasingly depends on the capabilities of technology platforms. Technology makes it possible to automate checks, analyse behavioural patterns, and integrate responsible gambling mechanisms without complicating the user experience. Soft2Bet implements this principle through a comprehensive approach in which responsible gambling is supported by analytics, monitoring, and internal procedures.

In today’s iGaming industry, responsible gambling is gradually becoming an integral part of how technology platforms operate. For Soft2Bet, responsible gambling is a comprehensive system that encompasses technology, operational processes, and corporate standards.

Ronnie Hamilton, pre-sales director at Climb Channel Solutions, argues that the channel’s real advantage in artificial intelligence is proof, not speed

Every AI product I get shown looks impressive, and that is the problem.

The channel has spent the past few years getting good at one half of the AI challenge: working out which vendors are worth selling. Distributors are overwhelmed by the number of vendors available to them, and sorting the contenders from the pretenders has become a discipline in itself. That work is real, and we do it too. But it is the easy half. It establishes that a vendor is a real company with a channel programme behind it. It does not answer the question the customer cares about, which is whether the product will work for them.

That answer tends to come later, in the proof of concept, where a vendor’s demo meets the customer’s own data and where pre-sales either earns the recommendation or finds the reason not to make it. The gap between what a product demonstrates and what it deploys has always existed. AI has widened it sharply. The industry’s answer is to move faster, certain the window of opportunity is closing. But this approach risks turning that gap into a bad recommendation..

A deadline the channel did not set

The channel is working to a deadline. When cloud arrived, partners had three to five years to retrain, hire and rebuild how they sold around it. Futurum puts the equivalent window for AI at 12 to 18 months, because the technology is now changing by the week.

Customers are applying their own version of the same pressure. In research we ran across 600 enterprise decision-makers in the UK, Ireland and Germany, 32% expect a return on AI within one to six months. And the channel is strangely absent while this is going on: 47% of those organisations are not engaging resellers or vendors on AI at all, even as 55% plan to expand their use of it.

The effect on a partner is clear. There is pressure to have an AI answer and pressure to have it now, against a backdrop in which every vendor’s deck leads with AI and every demo is impressive. The path of least resistance is to pick quickly and recommend quickly. It is also a trap.

Why AI resists judgement by demo

A demo runs on clean, curated data in conditions the vendor controls. A customer’s environment is none of those things. Their data is fragmented, access is governed, and edge cases are real.

The danger is that the product still installs perfectly well in that environment. The licence goes live, the pilot is written up as a success, and the failure is invisible at the point of sale. It only announces itself months later, when the customer asks what they actually got.

The scale of the mistake is already showing in the data. Over half of the organisations we surveyed (53.5%) place themselves in what we called the AI Gap: tools in use, but no value coming back. The confidence problem sits right alongside it. Some 61% describe AI as well understood and implemented in their organisation, while 49.2% have trained fewer than half their staff to use it. The belief that AI is working is running well ahead of the evidence that it is.

When that catches up with a customer, their disappointment falls on the partner who recommended the product, not the vendor who built it.

The discipline the market is skipping

So the answer is not to move faster. It is to validate before recommending, and validation is not the same discipline as vetting.

Vetting asks whether a vendor is sound. Validation asks whether this product does what it claims on this customer’s data, against this customer’s constraints, for the use case the customer actually has. That work happens in the proof of concept, it takes the time it takes, and it is the one stage that cannot be compressed.

It is also the stage a self-serve marketplace cannot perform, and the question a vendor, in the moment of a deal, is not placed to answer. It needs someone sitting between the two who has run the same product through enough real environments to know where it tends to break, and who will tell a partner a product is not right for their customer even when a quick yes would be easier.

This is the part of distribution that has nothing to do with moving stock. It is the judgement about whether a product fits, whether the use case holds and whether the risk is worth carrying, made for the long-term success of the deployment rather than the speed of the sale.

Vendors are not on the other side of this

None of it is at odds with what the vendor wants, either. No vendor is served by a sale that fails in production. A deployment that stalls is a renewal lost and a reputation dented in a market that talks.

The distributor that thinks past the transaction, and grounds what it carries in knowing where it works and where it does not, is looking after the partner, the customer and the vendor at the same time. A partner is better served by a team that tests a product honestly and sometimes comes back with a no rather than a fast yes that unravels in deployment.

Speed was never the channel’s advantage

None of this argues against the 12-to-18-month window. The window is real, and so is the demand behind it. The argument is about what the channel does inside it.

Vendors will always move faster than distribution, and marketplaces faster still. Speed was never going to be the channel’s sole advantage, and neither was the size of the catalogue. What the channel can still offer, when AI products demo better than they deploy and customers are in no position to tell the difference, is proof. The partners who build their AI practice on that principle will be the ones whose customers are still listening three years from now.

See more stories here.

Over 20 technology companies in Ireland have ranked in the Deloitte 2025 EMEA Technology Fast 500, which recognises the 500 fastest-growing technology companies across Europe, the Middle East and Africa, positioning Irish innovators alongside some of the world’s most dynamic tech leaders.

Across all 500 companies and 24 countries, the average revenue growth rate over four years was 1,024.47%. The 22 companies from Ireland were on par at 1,016.48%.

StormHarvester ranked highest among the companies in Ireland, at 24th on the list, with a revenue growth rate of over 3,012.4%.

The Belfast-based company, which has developed an advanced anomaly detection system to help wastewater utilities predict and prevent issues like flooding and pollution, was also the 2025 winner of Deloitte Ireland’s Technology Fast 50.

In the Fast 500 ranking, Irish companies Mail Metrics and Klearcom also placed in the top 100, ranking 54th and 74th, respectively. The companies also came in at second and third in last year’s Deloitte Fast 50 ranking in Ireland.

Mail Metrics provides customer communications solutions to organisations operating in regulated sectors, while Klearcom provides global voice and IVR testing capabilities to organisations with a dependency on customer communication.

In the previous year, 20 companies in Ireland were included in the Fast 500 rankings, with the Irish fintech Wayflyer ranking the highest at number 43.

These results underline the continued strength of Ireland’s indigenous technology sector in a highly competitive global market.

Applications for Deloitte Ireland’s 2026 Technology Fast 50 are now open

The Deloitte Fast 50 is one of Ireland’s foremost technology awards, ranking the country’s fastest-growing indigenous technology companies by revenue growth over four years.

Ireland has been home to approximately 10 technology unicorns, which is a reflection of the strength of the country’s start-up and scale-up community.

Several of these unicorns, including LetsGetChecked, Flipdish, Fenergo, Wayflyer, and Tines, are alumni of Deloitte’s Technology Fast 50 programme, highlighting its strong track record of identifying future high-growth success.

James Toomey, Fast 50 lead and Deloitte Ireland partner, said:

“The Deloitte EMEA Technology Fast 500 continues to highlight the exceptional strength of Ireland’s homegrown tech sector. Behind every one of these companies is a team that chose to push a bit further, a bit faster. For a small island, our entrepreneurs consistently deliver outstanding performances on a global stage, and that’s what this ranking really captures.

“It is also a testament to the critical role domestic direct investment (DDI) plays in the resilience of the wider economy and the importance of having supports in place that help more companies like these grow and scale. Congratulations to all the companies in the rankings.

“Applications for the 2026 Fast 50 rankings are now also open, offering an excellent opportunity for ambitious technology companies to join this distinguished group.”

Nick Keegan, founder and CEO of Mail Metrics, said:

“I firmly believe we’re only getting started in Mail Metrics. While we’ve achieved a lot, there is plenty more to come. Being recognised as one of the fastest growing technology companies in the Deloitte EMEA Fast 500 for two years in a row is an incredible recognition, benchmarking our success against leading tech companies across the globe. I pay huge credit to our team and our amazing clients for helping us achieve this.”

Laura Haldane, co-founder and Chief Revenue Officer of SciLeads, said:

“We’re an organisation that loves data, which is why we’re strongly aligned with the objectivity of the Deloitte Fast 50 awards. We’ve ranked for 5 years in a row, and that is purely based on our revenue growth. It’s a valuable and credible recognition for us when we meet with new clients, and an opportunity for us to pause and celebrate how we’re building our business.”

Application details and further information about the programme can be found here: https://www.deloitte.com/ie/en/Industries/tmt/technology-fast-50-awards.html

The closing date for entries is 25 September and the winners will be announced at a ceremony in Dublin on 26 November 2026.

See more stories here.

Tata Consultancy Services (TCS), a global leader in IT services, consulting, and business solutions that operates a global delivery centre in Letterkenny, Ireland, has announced a strategic partnership with Porsche AG to enable AI services across the mobility value chain for Porsche. The partnership is reinforced by a five-year strategic deal from Porsche.

As part of the deal, TCS will establish a dedicated AI Mobility Centre of Excellence for Porsche to drive innovation across manufacturing, engineering, operations and customer experience. TCS, through its subsidiary, will acquire 100% of MHP Management- und IT-Beratung GmbH (MHP), Porsche’s Germany-based management and IT consulting subsidiary. The proposed partnership and acquisition remain subject to regulatory approvals.

MHP brings strong automotive and industrial consulting and implementation experience, with strengths in business transformation, AI, SAP, manufacturing digitalisation, and connected mobility. Its long-standing track record in delivering complex automotive and industrial transformation programs will complement TCS’ global scale and engineering prowess.

Krithivasan, CEO and Managing Director, Tata Consultancy Services, said, “TCS is pleased to partner with Porsche in its transformation journey. As AI, software, and data redefine the automotive industry, this partnership brings together TCS’ capabilities in AI, engineering, technology and business transformation with MHP’s strong automotive consulting expertise. Together, we will industrialise AI at scale for Porsche, accelerating innovation across the value chain to deliver intelligent, software-defined mobility experiences of the future.”

Dr Michael Leiters, CEO, Porsche AG, said, “Porsche is taking another important step in its strategy to focus resolutely on its core business with the transfer of MHP to Tata Consultancy Services. At the same time, we are gaining a strategic partner in TCS. By combining Porsche’s automotive expertise with TCS’ digital technology and AI capabilities, we will further strengthen our innovative power, increase efficiency, and boost our competitiveness in an increasingly data- and software-driven world of mobility.”

This close collaboration will be structured around three core pillars:

1)        TCS to scale AI execution and drive outcomes for Porsche. TCS will set up a dedicated AI Mobility Centre of Excellence (CoE) which will focus on industrialising use cases in several core technologies for the mobility sector. The CoE’s role will be to convert AI ideas into secure and scalable solutions that enhance velocity, operations resilience and competitiveness across Porsche’s product and value chain. TCS and Porsche will collaborate to embed AI across intelligent manufacturing and operations, engineering and customer experience. The partnership will leverage Porsche’s world-class automotive engineering and brand experience along with TCS’ capabilities in AI, product engineering, technology and business transformation.

2)        TCS and Porsche to create a platform for long-term value creation. TCS’ expertise provides a strong foundation to scale AI transformation and deliver business outcomes for Porsche’s organisation and its mobility ecosystem. The five-year strategic business deal between Porsche and TCS will enable a strong foundation to deliver these outcomes.

3)        TCS, through its subsidiary, to acquire MHP, a firm with proven automotive consulting and AI transformation capabilities. The acquisition will strengthen TCS’ presence in the German market and amongst European automotive and industrial customers.

Deutsche Bank AG acted as financial advisor and Noerr as legal counsel to TCS.

We look at the new book by Jim Jim Al-Khalili. See more about ON TIME The Physics That Makes the Universe Tick here. 

ON TIME The Physics That Makes the Universe Tick, reviewed

Jim Al-Khalili makes a good stab at trying to outline and explain the various schools of thought about what time is, and is not. Although you also have to factor in that he is tackling something which can become very complex very quickly. From the get go, you have to navigate a path between those who believe that the past and future are not real, tangible things, but, does that then mean we are only ever living in the moment? He refers to Interstellar as his favourite scifi movie, which is fair enough. Except that Matthew McConaughey’s character does, arguably, get to have his cake and eat it too, in terms of aging by going too close to the black hole, being trapped in another dimension (sending messages to his daughter via the bookcase) but then also, ultimately coming back too. Albeit to see her as a very old woman, many years into the future.

Al-Khalili writes well, and tackles a tough subject valiantly, but, at times, we were a little lost and battling to follow some of the assertions. Naturally this is a complex subject, but we will warn the reader that this is not a completely entry level proposition here. It does seem like we may be some way off from knowing the answers to many of these very knotty questions too. We did enjoy the final, bonus chapter, where he tackled the question of time travel, and its possibility, or otherwise. We would agree with his conclusions, particularly because, if people have developed time travel, in the infinitely far ahead future, then surely they would have already come back and messed things up here, or perhaps even remedied them?

An interesting read, but not light reading!

See more about On Time here

From quantum physicist, New York Times bestselling author, and BBC host Jim Al-Khalili, essential insights into the meaning and fundamental nature of time.

While we have come a long way toward deciphering the laws of the universe, many physicists still regard time to be one of the greatest unsolved mysteries. On Time provides answers to the questions about time that philosophers and scientists have been asking for millennia, such as whether it has a beginning and an end, why it only points toward the future and not the past, whether it can be stretched and squeezed or even reversed, and whether it is even real.

In this mind-altering book, Jim Al-Khalili tackles the enduring problems of time head-on, carefully examining them across the three central pillars of physics—quantum mechanics, general relativity, and thermodynamics. He shows how, in each domain, time can be understood differently: as a coordinate or label, as an inseparable dimension of space-time, or as a direction or “arrow.” He explains why it can be difficult to reconcile these different perspectives and describes how theorists at the frontiers of physics are attempting to do just that. Al-Khalili makes the persuasive case that time is real, not illusory, and that a master arrow of time is not merely a trick of our senses but is rather a fundamental feature of reality that was baked into the structure of our universe from the very beginning.

Sharing fresh insights into some of the most complex and profound questions in science, On Time will forever change the way you think about the passage of time and your place within it.

More about the author here

Jim Al-Khalili is Distinguished Professor Emeritus of Physics at the University of Surrey and one of Britain’s leading science communicators. He has written numerous books that have been translated into twenty-six languages. A fellow of the Royal Society, he is a regular presenter of TV science documentaries and is best-known in the UK for his long-running BBC Radio program, The Life Scientific.

See more book reviews here.

]]> https://irishtechnews.ie/the-top-irish-consumer-concerns/ Wed, 26 Aug 2026 09:30:52 +0000 https://irishtechnews.ie/?p=185306

22,724 consumers contacted the Competition and Consumer Protection Commission (CCPC) helpline in the first half of 2026, according to the new CCPC helpline report.

The report gives insight into the top issues, sectors and traders reported by Irish consumers. New research from callbacks to those who contacted the helpline now shows us what happened next for those consumers.

Irish consumer concerns

• The top issues were faulty goods, pricing and contract performance
• The top sectors were vehicles and transport, utilities and fuel, and homebuilding and improvements
• The top five traders were Rathwood (737 contacts), Ryanair (238 contacts), Sky (228 contacts), Currys (223 contacts) and Harvey Norman (196 contacts)
• Consumers reported spending an average of €6,473 on the product or service they contacted the CCPC about
• Increase of 34% in contacts related to an online purchase
• 4,577 contacts related to faulty goods & services
• Over 1 million visits to the CCPC website

Aoibhín de Búrca, CCPC Director of Communications and Consumer Information said:

“The CCPC advises consumers on their rights when they contact the helpline, and from the numbers contacting us we can see there is ongoing demand out there, especially on faulty goods.

“It’s important that consumers know their rights if they buy something that turns out to be faulty. Regardless of whether you had a warranty or a guarantee, it’s up to the seller to resolve your issue, not the manufacturer.

“Our new research shows that when consumers are armed with the information we give them, they can get the replacements, repairs and refunds due to them. 91% of consumers took action following calls to the helpline and nearly 40% were resolved. But the research also shows that almost half of consumers had to contact the retailer more than five times and the issues still weren’t resolved. Now that we have this research it will inform our work.”

Aoibhín de Búrca added:

“Where we see breaches of the law we will act. Based on calls to our helpline we can and do take action. In July, with the help of intelligence received by the helpline, the CCPC secured the return of €250,000 in unspent gift card credit to Irish consumers by JD Sports. And in the last 18 months we have taken successful prosecutions against six major retailers and two second-hand car dealers for misleading consumers. So, we strongly encourage consumers to alert us when they see breaches of the law.

“Currently the CCPC must prosecute a business in court where a judge can then impose a fine. Recent consumer protection law cases have incurred fines of €1,000. This is why we welcome the commitment made by the Government to give the CCPC new powers to impose fines for breaches of consumer protection laws. And we want the fines to be higher to deter businesses from breaking the law.”

Getting the full picture from consumers

Since October 2025, the CCPC has been following up with consumers that have contacted our helpline to see how their journey is going. So far in 2026, 2,326 consumers have had their first check-in, at least four weeks after they contacted the helpline.

At their first check-in:

• 38% of consumers had resolved their issue, with 41% of those receiving either a full or partial refund
• 43% of consumers were still seeking a resolution
• 22% of respondents incurred extra costs trying to resolve their issue
• 91% of respondents contacted the trader at least once, with over half contacting the trader five times or more

Aoibhín de Búrca said:

“Within a month of contacting us and receiving information about their rights and suggested next steps on engaging with the trader, nearly 40% of consumers reported that they were able to get the issue resolved. These issues aren’t trivial and neither are the costs involved so it’s positive to see businesses reaching resolutions with consumers in a timely manner. We’d encourage all consumers to go back to the business as the first step if an issue arises, to make the complaint in writing and keep written evidence.”

Record referrals to the Small Claims Court

Almost 6,000 consumers were referred to the Small Claims Court by the CCPC in the first six months of the year alone. The small claims procedure is a simplified way of taking a consumer case against a business, without needing to hire a solicitor, but it is only intended for claims of up to €2,000. Given that consumers reported spending an average of €6,473 on the product or service they contacted the CCPC about, many cannot use this option.

Aoibhín de Búrca said:

“Many consumers, especially those with issues with cars or home improvements, are automatically excluded from the option of the Small Claims Court due to the low claim threshold. The CCPC welcomes the commitment from the Government in its Programme for Government and its 2025 Action Plan on Competitiveness and Productivity to ‘substantially increase’ the limit of the small claims procedure. We strongly recommend it be increased to €8,000.”

Website refresh

Over 1 million consumers visited the CCPC website so far in 2026. The CCPC’s free online comparison tools, which allows consumers to compare financial products including mortgages, loans and saving rates from a range of different providers, had 280,969 visits.

In May, the CCPC launched a new website which has transformed the experience for businesses and consumers that interact with the CCPC. The new website is Ireland’s best source for free, impartial and trusted information on consumer rights and personal finance.

How to contact us

For consumer queries and complaints, contact the CCPC helpline on 01 402 5555 (Monday to Friday, 9am to 6pm) or via our contact form or email ask@ccpc.ie.

Details of all completed prosecutions and enforcement actions taken by the CCPC can be found at ccpc.ie/cpl

The Competition and Consumer Protection Commission (CCPC) is the statutory body responsible for enforcing and promoting compliance with competition, consumer protection and product safety law, with new and expanding roles in digital and data regulation. We make markets work better for consumers and empower consumers to make informed choices. For more information and tips on your rights, how to complain, managing your money and unsafe products, visit www.ccpc.ie.

Case studies

The helpline report included seven case studies based on real consumer issues as reported to the helpline. Full details are included in the report.

*All information is presented from the perspective of the consumer. Some details have been altered for brevity and to protect anonymity.

See more breaking stories here.

Latest guest by David Stephen, who looks at addiction and brain science in this article. 

There is report on PennLive, How one student became the ‘largest drug dealer’ at PSU: grand jury, stating that, “A confidential informant for police bought cocaine at Penn State University’s Delta Upsilon fraternity house six times from September to December of 2024.”

“When the dealer, PSU student Thomas Robinson, was arrested, police began unraveling a drug trafficking ring that led to charges against 14 people, including the man one witness said was the “largest distributor of cocaine” at PSU. And it wasn’t Robinson.”

Can brain science help addiction?

There is a recent press release,  HHS Awards Over $96 Million to Strengthen Mental Health, Suicide Prevention, and Substance Use Disorder Services, stating that, “The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), through the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA), today announced $96.7 million in grants and cooperative agreements to strengthen behavioral health services and supports across the country.”

“The awards provide funding for a range of behavioral health services and initiatives, including services for people with serious mental illness who are homeless, suicide prevention and early intervention, substance use disorder treatment, training and technical assistance, peer support, and disaster-related emotional support.”

“The awards announced today include the following: Providers Clinical Support System – Substance Use Disorder Treatment (PCSS-SUD Treatment) ($2.9 million), which provides training and technical assistance, mentoring, and ongoing support for healthcare professionals in general health and behavioral health settings to increase their capacity to identify and treat substance use disorders, especially opioid and alcohol use disorders.”

Penn State University [PSU]

Penn State President Neeli Bendapudi, Ph.D., can immediately explore two angles to combat substance use disorders across the University community: conceptual brain science and electrochemical psychiatry.

It is not great that a Penn State student was busted dealing drugs.

Instead of simply suspending the fraternity involved or taking other expected actions, Penn State can use the opportunity to explore how to solve drug addiction for students – existing and incoming across the United States.

Simply, why would drug use be an option for students? Is it anxiety of studying, the future, survival, external pressures or what? If the situation is bad, why should drugs be the option to cope?

These questions should be of immediate concern to the Penn State Neuroscience Institute team: Dr. Krish Sathian, MBBS, PhD, at Hershey and Nikki Crowley, PhD, at University Park. Then, Chair Erika Saunders, MD of the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Health.

Psychiatry has not made progress in defining the human mind or explaining disorders beyond labels and descriptions. Penn State can take the leap to find components and mechanisms in the brain that would answer for how addiction works, then explain it, as a digital service, while estimating for students, benign alternatives that can be useful to counteract the craving pleasure and tolerance of drugs.

Because there is nothing at all for now, if Penn State takes the leap, it would be a mighty step forward, changing how drug use is understood and explored for solutions. In summary, Penn State should use electrical and chemical signals to explain how and why drug addiction works, placing it as an effort to increase will and resist helplessness.

Depression and Addiction

If depression and addiction are assumed to be problems of the human mind, progress would be to explore what the mind is, to isolate all the relays and hubs of mind that determine the experience of depression.

What is the human mind? Early options are genes and neurons. Genes are established to be the architects of human existence.

The human genome has already been mapped, in full. However, there are other options that structure nurture functions aside from genes. For example, an offspring has the genes of the parents, but the language that the offspring would speak may depend on another factor.

Simply, the capacity for language is possible by genes, but the language content is organized by another factor. Language is directly a function of the mind, just like several others, ruling out genes as the human mind—with this example, though others like subjects at school, neuroplasticity and so forth also rule out genes as the human mind, conceptually.

Genes often make calls, or act as engines, when expressed, but the wheels of functions are different.

Neurons in several parts of the human brain have been mapped. There is a field called connectomics dedicated to this science. So far, with advances in neuroscience, there has never been a neuron that has been identified for language, math, or others. Neurons are known to be active during functions.

But if neurons were the human mind, it would mean that they change in a certain way for a function, and then others in another way. Simply, for different aspects of language, or subjects, or smells, some neurons would be something, different from others. Then neurons for smell may also be different from neurons for touch.

There have not been neural differences, observed from neuroimaging and connectomics, to indicate that neurons are changing much or that their anatomy is responsible for a function or functions, directly.

So, if genes and neurons are not the human mind, what might the human mind be? Also, if what the human mind is, is theorized, how does it work, what is order in the mind, what is disorder? What happens in the mind that results in the experience of depression and addiction?

Human Mind

The human mind is theorized to be the collection of all the electrical and chemical signals, in sets, with their interactions and features, in clusters of neurons across the central and peripheral nervous systems.

Electrical and chemical signals have to interact in sets, to determine functions. Electrical and chemical signals have their features that determine the measures for those interactions.

Interactions are principally the strikes of electrical signals on chemical signals, in sets. Features include prioritization, pre-prioritization, splits, old sequences, new sequences, principal spot, arrays, thick sets, thin sets, intensity and so on.

A few of these can be theorized to be responsible for depression and addiction.

Possible Components of Substance Use Disorder

It is theorized that depression and addiction are problems of the principal spot, which is a prioritization segment of sets of signals.

Prioritization is defined as the set of chemical signals with the most volumes among all in any instance. This means that when a set has the most volume among all, it becomes prioritized. It is prioritization that defines what is labeled as attention. Other sets are pre-prioritized. There are often fast and numerous interchanges between pre-prioritized sets and the prioritized set.

The prioritized set often has a distribution veto, in the prioritized instance. This means that it can distribute summaries of its configuration, to several other sets of signals, in that instance. The prioritized set also has a high totalization index, which means that the set of electrical signals can interact with the full spectrum of the set,  making it possible to access its functions.

It is prioritization that makes listening different from hearing, or many instances or main vision different from other instances of peripheral vision [although main vision can be pre-prioritized, but may be in the array, to be prioritized again].

The sets of signals with volumes that may be prioritized are often in an array. This means that recently prioritized or those that are likely to be prioritized are often arrayed, such that they can switch and then distribute, then switch again multiple times. It is the interchanges between prioritization and pre-prioritization that makes it possible to do several tasks at the same time, like driving, speaking, listening to music and so forth.

Prioritization is also useful in the mind, not for where to focus attention or what to change, so that there is a urgency to reduce it.

Beyond prioritization is what is called the principal spot, it means the set of signals with the most domination. This means that it is not just attention, or the ability to be in the array, but to lead the array, determine distributions, have totalized interactions and be there for some time.

This principal spot is not necessarily a physical location, but a chemical signal configuration that keeps the maximum volume nearly constant, such that displacing it may become less frequent than regular prioritization.

There are sets of signals for everything. All experiences are configurations of sets of signals, conceptually. There is a set of signals for emptiness. There is another for fatigue. There is a set of signals for pleasure, and another for a smell, a taste and so forth.

Chemical signals hold these configurations, but electrical signals have to interact with them to access the configurations. There are several prioritization categories, but two of them include prioritization counterbalances and prioritization continuity. Counterbalance may be explained with [say] being thirsty and drinking water, such that the new prioritization cancels the old one.

Although the old one may [try to] persist in some cases, if the new one is sufficient enough the old one goes away. There are several other examples of prioritization like when a demand is canceled out by the supply, even if the [say] element [water or food] is yet to be absorbed by the body – so to speak.

Prioritization continuity is the situation where prioritization continues to build in a set, such that if there is no pause or break, it keeps going, not allowing other functions to get prioritized, while possibly over-using that function, which may cause issues in other sets that do not get prioritized, or even in the set, by over-using the volumes that are possible. Simply, there are sets where the prioritization may not change and would keep going without a break.

An example could be muscle use in one direction for a long time, or heat strokes, or severe cold. While some sets of signals may, in a prioritized situation, switch to something else in pre-prioritization, giving some break to that set, some sets would just keep going, until it breaks in some problematic way.

This means that [say] music is within earshot during some experiences [or say prioritization of some sets] it is possible that switches between the sets for the music and those of the experience would ensure that the experience has prioritization breaks, but some sets may not allow – and keep going. Sometimes, this continuance is a result of the principal spot.

There are sets of signals that are for experiences of nothing or regular, such that they are not just prioritized after say, thirst, but can also be prioritized in cases of just normality.

Depression

Depression is theorized to be a set of signals for nothingness moving to the principal spot, allowing it to lead the array of distribution and dominate against anything else that is pre-prioritized or prioritized. Simply, depression is a state where a set of signals that is supposed to be a neutral set, moves into the principal spot, then gives out distributions of the summaries of its configurations, which [then] becomes how some other sets that should not normally get the distributions do so.

For example, the set responsible for excitement or [say] pleasure may instead get distributions from the set of ‘neutral’, or the set for satisfaction from something may get the same. There can also be others like heaviness or lethargy getting distributions and becoming sometimes prioritized, since some sets of signals for lethargy and nothing may share the same thick set [a feature].

Simply, depression is theorized to be a state of the mind, where the set of signals that is supposed to be neutral becomes prioritized and moves to the principal spot, where it dominates, such that allowance for prioritization from other sets, whose prioritization may displace it, are reduced. It may also distribute to other sets like heaviness or fatigue, which may then distribute to apathy.

Depression is a set of the relays and interactions of electrical and chemical signals of the mind, which can be displayed for every symptom of the condition.

Addiction

Addiction is the movement of craving to the principal spot, which dominates arrays. Simply, craving is at the head of arrays, which distributes its configurations to other sets, making it appear like there is a general need for ‘the thing’. This is also expanded by splits of electrical signals [a feature], which after the last intake, there is an early split to the set of signal for pleasure, satisfaction or notice of taking it, but this does not get the full interaction, thereby, signaling that something is not complete, so another intake becomes desired.

Simply, after the last intake, there is a split of electrical signals, to the same destination, but without the full summary that it had been taken and then without the full interaction at the destination, which then distributes to an experience of absence, which may then move the urge for the craving.

Addiction can also be a result of depression, where there is just a continuous intake, to try to drive away the emptiness from the principal spot.

AI and Mind Displays

The necessity of a probabilistic way the human mind works and what occurs in an addiction, such that knowing what might be responsible, like principal spot, arrays, prioritization, splits of signals and so forth, may become a way to shape how therapy becomes possible or what to do pre-rehab, during or post-rehab.

Large language models [LLMs] can be used to display and describe the mind, with this concept, for every symptom of substance use disorder, so that it is possible to understand what it might be, and to find what might be appropriate, rather than trying different things, which may not work at all.

The goal is to ensure that progress is possible and fast enough against addiction.

Penn State can explore the postulate in Conceptual Biomarkers and Theoretical Biological Factors for Psychiatric and Intelligence Nosology before August 31, 2026 towards setting up this project, for a digital outcome by the end of September and giving it to [and beyond] the University community.

David Stephen does research in conceptual brain science and served as a visiting scholar in medical entomology at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. He did computer vision research at Rovira i Virgili University in Tarragona.

See more breaking stories here.

Guest post by Darya Yegorina, founder of Arventa

It is Friday evening. The work is done. You are at the kitchen table trying to work out what you actually did all week.

The quote is in your Notes app. The hours are in a WhatsApp thread. The client’s number is in your phone. Their address is on an old invoice. The receipt for materials is a photo on your camera roll.

So you copy. You paste. You copy again.

That is the real job for most small business owners in Ireland. Not the work. The re-typing of the work. And no AI tool on the market today is fixing it.

I want to explain why, because a lot of good people are being sold the wrong solution.

We are using AI. It is not saving us much.

Irish businesses are not behind on this. Irish Tech News reported research from OpenAI suggesting almost nine in ten Irish SME leaders now use AI. Separate research from Google and Amárach, also covered here, found that 80% of Irish SMEs believe AI can help their business.

So we believe in it. We are paying for it. Around €20 a month gets you a very good assistant.

Now look at what actually happens when you use it.

You open the chat window. You type out who the client is. You paste in last year’s prices. You describe the job from memory. You get back a nicely written quote. Then you paste that into your invoicing app. Then you type the same details a third time when you log your hours.

The AI saved you the typing. It did not save you the work. The work was the remembering and the re-entering, and that is still all yours.

This is not the AI failing. It is the AI having nothing to work with. A tool that cannot see your clients, your rates, your open jobs or your hours is a stranger with good grammar. It will give you something that sounds right, because sounding right is all it can do.

Irish Tech News made this exact point recently in a piece on why SMEs need better data foundations before AI delivers real value. I would put it more bluntly. If your business information lives in ten apps, your AI knows about none of them.

The app fatigue tax

Count the software you opened this week. Not what you pay for. What you opened.

For most small Irish businesses it looks like this. An accounts package. A separate invoicing tool. A spreadsheet doing the job of a CRM. A calendar. A time tracking app you stopped updating in March. WhatsApp for clients. Something for social posts. The bank app. A folder of PDFs. Email holding whatever the other nine dropped.

The subscriptions are annoying. They are not the real cost.

The real cost is you. In a business of one to five people, the owner is also the office, the credit control and the marketing department. Every switch between apps costs you attention. Every re-typed address is a chance to get it wrong. There is nobody to hand it to.

This is why so many owners quietly give up on software. The Google and Amárach research found that a third of micro-businesses with under ten staff are using no AI at all, and that the top barriers are fear of getting it wrong, lack of skills and cost.

I would add one more. Tiredness. People do not abandon tools because they are hard. They abandon them because it is one more place to put things.

That is app fatigue. It is not laziness. It is a fair reaction to a setup that turns you into the wiring between your own software.

One place instead of ten

Here is the fix, and it is less exciting than AI, which is probably why nobody sells it to you.

Put the quote, the job, the hours, the invoice and the VAT in one place. One record, not five documents.

When you do that, something quiet happens. Your business starts producing clean, organised information as a by-product of doing the work. Not as a chore on a Friday night. Automatically.

That matters more than people think. A PDF invoice is a picture of information. A human has to read it and type it in somewhere else. Organised information is different. It can be added up, checked, reported and reused without anyone touching it.

It is also what makes AI genuinely useful. Ask a question about your business and you get an answer based on your actual numbers, not on whatever you managed to paste into a chat box.

There is a deadline attached to this too. Under Revenue’s VAT Modernisation plan, structured e-invoicing becomes mandatory for large corporates from 1 November 2028, and widens further in November 2029. The part most small businesses miss is that from November 2028 every VAT-registered business in Ireland has to be able to receive a structured e-invoice. That includes a two-person operation.

If you are already working this way, that date will pass without you noticing. If you are running on PDFs and copy-paste, it will cost you.

What I would do first

The more useful thing I can give you is not a link. It is a job for Sunday.

Write down every tool you opened this week and what you typed into each one. Then mark every detail you entered more than once. The client name. The address. The rate. The hours.

That list is what your setup is really costing you, in your own handwriting.

Fix the duplication first. Add the AI second. That is the whole argument.

About Contributor:

Dr.Darya Yegorina is the founder of Arventa, a Dublin AI platform for small businesses, and previously founded the EdTech company CleverBooks. She spoke to Irish Tech News about building digital-first businesses here: Darya Yegorina, founder Arventa, digital native from day one.

See more stories here.

]]> https://irishtechnews.ie/viatel-reaches-highest-palo-alto-networks-partner-accreditation/ Tue, 25 Aug 2026 15:00:26 +0000 https://irishtechnews.ie/?p=185334

Viatel Technology Group has achieved Diamond Partner status within the Palo Alto Networks NextWave Partner Programme, the highest tier of recognition within the Palo Alto Networks partner ecosystem.

The accreditation recognises Viatel’s deep technical expertise, investment in specialist cyber talent and proven track record in helping enterprise, public sector and highly regulated organisations strengthen their defences against increasingly sophisticated cyber threats.

Operating across Ireland and the UK, Viatel’s Cyber Services division is a leading provider of cybersecurity, managed services and specialist security consultancy. Across government, criminal justice, healthcare, utilities, financial services and the private sector, Viatel supports customers in addressing complex security challenges, navigating evolving compliance requirements and building long-term cyber resilience. Its team works with organisations operating in complex IT and operational technology environments and provides expertise across regulatory and compliance frameworks, including NIS and CAF.

The achievement marks another significant milestone in the continued growth of Viatel’s cybersecurity practice. In July the company announced the acquisition of FullProxy, a specialist Scottish cybersecurity consultancy, further strengthening the group’s expertise, scale and capability across Ireland and the UK.

This accreditation will enable Viatel to deliver even greater value to customers through enhanced security expertise, access to the latest cyber innovations, and strengthened strategic support, helping organisations protect critical assets, manage cyber risk and build long-term resilience.

Paddy Trainor, Managing Director of Cyber Services at Viatel Technology Group, said: “Achieving Diamond Partner status is a landmark moment for Viatel. It validates our team’s deep technical proficiency and our unwavering commitment to defending our clients against sophisticated cyber threats.

“This accreditation reflects the strength of our partnership with Palo Alto Networks and enhances our ability to deliver world-class cybersecurity solutions that help customers strengthen their cyber resilience and operate with confidence in an increasingly challenging threat landscape.”

Adrian Purcell, Country Manager, Ireland, Palo Alto Networks, said: “We are delighted to welcome Viatel Technology Group to our elite group of Diamond Partners. Viatel has repeatedly demonstrated outstanding technical capability, deep market knowledge, and an absolute focus on customer outcomes.

“As enterprise security demands shift toward platformisation, automated SecOps, and Zero Trust frameworks, Palo Alto Networks looks forward to working closely with Viatel to drive market expansion, capture new growth opportunities, and protect our joint customers.”

The accreditation cements Viatel’s position among the leading cybersecurity specialists serving organisations across Ireland, Northern Ireland and the UK. Backed by continued investment in advanced security capabilities, specialist expertise and strategic growth, the company is helping customers stay ahead of an increasingly complex threat environment while meeting the security, compliance and resilience demands of critical and highly regulated sectors.

See more stories here.

Qualcom, a leading Irish provider of IT and cybersecurity services, has announced that it increased annual revenues in Northern Ireland by 30%. The company is continuing to accelerate its growth in 2026 and forecasts a further 15% revenue increase in the region by year-end.

Qualcom is expanding its team to support this continued growth and will add five new roles at its Belfast office by the end of 2026. Recruitment has already begun for these roles, which include positions for both on-site and field-based engineers. This will bring the headcount to 21 employees in Northern Ireland.

This growth has been largely driven by demand for Qualcom’s services within the retail sector in Northern Ireland. The increased move to digital payment services means that there is reduced reliance on traditional payment methods in store. Qualcom is seeing a growing demand among retailers for integrated and ultra-secure digital systems to support card and app payments, loyalty card programmes, and online ordering platforms – often across multiple locations. In addition, these systems require reliable internet connectivity and regular software updates to ensure uninterrupted service, a seamless customer experience, and the protection of sensitive financial data.

Due to the more complex nature of these systems, Qualcom is providing increased on-the-ground support to retailers to resolve issues quickly and maintain business continuity. In turn, this reduces the burden on in-house teams. Qualcom’s engineers can even remain physically on-site after system implementation to provide day-to-day support for retailers which, in particular, fills a critical skills gap for businesses without internal IT resources. This staff-as-a-service model has become an increasingly attractive option as companies look for more flexible and commercially viable ways to manage IT operations, especially in relation to managing holidays and sickness cover.

The company is also reducing complexity for retailers and other large businesses in Northern Ireland when it comes to post-Brexit customs and excise processes by managing the logistics of device and hardware procurement.

Leeann Saunders, Managing Director for Northern Ireland, Qualcom, said: “As the retail landscape continues to rapidly evolve, there is a growing demand for resilient IT infrastructure that can support secure and streamlined customer experiences, regardless of how they may choose to shop. Reputation is key in retail and it’s vital that sensitive customer information remains protected as cyber threats grow. This will not only strengthen public perception but ensure that operations can continue uninterrupted. In this vein, IT security is an increasing focus for boards and senior leadership teams in the retail sector as organisations place greater emphasis on resilience and securing confidential data.

“We are expanding our team in Northern Ireland to meet this increasing demand, bridge technical skills gaps and reduce pressure on organisations. This year, we will continue to work closely with our customers to deliver enterprise-grade capabilities without the enterprise-grade distance.”

See more stories here.

Here at Irish Tech News we love meeting and introducing new Irish startups to our readers and podcast listeners. One such startup is SelenaVoice AI  that builds custom AI phone receptionists for Irish service businesses. I recently caught up with Jack Power the founder of SelenaVoice AI.

Jack talks about his background, what SelenaVoice AI does, coming up with SelenaVoice AI, guardrails, future plans, and more.

More about Jack Power:

Jack Power is a 20 year old entrepreneur from Co. Meath, currently studying Digital Business and Innovation at DCU while building SelenaVoice AI. After a business partnership collapsed and cost him every client he’d built, Jack started again from scratch under his own name.

SelenaVoice AI builds custom AI phone receptionists for Irish service businesses, helping eliminate interruptions and stop them losing money to missed calls. Available and answering 24/7, so no lead is ever lost. Jack documents the journey daily on TikTok and Instagram.

See more podcasts here.

FBD Insurance has launched its ‘Fuelling Business Dreams’ competition for 2027, giving 15 businesses across Ireland the opportunity to receive a marketing support package worth €30,000 each.

Representing a total investment of €450,000 in Irish SMEs, this initiative will provide each winning business with a fully funded, professionally crafted marketing campaign designed to raise their businesses profile, reach new customers and help bring their  business dreams and ambitions to life. The competition is open to both existing FBD customers and non-customers, from ambitious start-ups to established local businesses. Applications are open from 17th August until midday on Thursday, 15 October 2026.

Fuelling Business Dreams

Entrants are being invited to share the moments that have defined their business journey, from securing a first major client or growing their team to receiving exceptional customer feedback or reaching an important milestone. Businesses will also have the opportunity to outline their future ambitions and explain how a €30,000 marketing campaign could support their next stage of development.

Applications will be reviewed by a judging panel from across FBD Insurance, with 15 winning businesses selected to participate in the 2027 campaign.

Speaking about the launch, Nicola Ging, Senior Marketing Manager at FBD Insurance, said:

“Irish SMEs are at the heart of communities across the country. They create employment, deliver vital local services and bring energy, ambition and innovation to the Irish economy. Fuelling Business Dreams is about recognising that contribution and giving businesses practical support to take their next step.”

“Every business has defining moments and ambitions for the future. We want to hear those stories and give 15 businesses access to the creative expertise, marketing support and exposure that can help turn their ambitions into reality. Whether they are an FBD customer or not, we encourage businesses from every sector and region to apply.”

Fuelling Business Dreams has become an important part of FBD’s wider commitment to supporting the passion, resilience and entrepreneurial spirit of Irish SMEs. The initiative combines a nationwide competition with bespoke advertising campaigns for the winning businesses.

Each winner will work with marketing professionals to develop a tailored campaign, which may include creative content and targeted promotion across outdoor, radio, print and digital channels.

Reflecting on the impact of a previous Fuelling Business Dreams campaign, former winner Michael Lynders of Lynders Holiday Parks said:

“We applied because we wanted to increase awareness of our business and reach a wider audience. The campaign also offered a fantastic opportunity to showcase what we do and connect with potential new customers.”

Businesses can enter the Fuelling Business Dreams competition at https://www.fbd.ie/dreams .  Applications close at midday on Thursday, 15 October 2026.

See more breaking dreams here.

We look at this call to arms by Will Hackman, published this year by Bloomsbury. See more about Radically Reframing Climate Change, A Guide to Saving Ourselves here. 

Radically Reframing Climate Change A Guide to Saving Ourselves, reviewed

Whew, tough times to write this book, when the planet is in such dire straits, and you have a president who is actually undermining environmental safe guards, destroying data and actively embracing polluting technologies. Even when renewables are now cheaper, growing faster, providing boom times for jobs, and all being rejected because the fossil fuel industry have stuffed the Potus’s pockets with money to advocate their agenda – even though it is raising deaths, global warming and so many other negative health trends.

Will Hackman acknowledges that, in such a terrible moment in time, with key people in positions of leadership, it really does require a massive effort to counter their negative impact, combined with the negative impacts of global warming too. It seems crazy to even need to spell this one out, firebomb forest fires in Spain and France this summer, repeated heat waves in the UK, higher deaths from heat and drowning. We have had climate change deniers, lobbyists looking to distort, deny, disassemble scientific facts, to raise corporate profits, while people die.

How do they sleep at night? What about their own children, who will have to live in this future diminished world, no matter how rich you are, if the planet is destroyed, where will you live? Naturally there is no point in drowning in despair, or rather, you might as well go down fighting. As Hackman points out too, many of these awful, self interested current leaders will not be alive in the very near future, so it is up to those with their best years ahead of them to be proactive and take charge and drag things back around. Populism has currently brought some awful, self interested people to positions of leadership, but the pendulum can equally swing back just as quickly too.

More about Radically Reframing Climate Change

An inspirational guide to discussing and fighting climate change for millennial and GenZ voters that cuts through the usual myths and scare tactics to provide practical advice.

Will Hackman is a Millennial, and he is pissed. Two wars, two global economic catastrophes, and a pandemic combined with a ballooning cost-of-living crisis and crushing student loan debt can do that to a person. But there’s one thing that compounds these challenges that is unequaled in human history: the ticking time bomb of fossil fuel emissions. Millennials and Gen-Zers will be left to deal with the worst of the climate change fallout well after those responsible have passed away. And we have never been more divided.

In Radically Reframing Climate Change: A Guide to Saving Ourselves, Will Hackman identifies three main obstacles to solving climate change: polarization, paralysis, and stale, ineffective messaging. He empowers readers to turn their anxiety or apathy into passion, and anger into action at the personal, community, and government levels. The climate rallying cries to “Save the Planet” no longer work in our hyper-partisan world, nor do images of polar bears on melting glaciers. The problem isn’t scientific, fact-based, or even technological. It’s political, emotional, and ideological. Hackman provides a path forward for engagement and voter mobilization that combats apathy, dread, and resentment, and builds greater issue identification.

Hackman reframes the climate crisis as a humanity crisis, arguing that we must change how we think and talk about climate change, both in our conversations with non-believers and among those who care. Assuring humanity’s place on a changing planet will require a near universal level of public support we will never reach if we keep making the same mistakes. We know how to do this. But the stakes have never been higher and time is running out.

More about the author

Will Hackman has more than fifteen years’ experience working in US political campaigns, public policy process, strategic communications, coalition building, climate activism, and global environmental conservation advocacy. Will is a frequent climate policy expert voice online and in the media and has been interviewed on several climate change-related podcasts and filmed a TEDx in 2022. His writing has appeared in The Hill and Washington Post. He lives in the beautiful Shenandoah Valley in Front Royal, Virginia with his wife Paula, tucked into the Blue Ridge Mountains and the north entrance to Shenandoah National Park.

See more reviews here.

We look at this study of the emergence and influence of minimalist music, from it’s origins in the 1960s, through it’s rise in popularity, and influence across wider musical genres. See more about Minimalist Music here. 

Minimalist Music reviewed

The distinctive style of Philip Glass and Michael Nyman in particular are more well known than you may realise, especially if you have watched Scorsese movies. Steve Reich is also of course deeply influential, if perhaps slightly less well known to some. George Grella does a great and even handed job of taking us through the origins of the emergence of minimalist music, and then its cross fertilisation and inspiration of other artists. David Bowie quickly saw the value and inspiration of Philip Glass’s music, even before you had Brian Eno and Philip Glass then reworking the epic Berlin period of Bowie’s music for a return rebound musical reworking too.

Grella very clearly describes how Reich and Glass were peers, even born in the same year, and students together too, and how both were vital, but significantly different key drivers in the creation of minimalism. Both created beautiful, emotionally significant, but very different types of music. Interestingly another pillar of minimal music, and also art critic too, Michael Nyman, actually coined the term too. For many people the stunning movie Koyaanisqatsi, 1982, was the perfect visual introduction to the work of Philip Glass, bringing him to a much wider audience, and also illustrating the power and beauty of what minimalist music can do.

Grella also includes an important, relevant, and interesting chapter on the fusion and expansion of what minimal music could be. Perhaps slightly sadly for some of these groups, like The Orb, and Orbital, despite being inspired by Glass and Reich, they were not actually seen as successors to their lineage. Despite this slight, for us, as more neutral listeners, it is clear that the Orb, Banco Di Gaia and many others have a clear debt to minimalism, and we are richer for it.

David Letterman is quoted in the book as introducing Philip Glass to his show by describing him as one of the most successful people to bridge popular and classical music. As Grella rightly points out, prior to ‘classical music’ being seen as elitist and not for the masses, it actually was popular music for the last several centuries. Philip Glass described himself as a composer of music for films and popular culture. and, with the subsequent interaction and evolution of ideas by Robert Frip, and Johnny Greenwood (Radiohead) it is clear that this music has inspired many people working in many areas. We are richer for this, and, despite the brevity of this book. it is a great read by Grella and helps to give the reader a better understanding of what minimal music is, and is not. Well worth a read.

More about Minimalist Music

Minimalist Music looks critically into the music’s past, shows how the genre thrives across styles, and points the way toward minimalism’s ongoing future.

Minimalism as a genre is best defined not by any style or flavor but by its means. Certain rhythms and chords in other music may identify things like jazz or bossa nova or reggae; take those same elements and put them through the processes of minimalism and you have minimalism with the hues of other musics.

A still young genre with ancient roots, minimalism is much less any kind of style than a practice, a manner of making music. Reviving those means and applying them to contemporary sounds and experiences, the pioneers of minimalism created a new and avant-garde music that immediately communicated its power to listeners of all kinds. The global appeal of minimalism and the way the methods adapt to myriad styles open up a view into how music actually works as an art and an experience, how through time it connects in a fundamental way to how we as humans listen.

Minimalist Music is also available in audiobook format from audiobook retailers.

More about George Grella, Jr.

He has written about music and culture for over thirty years for print and online publications, and has contributed to the Grove Dictionary of Music and the Library of Congress’ National Recording Registry. He is Music Editor at The Brooklyn Rail, publishes the Kill Yr Idols newsletter, and is the author of Miles Davis’ Bitches Brew (Bloomsbury 2015). He has played jazz, classical, and improvised music from CBGB to Carnegie Hall.

See more reviews here.

Most organisations are no longer struggling to deploy AI. They are struggling to derive measurable value from it.

Artificial Intelligence (“AI”) and its agentic capabilities place organisational transformation as a key strategic consideration for organisations across all sectors. In the first article in the KPMG AI Agentic series, KPMG’s Shane Garahy and Emma Coogan outline how businesses can unlock value through an agentic AI strategy.

KPMG’s Global AI Quarterly Pulse Survey Q2 2026 found that approximately 7 per cent of organisations surveyed are experiencing established Return on Investment, with organisations planning to invest an average of $188 million over the next year on AI investments. Organisations are reimagining the art of what is possible and are facing fears of being left behind or missing out on opportunities to expand revenue streams and enhance efficiencies.

Where to begin and how to align

The biggest challenges facing AI strategy are risk management, quality of organisational data, lack of measurable Return on Investment (“ROI”), employee adoption, and integration with other emerging technologies. This poses the question to all organisations: Where to begin and how to align? KPMG provide a tailored approach to your organisation’s needs on how to structure and approach envisioning a future where agentic AI is embedded across workflows, redefining every layer of your organisation and unlocking new sources of value.

The rapid emergence of agentic AI platforms and marketplaces is making it easier than ever for organisations to adopt AI agents at scale. However, the challenge is no longer access to technology, but making the right strategic choices around governance, integration, security, compliance and operating model design. As the regulatory landscape continues to evolve, organisations that prioritise trust and control alongside innovation will be best placed to unlock value, while those that move without a clear framework risk creating complexity, increasing compliance exposure and limiting return on investment.

Creating a frictionless agentic AI journey

There is an expanding gap between deployment and scaling of AI and creating tangible organisational value. Organisations successfully scaling AI now will be dependent on the effectiveness of aligning agentic AI strategies, governance embedded across operations and their effective ability to evaluate for trust and performance.

Designing such an agentic AI strategy requires meticulous alignment of strategic ambition, operating model design, technology integration, and regulatory readiness.

The ultimate goal is to create a frictionless agentic AI journey from discovery to deployment, embedding trust, governance and scalability at every juncture. Organisations that act now will shape the standards and value flows of this evolving ecosystem, while slower movers risk falling behind as the market matures.

Translating strategic ambition into a structured, scalable operating model

KPMG supports organisations with AI strategy design, operating model transformation, governance frameworks, regulatory readiness assessments, AI risk management and implementation roadmaps.

The KPMG Framework outlined below can be leveraged to structure your organisation’s thinking and approach throughout the design, development and implementation of your agentic AI strategy, from defining your ambition to shaping business and operating models. This can support your organisations in determining what good looks like and the consequences of getting your agentic AI strategy wrong.

Agentic AI has the capability to amplify success, but the same stands for failure in the event of poor design and/ or implementation of an agentic AI strategy. Getting this wrong can impact every tier of the organisation and can give rise to loss of control, loss of trust, regulatory implications, disruption to business activities, litigation exposure and competitive disadvantage, which can generate a loss on returns, diminish market share and erode organisational credibility.

This outlines the key considerations for successfully unlocking value from an Agentic AI strategy, including the introduction of KPMG’s Target Operating Model (‘TOM’), which defines how an organisation uses its people, processes and technology to deliver its strategy effectively.

KPMG’s Target Operating Model

What have leading organisations done?

• A clearly defined long-term strategic ambition for their agentic AI strategy and an understanding of how that ambition translates into financial objectives.
• A clear view of the total revenue opportunity and the market share required to make the strategy viable.
• Identified what consumers value, how those expectations will evolve, and how agentic AI can be leveraged to support long-term value creation.
• A clearly defined concept of agentic AI to bring their strategic ambition to life. Identified and defined the key drivers and trends shaping adoption, with a clear response strategy.

Agentic AI strategy readiness checklist

How KPMG can help

As organisations accelerate their adoption of agentic AI and explore designing, developing and implementing agentic AI strategy, they face a common set of challenges, from defining strategic ambition to navigating regulatory complexity, designing scalable, measurable operating models, and maintaining global consistency.

KPMG supports leadership teams to translate strategic ambition into practical, scalable operating realities that can support your organisation in envisaging a sustainable, trusted and competitive agentic AI strategy. For more insights, visit kpmg.ie.

Article Authors:

Tata Consultancy Services (TCS), a global leader in IT services, consulting, and business solutions and operating a global delivery centre out of Letterkenny, Ireland, has launched TCS ADD AgentHub, a role-based, enterprise-ready, and trusted AI platform that enables the use of agentic AI in drug development at scale. This new agentic AI workforce transforms clinical trials and pharmacovigilance services while maintaining regulatory and audit requirements.

Pharmaceutical companies function in highly regulated environments, where they face challenges with trust, governance and scalability when applying AI across functions. Growing data volumes, fragmented systems, and increasing regulatory expectations across clinical development and pharmacovigilance are adding complexities to the entire R&D value chain.

TCS ADD AgentHub provides a structured framework to mitigate these challenges. Within the framework, AI agents can operate with clear roles, defined oversight, and built?in auditability. Pharma companies can custom-build their AI agent hub and deploy them across clinical workflows. The platform allows rapid and streamlined integration with minimal effort, accelerating adoption while maintaining regulatory compliance.

Built on the TCS ADD framework, TCS ADD AgentHub delivers measurable operational benefits across drug development and drug safety functions. Solutions powered by the platform have demonstrated up to 40% efficiency gains in clinical data management activities, up to 30% reduction in clinical study build effort through metadata-driven automation, and up to 30% cost savings in end-to-end safety case processing. AI-powered safety agents can also reduce quality control effort by as much as 50%, helping organisations improve productivity across critical R&D processes.

Built on the TCS ADD agentic AI architecture, TCS ADD AgentHub enables pharma companies to deploy a Human + AI Operating Model in which AI agents are embedded into enterprise workflows, with humans retaining responsibility for governing and decision?making.

Debashis Ghosh, President, Lifesciences and Healthcare, TCS, said:

“TCS ADD AgentHub is a role-based, enterprise-ready, and trusted AI platform that will enable our customers to accelerate drug development using agentic AI at scale. It enables a shift from reactive to proactive, scalable, and audit-ready operations amidst an ever-changing regulatory environment. TCS’ strategy is to move towards autonomous enterprise functions where AI agentic workforce operates alongside humans, driving innovation in drug development and improving patient safety.”

TCS ADDTM AgentHub supports workflows across clinical development and pharmacovigilance through AI workers such as ICSR intake, data entry, coding, review, and literature analysis; study design, protocol digitisation, and clinical data review; SDTM (Study Data Tabulation Model) transformation; and medical monitoring assistance, among others.

With an evolving catalogue of AI agents to suit specific needs, based on requirements and landscape, they can be deployed progressively and rapidly with minimal integration and implementation effort. By standardising how AI agents are deployed across these processes, the platform helps organisations improve productivity and focus scientific teams on higher?value work.

Buoyed by its comprehensive “AI-first” culture, perfectly exemplified by TCS ADD AgentHub, TCS aspires to become the world’s largest AI-led technology services company. By leveraging the proprietary cognitive intelligence of the TCS ADD suite, TCS enables tangible, predictive, and secure digital ecosystems for its customers.

Ekco, one of Europe’s leading security-first managed service providers, has announced the results of new research which estimates that scammers cost adults in Ireland €760M last year.

The research was conducted by Censuswide on behalf of Ekco among 1,000 adults in Ireland. The data shows that 96% of people encountered a scam or phishing attempt last year and the average person received more than five scam or phishing communications per month, or 63 per year.

While many avoided being duped, 22% of adults made at least one payment last year, believing that it was legitimate communication, and 15% made two or more payments. This is despite the fact that 80% of adults are confident that they could identify a phishing text or email.

The average amount lost by those who made a payment was €890 over the course of the year. This equates to €760M1among the adult population and has left one-in-nine seeking financial help from a loved one after falling victim to cybercrime.

The most common scam identified by adults in Ireland is a customs charge payment request, with 48% saying they received one last year. This is followed by a request to verify payment details (37%) and a request to pay a toll charge (27%).

The research found that the proliferation of scams and phishing attempts has left 41% of adults feeling stressed about having to be vigilant about scams. Despite this, not everyone is sympathetic to people who fall victim, with 24% of adults saying are naïve or careless, rising to 31% among 18- to 24-year-olds.

Conor Scolard, Director of Cyber Resilience, Ekco, said: “The reason so many of us are fielding scam attempts month in, month out, is because cybercriminals know they work. And, while most people believe they can spot a scam attempt a mile off, the reality is that they are getting more sophisticated to the point where many are falling victim to scams multiple times per year.

“At Ekco, we are working hard to shut down the cybercrime economy. Businesses and service providers can do their bit by empowering customers to differentiate between legitimate and bogus communications. Doubling down on cyber defences, while also educating consumers about clicking on links, or providing payment information and PINs over the phone, can make a significant difference.”

See more stories here.

UNESCO Together, a new all?island initiative, is bringing Ireland’s UNESCO?designated sites into a single collaborative network for the first time. Led by Newry, Mourne and Down District Council and the Mourne Gullion Strangford UNESCO Global Geopark, the project is fully funded through the PEACEPLUS Change Makers Programme and will run for two years, focusing on peacebuilding, reconciliation, youth engagement and shared heritage.

Dublin will play a key role in shaping this new cross?border partnership, drawing on the capital’s two UNESCO designations, Dublin Bay Biosphere Reserve and Dublin City of Literature. Through these partnerships, Dublin will help drive creative exchanges, environmental learning, youth programmes and long?term strategic planning across the network.

UNESCO Together

As a UNESCO City of Literature, Dublin supports, promotes and develops literary heritage and contemporary literary life in the city, enhancing the position of creativity as the key to sustainable development. Dublin became the world’s fourth UNESCO City of Literature in 2010, joining an expanding group of cities world-wide as part of the UNESCO Creative Cities Network. The Dublin UNESCO City of Literature office is managed by Dublin City Libraries, working with Dublin’s creative community to continually strengthen the city’s literary profile and experience.

The Dublin Bay UNESCO Biosphere Reserve is a leading example of how a major city can protect sensitive natural environments while supporting sustainable community use. In partnership with Dún Laoghaire–Rathdown County Council, Fingal County Council, Dublin Port Company, Fáilte Ireland and the National Parks and Wildlife Service, Dublin City Council seeks to connect people and nature by inspiring greater understanding and appreciation of Dublin Bay’s unique natural heritage. Through this collaborative approach, it demonstrates the value of environmental stewardship across administrative boundaries, balancing biodiversity conservation, recreation, education and sustainable economic activity within a shared landscape.

UNESCO Together will link Ireland’s Biosphere Reserves, Creative Cities, World Heritage Sites, Global Geoparks and Tentative Sites, creating new opportunities for shared learning, sustainable tourism and community engagement. More than 650 cross?border participations are planned, including workshops, cultural events, environmental activities and online exchanges.

The Lord Mayor of Dublin, Daryl Barron, said, “Dublin is proud to contribute to UNESCO Together through our two UNESCO designations – Dublin Bay UNESCO Biosphere Reserve and Dublin UNESCO City of Literature. Together they showcase the very best of our city: our unique natural environment and our rich cultural heritage. By working with UNESCO partners across the island, we have an opportunity to strengthen connections, inspire young people, share knowledge and demonstrate how culture and nature can help build more sustainable, inclusive and resilient communities.”

At its core, the project will develop a long?term roadmap for UNESCO collaboration across Ireland, including exploring a future UNESCO Tourism Trail celebrating the island’s most remarkable cultural and natural landmarks.

To learn more about UNESCO designations please visit

Biosphere reserves What are biosphere reserves? | UNESCO

Cities of Literature:  Cities of Literature | cities of literature

UNESCO Creative Cities Network: https://en.unesco.org/creative-cities/home

Global Geoparks UNESCO Global Geoparks | UNESCO

World Heritage Sites: UNESCO World Heritage Centre – World Heritage List

See more breaking stories here.

Irish consumers are embracing artificial intelligence (AI) and self-service for simple customer service tasks but want access to a real person when issues become complex, sensitive or require empathy, new research commissioned by the Customer Contact Management Association (CCMA) Ireland has found.

Seven in ten (77%) respondents want to be told when they are interacting with AI, while almost three in ten (29%) respondents rate AI phone agents positively.

Phone for Customer Service is still important

The Consumer Perceptions of Customer Service in Ireland and their Views on the Use of Artificial Intelligence (AI) research, conducted by W5 among 1,012 Irish consumers, examined perceptions of customer service in Ireland, preferred communication channels, attitudes towards the use of AI, customer pain points, experiences of vulnerable customers and perceptions of careers in customer service.

Customer Service

Overall, six in ten (68%) consumers rated their most recent customer service interaction as good or very good, with ratings improving across most communication channels compared with a similar survey carried out in 2024.

• In-person remains the strongest-performing customer service channel at 75% (up 4% on 2024)
• Email: 61% (up 9% on 2024)
• WhatsApp/Messenger: 60% (up 5% on 2024)
• Phone: 59% (up 7% on 2024).

Despite the growth of digital channels, consumers continue to rely heavily on more established methods of communication, with nine in ten (91%) respondents using the phone and almost nine in ten (89%) using email to access customer service. Live chat with an agent has also achieved mainstream adoption, with seven in ten (70%) respondents reporting its use.

Artificial Intelligence

Consumers are increasingly comfortable with AI handling simple, repetitive and transactional tasks, such as making payments, booking appointments and tracking deliveries. However, as interactions become more complex or sensitive, consumers strongly favour human assistance. Complaints, billing issues and fraud are areas where respondents believe empathy, reassurance, understanding and problem-solving are particularly important.

AI phone agents received a relatively low satisfaction rating with almost three in ten (29%) respondents rating the experience positively, compared with five in ten (54%) who rated live agent chat positively.

Transparency is a clear expectation, with seven in ten (77%) respondents saying they want to be told when AI is being used in a customer service interaction. While just over half (57%) of respondents agree that it is currently clear when they are interacting with an AI agent, the findings indicate a significant expectation for greater transparency.

Vulnerable Customers

Vulnerable customers reported lower satisfaction with customer service, with six in ten (63%) rating their experience as good or very good compared with seven in ten (70%) among non-vulnerable respondents.

Almost three in ten (26%) respondents reported having a long-term physical or mental impairment that limits daily activities or work, including age-related conditions. The most commonly reported vulnerabilities included mental health conditions (26%), serious long-term illness (24%) and mobility impairments (24%).

Dorothy O’Byrne, CEO of CCMA Ireland, said:

“Irish companies are doing well in supporting their customers but it is clear there is room for improvement in some key areas.

It’s no surprise that customers prefer human support for complex or sensitive issues, but what is clear is that they do not want technology to come at the expense of good customer service. Long waiting times, difficulty reaching a real person, chatbots, inconsistent service and poor communication or follow-up remain among the key frustrations identified by customers

Consumers want advisors who understand their issue, provide accurate information, take ownership of problems and avoid scripted or generic responses. They also want honest answers, clearer timelines, regular updates and callbacks when promised.

The opportunity for businesses is to get the balance right – using technology to make simple interactions faster and more convenient, while ensuring customers can easily access a human when they need reassurance or help resolving a more complex issue.”

About CCMA Ireland

CCMA Ireland is a not-for-profit industry association that champions Customer Experience (CX) excellence and advocates for the customer service industry in Ireland. The industry employs over 60,000 professionals. Our members include many indigenous and international organisations in financial services, healthcare, telecoms, outsourcing and entertainment who provide customer service support from their operations in Ireland. Our mission is to promote collaboration, shared learning and best practice for customer service organisations.

See more breaking stories here.

Are you out of contract or looking for a better deal for your mobile phone? If so, there are some great SIM Only deals available in Ireland right now with huge savings to be made over long contract plans.

We’ve teamed up with Switcher.ie, the free and impartial price comparison and switching service, to find the best SIM Only deals available every month.

Check back regularly to stay informed of the latest deals and offers, and visit the Switcher.ie website to order one of these great packages.

Best SIM Only Deals

This SIM-only prepay deal from 48 is available exclusively through Switcher.ie. For a monthly top-up of €10.99, it provides a flexible mobile solution featuring 100GB of 4G data, 5,000 minutes, 5,000 texts, and a 17GB EU/UK roaming allowance. This promotion is valid until 30/09/2026.

Available exclusively through Switcher.ie for a limited time, LycaMobile’s National Unlimited Plan offers another affordable prepaid option to consumers. With 100GB of data, unlimited calls and texts, and a 17GB EU roaming allowance, this plan is priced at just €10.99 top-up every 4 weeks.

Take a look at Clear Mobile. At €12.99 monthly on a flexible 30-day rolling bill-pay contract, it includes unlimited calls and 5G data, 10,000 texts, and a 23GB EU roaming allowance. As an added bonus, new customers can receive their first month free.

Lastly, for another budget-friendly SIM-only plan, Sky Mobile is offering a promotion on their Unlimited Plan. For only €12.99 per month for the first 12 months, €15 thereafter, you’ll get unlimited data, calls, and texts. Plus, when you travel to the EU & UK for work and holidays, you don’t need to worry about extra data charges. With Sky’s unlimited plan, they don’t impose any limit, so you can use your data as you would at home.

(If you’ve come across this article after some of these deals may have expired, check out our main SIM Only category page to find the latest offers.)

We look at the new Pixel 11 Pro. See more about it here.

The new Pixel 11 Pro reviewed

It’s out, it has some new features, it costs a bit more, and it does things a bit better than a year ago. One of the biggest points of contention, for some at least, is the new flashing LED light on the back of the phone, with the camera, which is cool, could be really useful, and yet has very limited options in terms of possible types of notifications that you could be using it for. In many says this may only be an issue for the uber-users however.

The phone has a good to great look and feel, depending on how you like those tighter edges, versus the smoother sides that came before. The quality of the camera and the images it takes are as great as you would come to expect from any Pixel Phone these days. This is one aspect where you are getting good quality for what you are buying. Our review sample came with a clear protective case too. This fits well, and, these days seems like a no brainer, for something this valuable. Pixels have been relatively to quite durable, but still making it easy to add the protective case makes sense all day long, because it can be hard to avoid the odd drop and ding. It is still a thumbs up for the case to protect the new crown jewels.

We have also been testing the new Pixel Watch 5, and this phone naturally also dovetails well with the watch too. At the same time, prior to reviewing the Pixel 11 Pro, we were using the Pixel 8 Phone with the Pixel Watch 4 and 5,  and they all played well together. Google updates often bring added functionality and compatibility between different iterations, so you should be able to chop and change with a fairly seamless experience. Overall the Pixel 11 Pro is a good, solid addition to the Google Pixel phone family.

More about the Pixel 11 Pro

7 Years of Support

Pixel phones are built to last and will get even better over time with seven years of OS, Pixel Drops, and security updates.

Designed to Last

Exceptional Durability More Sustainable The Pixel 11 series is made with 10 premium recycled materials, including for the first time, 100% recycled lithium in the battery cell and 100% recycled rare earth elements in magnets.

Building on our exceptional drop resistance, our Pro displays have a new coating that’s twice as scratch resistant, so you can throw your phone in your bag with your keys and not worry about it.

Google Tensor G6

At the heart of the Pixel 11 series is our most powerful chip yet: the Google Tensor G6. But we didn’t just build a faster chip; we built a purpose-driven engine designed to make your Pixel more intuitive, fluid and helpful.

The Tensor G6 pairs an upgraded Image Signal Processor (ISP) with a 50% more powerful Tensor Processing Unit (TPU) to handle complex computational photography faster, producing images that look better than ever before.

Tensor G6 also drives our most advanced on-device Gemini Intelligence. The more powerful TPU, paired with the latest Nano model, run faster & with lower energy to deliver proactive assistance that anticipates your needs.

Proactive security with Titan M3

The new Titan M3 security chip and Google Tensor G6 can provide proactive security using post-quantum
cryptography in secure boot to help your Pixel stay protected from emerging advanced threats.

Magic Capture catches the moment while you live it.

With one tap, Google Pixel captures a video and high-quality photos with quick
edits so they’re ready to share.

Make every photo unmistakably yours.

Choose an alternate default look with warmer tones or deeper shadows, or
create your own set of professional-grade film styles and unique photo
aesthetics. Looks run directly inside Pixel Camera to achieve the ultimate quality
by taking full control of the imaging pipeline.

Customize your Camera controls

Open your camera ready to shoot your way.
Customize which mode Pixel Camera opens to every time you launch the app–
whether that’s Photo, Video, or Magic Capture.

Try it yourself!

Your favorite camera controls, just a tap away.
Put your most-used camera controls right where you want them. Customize
your camera controls in settings and tap the viewfinder to reveal them.

See more product reviews here.

We look at the new Google Pixel Watch 5, which we have been wearing and using for the last week now. See more about the watch here.

Google Pixel Watch 5 reviewed

Since reviewing the Pixel Watch 4 last year, we continued to use it through to the arrival of the Pixel Watch 5 last week. This naturally helped in terms of having a good point of comparison between the two, as well as in relation to other options out there in the market place. First up, it does charge quickly, both the 4, and now the 5 too. We wouldn’t be completely convinced about the 40 hours battery life, but you might closer to this by bringing down the brightness setting for example. Mostly it serves you pretty well, especially if you don’t need to sleep with it on, every or any night. We did it once or twice, but, after seeing the usual sleep patterns it felt unnecessary to sleep with it on every night, and hey, how much of your data do you want to share too? As above, the charging cradle does its job super effectively too, so you can normally work around a quick blast and then you should be covered for your next bout of activities.

There are plenty of watch face options too, all very quickly and easily changed via the app. You can also use the Gemini AI to generate your own personalised watch faces too, so you could really go to town on that option and have some fun. We imagine everyone will have their own interesting anomaly stories. For us, it was using a power tool, to drill off plaster, and have the watch suggest that we had been cycling for the duration! Go figure, but of course it can be hard for the watch to track exactly every activity that you might be doing. For walks and runs, the watch does very well, as you would hope, and perhaps even expect. Several of our testers immediately enjoyed using the watch to get good, precise maps and data about their workouts, so it is a definite thumbs up for these functions and the watch’s capabilities.

There is also the interesting question about if information can inform, inspire and change behaviour and habits. Naturally we all want to be fitter, exercise more, the watch, with it’s steps tracker, kinda by default, did help nudge us to be more active over the last year. At the same time you don’t want to become a hamster on a wheel, constantly aiming to beat the last pb, the last week’s total distance covered, and so on. Overall we felt the data from the activities was a good input into trying to be more healthy. At the same time, the nudging to get wellness tips, and fitness plans was something that we were less interested in. For a while there was a series of motivational comments and feedback. The trouble is, you can very quickly tell that it is AI derived, and quite soon it becomes repetitive and same-ish. Through the year of using the Pixel Watch 4, the app went through a few changes, so it would be good to see if it settles down for the new Pixel 5.

In other ways, apart from the supporting app, which was Fitbit, and is now Google Health, in many ways the Pixel Watch 5 is not massively different from the 4. In many ways it is quite possible therefore that this watch is aimed at users of the Pixel Watch 3 and earlier, or other brand users, who now wish to move into the Pixel Watch 5 ecosystem. As the Pixel Watch 4 sample we reviewed was still going strong a year later, this would also make sense – that the new watch is not shouting out to be an immediate replacement for Pixel Watch 4 users, if you see what we mean. It has been a positive experience using the PW4, and, a week in, we are optimistic that using the Pixel Watch 5 could also be a good option, and continue to inform and inspire heathier living. A qualified thumbs up so far, and next we shall see how it performs for durability and longevity.

More about the Google Pixel Watch 5

What’s new with the Google Pixel Watch 5.

Our most comprehensive health and wellness tracking.

Epic accuracy. Epic performance.

Designed for Gemini Intelligence.

Up to 40 hours of battery. Get 15 hours in just 15 minutes.2

See more breaking stories here.

Sports fans no longer have to choose between the biggest live events as Sky launches ‘Your Multiview’, allowing customers to watch up to four live Sky Sports events simultaneously on one screen. No more switching channels or reaching for a second screen. Launching for the return of the Premier League on 21 August, ‘Your Multiview’ is available only on Sky.

Watch more of the action with ‘Your Multiview’

On busy sporting weekends, ‘Your Multiview’ lets fans choose up to four live Sky Sports events and watch them side by side on a single screen, available on Sky Glass, Sky Stream and Sky Q.

Fans can follow football matches from across the Premier League, EFL, SPFL, or WSL at once, or stay across a packed day of live sport spanning football, F1, cricket, tennis, golf, NFL and rugby – all without switching channels or checking for results elsewhere.

When the biggest sporting moments take over a weekend, ‘Your Multiview’ puts fans in control of how they watch. The new feature allows viewers to spotlight an event to change the on-screen layout, select the audio they want to hear, and switch any event to full screen when it’s the one they don’t want to miss.

New features make watching football on Sky the best viewing experience

Sky is also introducing more ways for football fans to stay across the games, teams, and moments that matter most to them. As the home of football, Sky will show more than 1,500 matches across the Premier League, Women’s Super League, EFL, and Scottish Premiership. This season, fans will be able to follow multiple games, check the latest scores and tables, follow a favourite team, and catch up on the biggest talking points, all through their TV screens.

Matt Price, Commercial Director of Sky & NOW, said: “The way people watch sport continues to evolve, and fans increasingly want a more personalised viewing experience. Whether it’s following multiple matches at once, checking live scores and stats, or catching up on key moments, we want to give our customers the flexibility to watch sport their way. That’s why we’re continuing to develop new features like ‘Your Multiview’, helping fans stay connected to more of the sport they love in one place.”

What’s new for the 2026/27 season on Sky Sports

See live scores and stats without leaving the match: Sports Hub

Sports Hub, available only on Sky, brings scores, stats, league tables, schedules, short-form clips and highlights to the side of the screen while fans watch the big match. It also gives fans routes to tune into other games, access Recap and launch Multiview, helping them follow more of the live sport story without leaving the screen.

It is available anytime on Sky Sports Premier League and Sky Sports Football, and during selected live matches on other channels, with Sky Glass, Sky Stream and Sky Q.

Catch up in a scroll with Clips

Built into Sports Hub, Clips gives fans a new way to browse and watch short-form sports videos in an autoplay, scrollable experience. Fans can catch up on the latest news, highlights, key moments and stories from teams, leagues and competitions, and keep exploring related clips.

Get to live sport faster, and closer to the moment

The refreshed Live Sports Rail makes it easy to see what’s live now, what’s coming up and when events start, so fans can dive straight into the action. Coming soon, Real Time will be expanding to Sky Sports Football, Sky Sports+ and Sky Sports Premier League on Sky Glass and Sky Stream, bringing fans closer to real time so they stay right on top of every goal, decision and big moment.

Everything in one place

On Sky Glass and Sky Stream, these features are brought together by Sky OS, the entertainment operating system that powers the experience, helping customers easily move between live sport, Team Pages, Playlist, reminders, and personalised recommendations.

Catch the moments everyone is talking about in the Sky Sports app

On the move with the Sky Sports app, Moments gives fans a personalised feed tailored to their favourite sports, teams and competitions, helping them find the clips, opinions, and stories they care about faster. It’s a fresh, scrollable stream of vertical videos, from live clips and highlights to analysis, interviews, reactions, and behind-the-scenes content, all easy to like, share, and search in one place.

How to buy

Sky Sports is available from €20 per month for 12 months for new and existing customers, as an add-on to Essential TV or Ultimate TV on Sky Glass, Sky Stream and Sky Q.

With Sky Stream, fans can get Sky TV over WiFi with no satellite dish and no engineer visit. The Sky Stream puck plugs into any TV with an HDMI port and is ready to set up straight out of the box, with on-screen instructions to get customers watching in minutes.

Sky Stream also gives customers flexible ways to watch, including a 31-day flexible plan, and next-working-day delivery where orders meet the relevant cut-off times.

See more stories here.

Enterprise Ireland’s Annual Knowledge Transfer Survey 2025 shows rising innovation activity and increased industry collaboration, with €953 million invested in research

13th August – Enterprise Ireland has published the Annual Knowledge Transfer Survey (AKTS) 2025, which highlights another year of strong performance across Ireland’s research and innovation ecosystem and demonstrates the growing impact of publicly funded research on enterprise development, economic growth and job creation.

Spin-Outs drive employment gains

Key findings include:

• €953 million in total research expenditure, up 8.3% year-on-year
• 2,393 new R&D and consultancy agreements with industry and non-commercial organisations — 63% involving Irish SMEs
• 528 invention disclosures (up 18%) and 118 patent applications (up 49%)
• 260 Licence, Option and Assignment agreements, up 18%, with 80% granted to Irish companies
• 20 new spin-out companies; 178 active spin-outs employing 2,467 people
• 1,450 active industry R&D projects at year-end 2025

The results point to a robust innovation pipeline emerging from Ireland’s publicly funded research system, with 20 licences resulting in new products and services entering the market during the year. Since 2021, 127 spin-out companies have been established from publicly funded research.

Minister for Enterprise, Tourism and Employment, Peter Burke TD, said:
“These results demonstrate the value of connecting Ireland’s world-class research base with the ambition and innovation of Irish enterprise. In 2025, there were 2,393 new agreements with industry, a significant increase in patent applications and new spin-out companies employing almost 2,500 people, all showing that publicly funded research is delivering tangible benefits for the economy, supporting jobs, competitiveness and regional development.

The strong level of engagement from Irish SMEs is particularly encouraging, highlighting how research and innovation are helping businesses of all sizes to develop new products, access new opportunities and strengthen international competitiveness.”

Joe Healy, Divisional Manager, Research & Innovation, Enterprise Ireland, said: “Through our continued collaboration with higher education institutions and the research sector, we are ensuring that cutting-edge research is translated into real-world solutions, competitive advantage and high-value jobs for Irish companies. This success is a testament to the dedicated technology transfer teams working across Ireland’s universities and research organisations.

“The findings also recognise the contribution of the technology transfer teams across Ireland’s universities and research organisations, whose expertise in intellectual property management and commercialisation helps transform research discoveries into products, services and companies. Enterprise Ireland will continue to work closely with the technology transfer offices and the wider research community to ensure Ireland remains at the forefront of innovation and enterprise development.”

KTI Annual Knowledge Transfer Survey 2025 here 

See more breaking stories here.

The broadband market in Ireland is now flooded with providers all offering a myriad of deals. We know it’s hard to find the perfect deal that suits your needs, but we’re here to help.

We’ve teamed up with Switcher.ie, the free and impartial price comparison and switching service, to find the best broadband deals available every month.

Check back regularly to stay informed of the latest deals and offers, and visit the Switcher.ie website to order one of these great packages.

Best Broadband Deals

If you are searching for a great deal on broadband, new eir customers can find fantastic value in the Fibre Broadband, Talk – 24 Month Discount package. Available for €34.99 per month on a 24-month contract, this plan includes unlimited broadband reaching speeds up to 500Mb, alongside unlimited off-peak national and local calls. Additionally, customers who sign up by 28/08/2026 will enjoy extra savings through a €100 bill credit applied directly to their eir broadband account.

The Vodafone 500Mb Full Fibre Broadband – 24 Month plan is another contender for consumers seeking great long-term value. Delivering speeds up to 500Mb with unlimited data, it features a discounted rate of €25 monthly for the initial six months before increasing to €40 per month. A key benefit of this package is that it avoids the steep “thereafter” price hikes typical after a contract expires, providing reliable ongoing savings. Additionally, as a limited-time perk, customers who sign up by 31/08/2026 will receive a €75 credit on their Vodafone broadband bill.

For households seeking affordable high-speed internet, Virgin Media’s 500Mb Broadband – 24 Month plan is another highly competitive option. At just €35 per month for 24 months, it delivers unlimited broadband with download speeds reaching 500Mb. To top it off, new customers who join prior to 30/08/2026 can unlock substantial savings with €105 credited to their Virgin Media broadband account.

(If you’ve come across this article after some of these deals may have expired, check out our main Broadband Deals category page to find the latest offers)

Echelon Data Centres, the Irish-headquartered hyperscale data centre owner, developer and operator, has entered into a strategic collaboration agreement with Trinovium, a subsidiary of Trinity Biotech plc (NASDAQ: TRIB), to develop next-generation liquid cooling solutions for AI and high-density computing environments.

The collaboration comes as the rapid growth of AI drives increasing computing and power densities within data centres, creating new requirements for the infrastructure needed to manage the heat generated by increasingly powerful hardware.

New Liquid Cooling solutions for AI infrastructure

The global data centre liquid cooling market is projected to grow from approximately $4bn in 2026 to $27bn by 2033[1], as operators and technology companies respond to these changing requirements.

As liquid cooling becomes more widely deployed, the quality and condition of the coolant itself also becomes increasingly important. At higher temperatures and operating demands, factors such as corrosion, particulate contamination, fluid degradation and microbial growth can have implications for system reliability and uptime.

The collaboration brings together Echelon’s experience in designing, developing and operating hyperscale data centre infrastructure with Trinovium’s expertise in high-purity fluid manufacturing and analytical technologies.

Under the agreement, the companies will work together to develop and refine advanced liquid cooling technologies, informed by the requirements of the hyperscale and AI infrastructure Echelon is developing across its portfolio.

Echelon is developing one of Europe’s largest hyperscale data centre portfolios, with more than 700MW currently in development and more than 1.4GW of secured capacity across Ireland, the UK, Italy and other strategic markets.
Trinovium was established to apply Trinity Biotech’s experience in healthcare-grade fluid manufacturing to AI infrastructure. Its initial direct-to-chip liquid cooling formulation has been designed around three core performance requirements and relevant Open Compute Project guidelines:
Ultra-high-purity, highly stable aqueous chemistry
Corrosion inhibition and coolant system protection
Healthcare-level consistency and traceability.

Alongside the cooling fluid, Trinovium is developing a fluid health and system intelligence platform drawing on Trinity Biotech’s analytical technology portfolio, including connected electrochemical sensing and mass spectrometry.

The platform is being designed to monitor corrosion and scaling, particulate contamination, and microbial growth and biofilm formation, providing greater insight into the condition and performance of liquid cooling systems.

Development activities are expected to commence imminently, with initial focus areas including direct-to-chip cooling fluids, thermal management systems and modular liquid cooling solutions optimised for AI and high-performance computing deployments.

Niall Molloy, CEO of Echelon Data Centres, said:
“AI is changing the infrastructure requirements of data centres. As more computing power is concentrated into smaller spaces, managing the heat it generates becomes an increasingly important engineering challenge.

“Liquid cooling will be an important part of meeting that challenge, but it is not simply about moving heat more efficiently. The quality, stability and monitoring of the fluids within those systems will also be important to their long-term reliability.

“This collaboration brings together Trinovium’s expertise in fluid science and analytics with our experience of developing hyperscale infrastructure. It gives us an opportunity to develop and refine technologies specifically around the requirements of the next generation of AI data centres.”

John Gillard, Chief Executive Officer of Trinity Biotech, said:
“The rapid growth of AI is creating unprecedented demand for advanced cooling technologies capable of supporting increasingly dense and power-hungry computing environments.

“By combining Trinovium’s capabilities in high-performance fluid design, precision manufacturing and advanced analytics with Echelon’s hyperscale data centre expertise, we believe we can accelerate the development of innovative liquid cooling solutions designed specifically for the next generation of AI infrastructure.”

See more breaking stories here.

Analysis from the Sustainable Energy Authority of Ireland (SEAI) shows strong evidence that improving a home’s energy efficiency can significantly increase its market value, all the while reducing energy bills and improving comfort. Based on data from MyHome on almost 50,000 homes sold during 2023 and 2024, SEAI found that each improvement on the Building Energy Rating (BER) scale is associated with an average 2.7% increase in final sale price nationwide. The effect was strongest in rural Ireland, where each improvement on the scale was linked to a 4.7% increase in value.

Energy Efficiency

The analysis used actual sale prices rather than advertised list prices, offering a clear picture of how much more buyers are willing to pay for more energy-efficient homes. It was completed relative to the familiar 15-point BER scale, ahead of the recent introduction of the simplified 8-point BER scale.

Key findings include:

• Nationally, each step up the (15-point) BER scale is linked to an average increase of 2.7% in the value of a typical Irish home.
• Houses (2.8%) see a slightly higher average uplift than apartments (2.2%).
• The strongest uplift is seen in rural areas, where each BER improvement is associated with an average 4.7% increase in value.
• There was a 2.7% uplift for urban areas outside Dublin versus 1.7% for urban Dublin.

The comparatively lower uplift in urban Dublin may reflect the greater influence of other buyer priorities in the capital such as location, space, and proximity to amenities. However, the research shows that BER improvements can still translate into meaningful euro gains.

The analysis shows energy efficiency is a contributor to value across all market segments and, while the value uplift varies by property type and location, the relationship remains strong even when such price-influencing factors are controlled for.

William Walsh, CEO of SEAI said: “Thousands of homeowners across the country are already enjoying the benefits of retrofitting, living in warmer, more comfortable homes, with cheaper, more predictable energy bills. The research we’re publishing today adds yet another compelling reason to upgrade your home – we now have very clear evidence that homebuyers are increasingly valuing the resilience, day-to-day affordability and health benefits of owning a retrofitted home.

“Thanks to unprecedented support from Government, our grants at SEAI are now more generous than ever, with many covering a significant portion of the overall costs involved. There’s never been a better time to retrofit your home, and no matter what stage or budget a homeowner is at, we at SEAI are here to help.”

Joanne Geary, Managing Director of MyHome, who collaborated with SEAI on the analysis, said: “We are delighted to partner with the SEAI on this invaluable research, which reinforces the importance of a strong BER for homeowners. The impact of a better BER on day-to-day running costs and the environment is already clear, and now this innovative analysis proves the positive, proportionate effect the rating has on house prices in urban, suburban and rural areas around the country. These research findings give homeowners yet another compelling reason to investigate a home energy upgrade as we look to reduce our dependence on fossil fuels.”

The analysis shows that BER improvements often have a stronger impact on final sale prices than on asking prices, suggesting homeowners may be able to unlock additional value by upgrading before selling. Demand is also being driven by buyers seeking improved comfort, as well as lower and more predictable energy bills. Evidence from SEAI-administered upgrade programmes also points to wider benefits, including warmer, more comfortable, and healthier homes. Energy efficiency is increasingly linked to mortgage rates and by extension affordability, with many lenders offering green mortgages for homes rated B or better.

With homes accounting for nearly a quarter of Ireland’s energy use, the study shows how upgrading residential energy performance can support household finances while also contributing to Ireland’s climate goals. In 2025, SEAI government grant schemes supported upgrades in more than 58,600 homes, including more than €230 million investment on free home energy upgrades in 8,100 vulnerable energy poor homes. Homeowners can visit the SEAI website to read the full report and find out more about available home energy upgrade grants and supports [Home Energy Upgrades | SEAI].

This study examines the relationship between the BER at the time of sale and the property sales price, and therefore many of the results discussed reference the previous BER scale for properties sold prior to the effective date of the new scale introduced in May 2026 (full details here https://www.seai.ie/ber/new-simplified-scale). As all existing BER certificates remain valid for 10 years from their date of issue, including for mandatory requirements such as the sale of a home, the results discussed here apply to most existing BERs. The general relationship between improvement along the BER scale and higher property sales price can be expected to hold for the new simplified scale, which is supported by underlying energy value analysis conducted for this study.

About SEAI 
SEAI is the expert authority on decarbonising Ireland’s energy system, using robust, objective data and an evidence-based approach to help inform policy development and energy user behaviours. SEAI empowers households, businesses, motorists and the public sector to move away from fossil fuels with practical advice and financial supports. We encourage positive changes in how Ireland uses energy to deliver a more prosperous, energy efficient and cleaner environment.

SEAI is funded by the Government of Ireland through the Department of Climate, Energy and the Environment.

See more breaking stories here.

A few months ago, I was helping a friend compare van insurance in Ireland after he bought his first Transit for a small plumbing business.

He assumed he could just insure it the same way as his car. It seemed logical enough – the van would mostly be parked outside his house, and he’d only be using it for work during the week.

It turns out that assumption could have been a very expensive mistake.

After speaking to a van insurance broker and doing a bit of research, I realised there are some important differences between private van insurance and commercial van insurance that aren’t always obvious when you’re buying a policy.

The first question isn’t “What van do you drive?”

It’s how you use it.

If you’re carrying tools, visiting customers, transporting equipment or making deliveries as part of your work, you’ll almost certainly need commercial van insurance.

Even if you only use the van for business a couple of days a week, your insurer needs to know.

On the other hand, if the van is genuinely only used for personal journeys and not connected to any business activity, a private policy may be appropriate, depending on the insurer.

The important thing is to be upfront. If your policy doesn’t match how the van is actually being used, you could run into problems if you ever need to make a claim.

More people in Ireland are buying vans than ever

One thing that surprised me was just how many commercial vehicles are on Irish roads.

According to the Society of the Irish Motor Industry (SIMI), registrations of new light commercial vehicles were up 9.3% year-to-date in 2026, with 27,237 new LCVs registered by the end of July compared with 24,915 over the same period in 2025.

Figures from the Central Statistics Office (CSO) tell a similar story. In the first six months of 2026 alone, 19,477 new goods vehicles and 6,566 used imported goods vehicles were licensed for the first time in Ireland.

With more vans and commercial vehicles entering the Irish fleet, it’s even more important to make sure your insurance is suitable for how you actually use your vehicle.

Commercial insurance usually includes private use

One thing I didn’t know is that many commercial van insurance policies also allow for social, domestic and pleasure use.

So if you use your van for work during the week but head to the DIY shop or take it away for the weekend, you’re often still covered.

The opposite isn’t normally true.

A private policy generally won’t cover business activities like:

• carrying tools or equipment
• travelling between job sites
• making deliveries
• transporting stock
• using the van in connection with your business.

That’s why simply choosing the cheaper policy isn’t always the right decision.

Don’t forget about your No Claims Bonus

Another thing worth checking is your No Claims Bonus (NCB).

If you’re moving from private insurance to a commercial policy, or vice versa, ask your broker how this will affect your NCB.

Every insurer has slightly different rules, and it’s much easier to understand your options before you switch than afterwards.

My advice

If you’re unsure which policy you need, don’t guess.

Spend five minutes explaining exactly how you use your van. A good broker will quickly tell you whether private or commercial cover is the right fit.

It’s a simple conversation that could save you a lot of hassle if something ever goes wrong.

Guest post by Rob Morrison, Head of Technology, Esri Ireland

AI has dominated headlines, but while much of the focus has been on chatbots, another important shift is taking place. AI is quietly transforming Geographic Information Systems (digital mapping and location-based technology) and Digital Twin technology (a digital version of a real place, asset or piece of infrastructure).

At this year’s Esri User Conference, one message stood out: mapping is becoming a way to understand what is happening in the world in real time, predict what could happen next and help organisations respond faster. For Ireland, the implications could be significant.

For decades, mapping has helped Irish organisations establish what happened and where. By combining digital mapping with AI and Digital Twins, they can establish what is happening now, what will happen next and, most importantly, what they should do about it. This shift has moved mapping from being reactive to proactive. Instead of static maps, Irish organisations can now create systems that are constantly updated as new information becomes available. AI can then analyse that information, identify risks and highlight what needs attention.

There is a misconception that AI could replace mapping technology, but in reality, the rise of AI has made trusted location data more valuable. AI is only as reliable as the information behind it. We all know that when AI doesn’t have the data to back up a prompt, it can “hallucinate”. Many Irish organisations, including local authorities, utilities and emergency services, have spent years building accurate geographic datasets, and that investment is now paying off.

With trusted digital mapping data behind it, AI can analyse imagery to identify changes in the landscape and spot damaged infrastructure across thousands of locations. Work that might once have taken weeks can now be done so much faster.

Digital Twins take this a step further, as their value comes from their connection to what’s happening in the real world. Sensors, drones, satellite imagery and connected devices can continuously feed new information into a model, giving life to a digital version of a real place, asset or piece of infrastructure. AI can then analyse that information, identify problems and predict where attention may be needed. Add digital mapping technology, and the model gains the geographic context it needs to be genuinely valuable. Together, these technologies can create living models that evolve alongside the places and infrastructure they represent.

Ireland is very well placed to benefit from these developments due to the accurate datasets that have been cultivated. As a country, we are in the throes of attempting to modernise critical infrastructure, build more housing, improve environmental monitoring and prepare for the growing effects of climate change. All of these challenges have one thing in common: location.

Decisions about where to build homes, how to maintain electricity networks, where to improve transport or how to protect biodiversity ultimately come down to geography. AI allows Irish organisations to process much larger amounts of information and develop sharper insights. Digital mapping ensures those insights stay grounded in trusted information about real places and not “hallucinations”.

Emergency management is a good example of what these technologies could look like working in tandem. Before a storm, authorities could model which Irish towns are most at risk, which roads could flood and where emergency resources should be placed in advance. As the storm hits, weather information, sensors, drone imagery and reports from crews on the ground could continually update a Digital Twin.

AI could help identify flooded roads, damaged power lines and other emerging risks as conditions change. Decision-makers could then work from a clearer live picture, allowing emergency vehicles to be directed where they are needed most. Afterwards, aerial imagery could help assess damage and support faster repairs and recovery.

We are entering an era where maps can do much more than tell us the history of things. Now they can show us the present and the future. The combination of AI, digital mapping and Digital Twins represents a different way for organisations to understand the world around them. For Ireland, the opportunity is to combine AI with the trusted geographic information Irish organisations have built up over decades, to make better decisions about our communities, infrastructure and economy.

This is our superpower that could mean better planning, faster responses to emergencies and smarter use of limited resources. The Irish organisations that invest in building those foundations now will be set to reap the rewards, and to guide the rest through whatever comes next.

See more stories here.

Mater Private Network has announced its participation in the FARADIGM clinical trial, a global study evaluating the safety and effectiveness of Boston Scientific’s FaraFlex Mapping and Pulsed Field Ablation Catheter for the treatment of patients with paroxysmal and persistent atrial fibrillation (AF). Mater Private Network is among the first centres worldwide to participate in the study, and the first in Europe to use the integrated mapping and pulsed field ablation technology.

The FARADIGM trial combines high-density cardiac mapping with pulsed field ablation, enabling physicians to map the heart’s electrical activity in greater detail before delivering targeted therapy. By integrating mapping and treatment into a single platform, the technology has the potential to support more personalised treatment planning and greater procedural precision for patients with complex cardiac arrhythmias.

Irish involvement in the global trial will be led by Prof. Gábor Széplaki, Head of Cardiac Electrophysiology at Mater Private Network in Dublin, who is a member of the study steering committee.

Atrial fibrillation is the most common sustained cardiac arrhythmia, affecting an estimated 12.9 million people across Europe. Left untreated, it significantly increases the risk of stroke, heart failure and other cardiovascular complications, making continued innovation in treatment an important priority for clinicians and healthcare systems alike.

Commenting on the trial, Prof. Gábor Széplaki said: “Mater Private Network has a long-standing commitment to advancing the treatment of cardiac arrhythmias through clinical research and innovation. Being among the first centres globally to participate in the FARADIGM trial, and the first in Europe to use this technology, reflects our commitment to ensuring patients have access to the latest developments in electrophysiology.

“Atrial fibrillation affects millions of people worldwide and can substantially raise the risk of stroke and heart failure if left untreated. Integrating detailed cardiac mapping with pulsed field ablation will allow us to map the heart’selectrical activity in greater detail, creating the potential to deliver a more precise, targeted, and ultimately more effective treatment to our patients. As a hospital, we pride ourselves in being a leader in cardiovascular medicine and research, and we are proud to contribute to the international evidence base evaluating this promising technology.”

Should the FARADIGM trial demonstrate favourable safety and effectiveness outcomes, the technology could help expand treatment options for patients with both paroxysmal and persistent AF, while supporting more precise and individualised ablation procedures. The study represents an important step in the continued evolution of pulsed field ablation, an emerging technology that has transformed the field of cardiac electrophysiology in recent years.

Mater Private Network’s participation further strengthens its role within an international network of leading centres helping to evaluate next-generation cardiovascular technologies and shape future standards of care for patients with atrial fibrillation.

As Ireland’s leading provider of specialist cardiovascular services, Mater Private Network continues to invest in advanced technologies, multidisciplinary expertise and international clinical research, reinforcing its position as a leader in cardiovascular medicine and research and ensuring patients have early access to the latest evidence-based treatments.

See more stories here.

Logicalis, the leading global technology service provider, has revealed research that suggests an imminent surge in the global AI agent population. It found that 60% of global CIOs confirm their organisations are planning investment in agentic AI over the next year.

The research, published in the Logicalis 2026 CIO Report, reveals that more than half (53%) of global CIOs believe generative and agentic AI will fundamentally disrupt existing business models within the next two years. This signals that organisations are moving beyond using AI simply as an efficiency tool; instead, they see it as a catalyst for major transformation.

However, the research suggests that the practicalities of AI adoption could soon present significant organisational issues. Two-thirds (66%) of global CIOs believe employee training around AI risk management and responsible AI is inadequate. Additionally, only 37% believe their own knowledge enables them to accurately assess the reliability and stability of their AI providers. This has led one-in-seven (14%) to believe that their organisation has not conducted sufficient thorough due diligence on all their AI providers, raising concerns around potential exposure and governance gaps.

With these issues comes the fear that governance simply cannot keep up with the speed of AI adoption. Indeed, two-thirds (66%) of global CIOs are not fully confident that their organisation’s AI governance model can keep pace with the speed of deployment. CIOs in Ireland and the UK are more concerned than their global counterparts, with almost eight in ten (79%) expressing the same opinion.

The Logicalis 2026 CIO Report findings are reinforced by research sponsored by Logicalis and carried out by International Data Corporation (IDC) for its analyst brief Security in an Age of AI: Why Data Governance Makes the Difference. IDC projects that by 2029 more than one billion AI agents will be operational globally, collectively processing more than 217 billion actions per day, underlining the scale and pace of enterprise AI adoption.

As organisations move beyond pilot programmes towards implementation, IDC found that the challenge is increasingly shifting from AI adoption to AI governance. IDC identifies lack of security and governance as the leading concern surrounding enterprise AI globally, cited by 48% of organisations.

Mairead Malone, Ireland Country Lead, Logicalis UK&I said: “Our CIO research shows organisations are entering a new phase of AI adoption, where the conversation has shifted from possibility to practical implementation.

“IDC’s findings also reinforce what we are seeing in the Irish market. As agentic AI becomes embedded across business operations, organisations need to ensure governance evolves alongside deployment. Data governance sits at the centre of secure and scalable AI, extending across identity, permissions, auditability and tool usage. Organisations that establish these foundations will be best positioned to reduce risk while unlocking long-term value from AI investments.”

See more stories here.

More than one in four adults (26%) either lack full details of their workplace pension savings or suspect they’ve lost track of at least one pension pot altogether, according to new nationwide research from Royal London Ireland, one of Ireland’s leading life insurance and pension companies. The issue is particularly pronounced among those aged 35 to 54 – 34% of whom are in this position.

Tips for your pension

• One in ten of the respondents with a workplace pension said they have completely lost track of at least one pension, rising to 15% among 35- 44-year-olds.
• While 22% of men said they either do not have or do not believe they have any workplace pensions, 34% of women said the same.
• Stark socio-economic differences also emerged, with half of all C2DE respondents (50%) saying they either do not have or do not believe they have any workplace pensions, compared with just 13% of ABC1 respondents.

Royal London Ireland’s research also explored what people would do if they discovered a forgotten pension worth between €5,000 and €10,000. More than one-third (34%) said they would consolidate it into their main pension, while 33% said they would cash it out if possible, and a further 21% said they would simply leave it where it is.

According to Mark Reilly, Pensions Proposition Lead at Royal London Ireland,

“There is still a clear lack of awareness and confidence among many people when it comes to their retirement savings. There is still a sizeable group who either do not have full visibility of their pension arrangements or may have lost track of older pension pots entirely.

“The gaps across gender, age and socioeconomic groups are also striking. Women, middle-aged workers and lower-income households appear less confident about their pension position.

“People are changing jobs more frequently than in the past, and as a result, pension savings can easily become spread across multiple schemes over time. Even relatively small pension pots can grow substantially over the long term, which is why it is important that people regularly review their pensions, keep their details up to date and understand the options available to them.”

What to do with a forgotten pension?

When asked what they would do if they discovered a forgotten pension worth between €5,000 and €10,000:

• More than one in ten respondents (11%) said they would not know what to do with the money. Younger adults were significantly more uncertain, with more than one in five 18- to 24-year-olds (22%) saying they wouldn’t know what action to take, compared to just 5% of those over 55.
• Cash-out intentions were highest among younger workers and those closest to retirement: four in ten people aged 25 to 34 (40%) said they would cash out a forgotten pension, followed by 37% of those over 55.
• Income also shaped responses. Higher earners were far more likely to consolidate a forgotten pension into their main retirement savings plan, with 41% of ABC1 respondents choosing this option compared to just 26% of C2DE respondents. Lower income groups were also more likely to say they wouldn’t know what to do with the money (17% v 6% of ABC1 respondents) and more likely to cash it out if possible (39% v 29%).

Mr Reilly commented on the findings,

“These findings suggest that many younger adults still view pensions as something distant or difficult to engage with rather than as an important long-term savings tool. This is particularly concerning given the value of starting pension contributions early in order to maximise the benefits of compound growth and tax relief over time.

“With age and experience, people often become more familiar and confident when it comes to managing their pensions. Just 5% of over-55s said they would not know what to do with a forgotten pension, compared to more than one in five 18-24-year-olds.”

Mr Reilly concluded,

“While auto-enrolment and higher levels of pension participation are positive developments, it is equally important that people understand where their pensions are held, how they work and the long-term value of keeping retirement savings invested.

“Starting pension contributions early and staying engaged with retirement savings can make a significant difference to financial outcomes later in life. It is why we always recommend people get impartial advice from a Financial Broker; they are best placed to make sure people’s pensions are suitable for their circumstances and optimised to achieve their financial goals.”

*Based on total 2022 premium income. ICMIF Global 500, 2024

See more breaking stories here.

With a 28% rise in purchase scams reported to Bank of Ireland in the first half of 2026 compared to the same period last year, the Bank is urging customers to be extra vigilant when buying tickets for popular concerts and festivals.

Electric Picnic coming soon

The warning comes ahead of Electric Picnic, the country’s largest gathering of music and arts from 28 – 30 August. Over 80,000 festival goers will attend the sold-out event.

Fraudsters are likely to target people searching for sold-out tickets and accommodation passes through fake ticket listings on social media, online marketplaces and unofficial resale websites.

Festival goers can protect themselves by using official resale or ticket transfer platforms, avoiding purchases through social media or private messaging apps, and taking time to verify sellers before making a payment.

What to look out for

• Tickets being offered at unusually low prices.
• Sellers looking for a quick sale.
• Pressure to act fast or pay immediately.
• Requests to move the purchase outside of an official ticketing resale platform.
• Sellers who can only provide screenshots as proof of purchase.
• Sellers unwilling to use official ticket transfer or resale facilities.
• Ticket adverts or offers appearing on social media or through unsolicited messages.
• Fraudsters use fake social media profiles, advertise non-existent accommodation passes, or sell the same ticket to multiple buyers.

Nicola Sadlier, Head of Fraud Protection, Bank of Ireland, said: “Electric Picnic is one of the most popular, unique events in the festival calendar. Tickets sell out months in advance, so demand for tickets is high and many fans will be looking for opportunities to secure tickets through resale channels. Fraudsters understand the excitement surrounding major events like this and often target fans who are keen not to miss out.

Whether you are buying tickets for Electric Picnic or any other major summer events, it is important to take your time and make sure you are buying from a trusted source.  If you are looking for tickets, stick to verified resale platforms and be wary of deals that seem too good to be true.

Stop, think and check before making a payment, this can help protect both your money and your festival plans.”

What to do

• Buy only through official ticket sellers or verified resale platforms.
• If you think you’ve been targeted, contact your bank immediately – the bank can try to stop the fraud and potentially recover funds.
• Bank of Ireland customers can call the Fraud Team 24/7, Freephone line 1800 946 764.

Bank of Ireland is the Official Banking Partner at Electric Picnic.  As part of the three-year collaboration, Bank of Ireland customers will have access to in-demand pre-sale tickets for Electric Picnic 2027.

See more breaking stories here.

A major confidence gap is holding Irish employers back from hiring more neurodivergent people and people with disabilities, according to new research commissioned by leading social enterprise NOW Group.

NOW Group is a leading social enterprise operating across the island of Ireland, supporting people with learning difficulties, autism and who are neurodivergent into sustainable employment. Through a range of services and social enterprises, NOW Group works with businesses and individuals to create inclusive workplaces and deliver social value.

Making inclusive hiring better

The group’s latest research offers critical insight into the barriers to inclusive hiring, as Ireland continues to carry the weight of the European Union’s largest disability employment gap. Just 8% of employers surveyed describe themselves as very confident when it comes to hiring and supporting neurodivergent talent and people with disabilities.

The research among Irish employers reveals that while many businesses recognise the opportunity to recruit more inclusively, a significant proportion lack the confidence, knowledge and practical tools to do so. More than half (54%) say they feel only “a little” equipped or “not at all” equipped to hire and support neurodivergent people and people with disabilities.

The findings suggest that uncertainty and fear of getting inclusion wrong are creating significant barriers for employers.

A quarter (25%) cite a fear of being insensitive during recruitment or in the workplace as a barrier to hiring more inclusively, while 26% are unsure how to reach neurodivergent candidates and candidates with disabilities.

Almost 1 in 5 (18%) say they would not know how to accommodate neurodivergent people and people with disabilities in the workplace, while 15% do not know how to accommodate candidates during the recruitment process.

The research also points to a significant opportunity to help employers move from good intentions to action. Almost one in four (25%) say training on workplace inclusivity would make the biggest difference in helping them hire more inclusively, while 24% want guidance on how to reach neurodivergent talent and people with disabilities.

Maeve Monaghan, CEO of NOW Group, said:

“The biggest message from this research is that employers don’t necessarily lack the willingness to become more inclusive – many lack the confidence and practical knowledge to know where to begin. Our message to Irish employers is simple: you don’t need to have all the answers before you start. The expertise and support is available, and organisations like NOW Group can be your partner throughout that journey.

“We work on both sides of that equation – supporting neurodivergent people and people with disabilities to prepare for and progress into sustainable employment, while working directly with employers to give them the confidence, knowledge and practical support to recruit inclusively.”

NOW Group aims to support 300 people with disabilities into paid employment over the next three years through employer-led training programmes and partnerships with businesses committed to inclusive hiring.

The research comes as employers continue to navigate recruitment challenges, with 38% of organisations surveyed reporting difficulties recruiting over the past 12 months. NOW Group says the findings demonstrate the need for specialist employer partnerships that go beyond awareness and help organisations make tangible changes to how they recruit, onboard and support employees.

The organisation recently celebrated its largest-ever Dublin graduation ceremony, with more than 120 people with learning difficulties and who are neurodivergent graduating from its employment and skills programmes – more than five times the 22 graduates recorded in 2025.

NOW Group already works with major employers and organisations across Ireland, with partners including An Post, Deloitte Ireland, Levy Ireland, Flutter and Circle K.

Research

Research conducted by iReach and commissioned by NOW Group and surveyed 150 employers in Ireland in July 2026.

Key findings include:

38% of employers describe themselves as confident or very confident hiring and supporting neurodivergent talent and people with disabilities.
46% are neither confident nor unconfident, while 17% are unconfident or very unconfident.
54% feel only a little equipped (27%) or not at all equipped (27%) to hire and support neurodivergent talent and people with disabilities.
25% cite fear of being insensitive during recruitment or in the workplace as a barrier to more inclusive hiring.
26% are unsure how to reach neurodivergent talent and talent with disabilities through recruitment.
18% would not know how to accommodate neurodivergent people and people with disabilities in the workplace.
15% do not know how to accommodate candidates during recruitment.
25% say training for inclusivity in the workplace would make the biggest difference in helping them hire more inclusively.
24% want guidance on how to reach neurodivergent talent and people with disabilities.
18%identify training for inclusive recruitment as the support that would make the biggest difference.
38% of employers experienced recruitment difficulties during the past 12 months.
34% expect inclusive hiring to increase significantly or somewhat over the next 12 months.

About NOW Group

NOW Group is a leading social enterprise operating across the island of Ireland, supporting people with learning difficulties, autism and who are neurodivergent into sustainable employment. Through a range of services and social enterprises, NOW Group works with individuals and businesses to create inclusive workplaces and deliver social value.

See more breaking stories here.

This is Part 2 of my article on 5 August “If Your Audience Can’t Remember It, They Can’t Retell It“

Where do good stories come from? 

John Creedon, on his programme ‘Musical Atlas of Ireland’, suggested that folk music is having a moment. New bands such as Amble and Kingfishr, along with a myriad of other groups, are now making a name for themselves on the Irish and international scene. I’m sure you can think of your own personal favourite singers and bands.

The best folk songs are the ones we want to sing along to, and that tell a story that touches us emotionally, and possibly how we think about something.

A good story song can be humorous, topical or both.

Some personal examples:

Ralph McTell’s song “The Streets of London” was written in the sixties but is unfortunately as relevant today as it was way back then. Good stories last!

“Jennifer’s Rabbit” by Tom Paxton. Every time I hear this song, I am reminded of great nights reading my daughter Jennifer bedtime stories. If you have a Jennifer in your life, listen to this song.

“England 2 Colombia 0” by Kirsty McColl

Recently rediscovered by me, Kirsty uses humour to deliver a hard-hitting message about infidelity, with a fun chorus. Memorable and repeatable.

You will have your own personal songs or poems that you go to in times of difficulty or when seeking inspiration.

Alternatively, ask yourself: what informs you on the radio, podcasts, TV, or in books?  That you would be interested in telling others.

Telling your story as a metaphor or analogy is an excellent way for people to grasp, understand and remember your message, particularly if yours is a technical topic.

How do I become a good storyteller? 

Storytellers are people others want to engage with, so they can be informed and, ideally, entertained.

Think about your own circle of friends and work colleagues; who are the ones you wish to be in the company of?

In Ireland in the past, it was a seanchaí who moved from house to house telling stories, sometimes sung, mostly spoken. This was in a time when storytellers were in demand as the only form of entertainment poor people had.

A good storyteller must first enjoy telling their story.  

If they want to hold an audience’s attention while informing and entertaining them in equal measure, the story should be full of colour and detail, with elements of fun and pathos.

Before people buy the product, idea or proposal, they have to buy into the person telling the story.

Note: there is no greater satisfaction than holding an audience in the palm of your hand.

Why emotion matters more than information.

Sir Ken Robinson’s TED Talk is still the most-viewed TED Talk globally, with over 80 million views. In his talk, he tells many short stories that are memorable and mostly funny. So, listeners remember the story and, in many cases, can retell it to others.

People remembered his stories and therefore remembered his message.

Aesop’s fables have travelled the world by word of mouth, and over 70 countries worldwide have a version of this wise old proverb.

“A bird in the hand is worth two in the bush.”

A story in a sentence!

Currently, the movie “The Odyssey“, directed by Christopher Nolan, is being shown around the world. Another story that started out as a tall tale, told around campfires a long, long time ago.

If you want to be remembered, tell stories. Stories are a window to your soul, and people want you to reveal something of yourself when you engage with them.

How will I remember stories? 

I am constantly on the lookout for stories that engage me. If they engage me, they will engage others. Next, I repeat my interesting stories to other people I have interacted with and gauge their reaction.

If it’s good, I capture the incident/story on paper or dictate it into my phone in the hope that it will provide content for a future article or conversation/presentation

How to practice: 

Next on the agenda of becoming a good public speaker is polishing your stories.

What I mean is telling your stories to anyone who will listen; every time you do, they become more refined with each telling.

When preparing, practise the talk by talking out loud. While walking or driving, you’ll hear your conversation out loud and know whether the flow works.

(People will not think you are mad; they will just assume you are speaking to someone on the phone)

NEVER, NEVER stand in front of an audience and be like them, hearing your talk out loud for the first time!

Should I practice in front of a mirror?

No, no, never. All you will see is what you believe you are doing wrong.

Also, be very careful about who you choose to seek advice from, as the only advice you usually get is what’s wrong with your talk.

What do good speakers do?

The best speakers tell stories that engage and entertain. Each story should end with a punchline, an important message and often a call to action

If you want to be remembered, tell stories: 

Stories are a window to your soul, and people want you to reveal something of yourself when you engage with them.

Facts inform.
Stories travel.
Stories persuade.
Stories are remembered.

If you want your ideas to live far beyond the moment you deliver them, learn to tell stories.

YOUR story is a success when someone else retells it.

By Executive Coach Andrew Keogh of Aristo.ie

Esri Ireland, the market leader in Geographic Information Systems (GIS), has announced a new partnership with DataBuilders to help organisations connect data held across enterprise systems, and use it to make faster and more informed decisions. The partnership combines Esri Ireland’s geospatial technology and GIS services with DataBuilders’ expertise in making enterprisedata reliable, connected and ready to use.

Public and private sector organisations across Government, Infrastructure and Commercial markets, are increasingly running programmes that combine GIS, enterprise systems, cloud migration and AI, drawing on data held across multiple systems and formats. Where this data isn’t properly connected or governed, delivery slows and organisations get less value from their technology investment.

DataBuilders is a Dublin-based data intelligence and consulting firm. Under the new partnership, DataBuilders’ Safe-Software-certified FME specialists will work with Esri Ireland’s project teams to connect data and automate how it moves across systems, reducing duplication and lowering delivery risk for customers.

This partnership significantly strengthens both DataBuilders and Esri Ireland’s ability to deliver end-to-end data transformation, migration, automation and governance services. By combining Esri Ireland’s expertise with DataBuilders’ specialist FME capabilities, customers will benefit from improved data quality, simplified integration and migration, and delivery of complex programmes with greater confidence and lower risk. Once data is connected and governed within ArcGIS, Esri’s location intelligence platform, organisations can use geospatial analytics more effectively and build the trusted data foundations needed for AI and other complex digital transformation programmes.

Paul Synnott, Managing Director of Esri Ireland, commented: “This partnership reflects the growing importance of trusted, connected data across the enterprise. Together, Esri Ireland and DataBuilders will provide customers with a stronger, more scalable capability for data transformation, migration, automation and governance, helping them remove silos and maximise the value of their technology investments.”

Aoibhinn Stuart, CEO of DataBuilders, added: “Most organisations don’t have a technology problem; they have a data problem hiding underneath it. Data is one of the most valuable assets any organisation holds, and its value depends on how trusted, connected and AI-ready it is. At DataBuilders, we shed light on your data, no matter its location or format, so it’s visible and actionable. By partnering with Esri Ireland, we’re bringing that capability directly to the GIS and data professionals who rely on ArcGIS every day, giving them higher-quality data, deeper analysis and the confidence to act on it.”

See more stories here.

Picture 1 and Picture 3 – L-R Melanie Horkan (HR Manager, IMR), Maurice O’Connell (COO, IMR), Gina Horan (CFO, IMR) and Barry Kennedy (CEO, IMR)

New IMR report records engagement with 679 industry organisations across all 26 counties and warns that digital readiness will determine how quickly manufacturers turn AI and automation into commercial value.

Commercialising automation

Irish manufacturers are moving from testing advanced technologies towards implementing them in their operations, but the strength of their digital foundations will determine how quickly AI and automation deliver value on the factory floor, according to a new report from Irish Manufacturing Research.

IMR’s 2025 End of Year Report records engagement with 679 industry organisations through 704 engagements across all 26 counties. Outcomes captured through 31 client impact statements project almost €18 million in economic value, comprising €13 million in additional revenue and €5 million in cost savings. The same statements identified 32 jobs created or safeguarded and projected reductions of 197t COe.

“The debate about whether AI and automation matter is over. Manufacturers can see the opportunity,” said Barry Kennedy, CEO of Irish Manufacturing Research.

“The question now is whether they have the digital infrastructure, skills and implementation capability to turn that opportunity into real commercial value. Technology alone will not transform a factory. The data, systems and people around it must also be ready.”

The findings point to a wider shift within Irish manufacturing, as businesses focus increasingly on moving technologies beyond isolated trials and into real operational environments.

This transition is also increasing demand for new skills. During 2025, IMR delivered 811 training days, with 363 participants from 107 companies developing capabilities needed within a rapidly changing manufacturing environment.

Kennedy said the next phase of industrial competitiveness would be shaped by how effectively manufacturers translate investment into implementation.

“Ireland has a real opportunity to lead in advanced manufacturing, but speed alone is not enough. Companies need the right foundations and the right support to make technology work within their operations.

“The manufacturers that get this right will be better positioned to improve productivity, build resilience and compete successfully in increasingly complex global markets.”

The IMR 2025 End of Year Report outlines the organisation’s work with industry across digitalisation, automation, sustainability, skills development and advanced manufacturing innovation.

Read the full report at: https://pages.imr.ie/2025-end-of-year-report-download

The projected impact figures are based on 31 client impact statements and include €13 million in projected income growth, €5 million in projected cost savings, 32 jobs created or safeguarded and 197 tCOe in projected emissions reductions.

IMR engaged with 679 industry organisations through 704 engagements across all 26 counties during 2025.

See more breaking stories here.

By David Stephen

Artificial intelligence still hallucinates a lot. Even chatbots that are said to lead most benchmarks mislead consumers, sometimes at stages where there is reluctance or haste to extra-verify information. There has been progress, using fine-tuning, against hallucinations, but what Google should be asking is this, seeing how hallucinations persist, how can Tensor Processing Units [TPUs] be the answer, so that it becomes embedded into new and existing AI training compute, anywhere on earth?

AI with Gemini?

Simply, if AI remains unreliable because of its mistakes, how can Google explore TPUs as answers that would seal permanence for Google, wherever AI is run and trained? To completely rival Nvidia, Google should look at the conceptual mechanism of human memory, to pursue a new memory architecture for TPUs. This means that even if artificial general intelligence [AGI] is not achieved yet, it can at least solve AI hallucinations, becoming the oxygen of accurate AI.

Human intelligence is completely reliant on human memory. Human intelligence is defined here as the use of human memory for expected, advantageous or desired outcomes. This means that memory is at destinations, the relays across relevant aspects of those destinations for outcomes is called intelligence.

Now, why do humans have better intelligence than other organisms, given that studies have shown similarities – with many – in navigating habitats? What makes it possible that human memory can bear complex languages, not those of other organisms?

To solve hallucinations, pursue theoretical mechanisms of how human memory works. The same applies to solving artificial general intelligence. When human memory breaks, it does so in [or with] recollection, maybe by forgetting or by misrepresentation. It is the architecture of memory that makes both possible.

This means that while it is necessary to remember people, things, events and so forth, human memory prioritizes for intelligence [needs or outcomes] in the instance. So, even with forgetting or misrepresentation, it does, with the pathway that it is supposed to be used for intelligence, not recollection. Hallucinations [or say confabulations] are therefore more common for humans with a mental disorder than not.

This indicates that human memory is a pointer to solving AI hallucinations – if a parallel digital memory can be built for training data. How so? By an extra layer of memory collection, with [next generation] TPUs, such that instead of having new training, existing training data can pass through the collection architecture of new iterations of TPUs, then have data heaved again into collections, to have hallucinations solved, while plowing on to AGI.

Simply, human memory does not store exact details of everything in the external world. Door is a collection for everything text, audio, image, video or motion about door, the same applies to table and so forth. So, having collections by the brain makes it easier for the transportation of intelligence to have fewer roads to travel for on-demand usefulness.

Assuming human memory stored every single thing separately, the mix up would be unbearable, since intelligence would have to find a blue door, or a red door or the audio of a door and so forth, to make instantaneous interpretations.

It is this mechanism that Google can pursue as research, for initial results within 4 months, including for AI safety.

Since the mechanism is set, the math framework, hardware design, algorithms and experiments can be accelerated fast. The mechanism is available from the postulate in Conceptual Biomarkers and Theoretical Biological Factors for Psychiatric and Intelligence Nosology.

This should be central mission for Sergey Brin, Koray Kavukcuoglu and the rest of the Gemini team, towards the future of AI overviews. How Google would not have another missed opportunity, after ChatGPT, especially in an area Google already has a head start.

Also, as Pixel 11 Pro Fold takes off, Google can seek writing, with a path towards an AI pen that can sell up to two billion units before August 31, 2028.

AI that can augment human abilities is the campaign of human-centered artificial intelligence [HCAI]. What if there is an AI pen that can reverse handedness or laterality for humanity, removing the dominance and precision of one hand, through enabling the other with an autonomous pen?

Google can get there before others. Even as Gemini 3.5 Pro is speculated to be expected before January, 2027.

The directions that hold commercial and technical dominance for Google are adjacent to TPUs and Pixel 11 Pro Fold.

There is a recent [August, 2026] blog by Google, Google’s most sophisticated foldable: Pixel 11 Pro Fold, stating that, “Introducing Pixel 11 Pro Fold, our latest foldable with a thinner and lighter design, brand-new main camera, added durability inside and out, and enhanced intelligence tools.”

“Pixel 11 Pro Fold is here, and it’s our most sophisticated foldable yet. With a fresh and durable design, stunning (and helpful) new camera visor with HiLight, and unique features that help you throughout your day, this phone is next-level.”

“Pixel 11 Pro Fold is almost 10% lighter and about 1mm thinner than Pixel 10 Pro Fold, so it’s more comfortable to hold in your hand and in your pocket. 1 With even thinner bezels than before for a sleek look, the new Pro Fold comes in our classic Obsidian and brand-new Olive for a pop of color.”

David Stephen does research in conceptual brain science and served as a visiting scholar in medical entomology at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. He did computer vision research at Rovira i Virgili University in Tarragona.

See more breaking stories here.

Tata Consultancy Services (TCS), a global leader in IT services, consulting, and business solutions, and Rolls-Royce, a British multinational specialising in civil aerospace, defence aerospace, services and power systems, have achieved a major milestone in the hydrogen propulsion programme. First announced by Rolls-Royce and easyJet in 2022, TCS joined the programme in 2024, bringing its engineering and technology capabilities in the areas of development, testing and validation.

Together, TCS and Rolls-Royce have, in an industry first, demonstrated the successful operation of a modern aero gas turbine across a fully simulated flight cycle using 100% hydrogen.

The test is the culmination of a four-year programme to prove hydrogen’s potential as a future aviation fuel. Operated using 100% hydrogen, the modified engine successfully completed a flight cycle demonstration, including take-off, cruise and landing.

The tests validated critical hydrogen propulsion technologies across combustion, fuel systems, and engine controls. As Rolls-Royce’s engineering partner, TCS provided engineering expertise that helped fast-track the development, testing and successful delivery of the hydrogen propulsion programme. TCS supported Rolls-Royce on critical areas including fuel system and engine controls integration, hydrogen combustion analysis, test preparation, validation, data analytics, risk management, and detailed design.

Adam Newman, Chief Engineer, Hydrogen Demonstrator Programme, Rolls-Royce, said:

“The programme marks an important milestone in our journey towards more sustainable aviation. Through a rigorous and carefully staged testing approach, we have gained valuable insights into how 100% hydrogen behaves in a modern aero gas turbine across a full flight cycle while validating critical combustion, fuel and control system technologies. TCS has been a trusted partner throughout this programme. The learnings from this initiative will support future propulsion innovations, including UltraFan®, and strengthen our confidence that gas turbine technology can continue to play an important role in the future of sustainable flight.”

Anupam Singhal, President – Manufacturing, Tata Consultancy Services, said:

“This milestone reflects what becomes possible when advanced engineering is combined with digital capabilities and deep ecosystem collaboration to move breakthrough innovation closer to the real world. At TCS, we are proud to support Rolls-Royce in accelerating hydrogen propulsion through integrated engineering, systems, and software expertise. This achievement marks a significant step forward—demonstrating not just the viability of hydrogen, but the industry’s readiness to translate ambition into execution.”

The partnership with Rolls-Royce underscores TCS’ commitment to driving sustainable transformation across industries, aligning with its broader mission to harness technology for positive societal impact. Aviation currently accounts for approximately 2–3% of global CO? emissions, and hydrogen-powered propulsion technologies have the potential to eliminate in-flight CO? emissions when deployed at scale. The success of this demonstration marks a significant step towards enabling lower-carbon aviation.

The demonstration brought together expertise from across the aviation ecosystem, with Rolls-Royce and TCS working alongside easyJet, NASA, the UK Health and Safety Executive (HSE), and other industry partners to bring hydrogen-powered flight a step closer to reality.

The programme provides one of the clearest demonstrations to date of how hydrogen could power future aircraft engines. The knowledge gained from this programme will be the bedrock that will help inform future propulsion technologies and support the aviation industry’s transition towards low-carbon air travel. Building on this milestone, TCS will continue working with Rolls-Royce to advance hydrogen-powered aviation technologies.

A new partnership between Payzone and Miconex is bringing Town & City Gift Cards to over 3,000 Payzone locations in Ireland.

From today, people will be able to buy Town & City Gift Cards locally at selected Payzone payment terminals located in convenience stores, newsagents and supermarkets across the country, including prominent retail chains.

Digital Town & City Gift Cards locally branded for Irish towns including Ballinrobe, Carndonagh, Drogheda, Donegal Town, Dungarvan & West Waterford, Kilkenny, Limerick, Letterkenny, Monaghan, Mullingar, Macroom, Sligo, Tipperary, Waterford and Wexford will be available for purchase in values from €10-€250. More Town & City Gift Cards programs are set to launch in 2026.

3,000 Payzone stores will offer Town & City Gift Cards. Once purchased, recipients add their digital Town & City Gift Card to their digital wallet using Miconex’s Love Local app. A full list of Payzone locations offering Town & City Gift Cards is available online.

Delivered by fintech Miconex, Town & City Gift Cards are Mastercard backed and can be spent with registered shops, restaurants, salons, attractions and hotels. Town & City Gift Cards amplify the local offering to encourage local support, locking spend into Irish communities.

Over €17.4 million of Town & City Gift Cards were sold in Ireland in 2025. The cards tap into increasing ‘shop local’ sentiment, giving people and organisations a local option for gifts, rewards and incentives.

The Payzone and Miconex partnership is estimated to drive an additional €1 million of spend in Irish communities over 3 years.

Olivia Noonan, head of financial services, Payzone Ireland said: “At Payzone, we’re committed to supporting communities across the country and the independent businesses that are at the heart of them. Making Town & City Gift Cards available through our retail network gives consumers another easy, convenient way to ‘support local’.

“With more than 3,000 retail partners across Ireland, we’re proud to help make these gift cards more accessible and, in doing so, contribute to keeping more spending within local economies.”

Colin Munro, CEO of Miconex, said: “Shop local sentiment in Ireland is extremely strong. People actively want to support the local businesses in the towns and cities where they live and work, and Town & City Gift Cards make it easy and enjoyable to do just that. What makes Town & City Gift Cards unique is the unbeatable local choice, big brands and independent businesses in one card, paired with the unrivalled support for local. Our partnership with Payzone is putting Town & City Gift Cards where people want to buy them, while they’re buying petrol or picking up essentials, enhancing the ease and accessibility of supporting local.”

Trevor Connolly, CEO of Love Drogheda BID added: “The Love Drogheda Gift Card has been a part of the Town & City Gift Cards initiative since 2020. It’s the number one choice for gifts, rewards and incentives in the area with almost €1 milllion locked into Drogheda through the gift card to date. The partnership between Town & City Gift Cards and Payzone is powerful because it gives the ability to buy Town & City Gift Cards, including the Love Drogheda Gift Card, at Payzone locations across Ireland. Shopping local transforms communities, and this partnership is key to making that happen.”

See more stories here.

Expleo, the global technology and consulting service provider, has announced the July results of its AI Pulse sentiment tracker for Ireland. The data shows that June’s dip in AI confidence continued into July. Business leaders in Ireland are now the most pessimistic among their European peers across every sentiment measured in the AI Pulse.

Expleo’s monthly AI Pulse barometer is carried out by Opinium among 800 business leaders in Ireland, the UK, Germany and France. Last month’s results found that 54% of business leaders in Ireland are worried about how AI is transformingtheir businesses, compared to an average of 41% elsewhere in Europe. Additionally, 50% in Ireland are worried about the impact that AI will have on their job, versus 39% in other locations.

Expleo’s research also shows that business leaders in Ireland are the least likely across the countries surveyed to be excited by AI (60% in Ireland Vs 67%); the least likely to trust their organisation to use AI ethically (62% in Ireland Vs 73%); and the least likely to see AI primarily as a benefit to their business (54% in Ireland Vs 63%).

Three in five (60%) business leaders in Ireland would trust AI to act autonomously to summarise emails, documents and meeting notes, compared to a 71% average elsewhere in Europe. Meanwhile, 27% in Ireland would trust AI to make hiring or HR-related decisions, versus 42% in Europe.

Phil Codd, Managing Director – Ireland, Expleo, said: “Irish organisations may have one of the highest AI adoption rates in the world, but business leaders are wary of its impact. Recent news about rogue AI agents have shown the importance of human oversight, and so, to a certain extent, all business leaders should be cautious. But at what point does healthy vigilance become inertia? If business leaders are worrying about AI summarising a document, are they ready for agentic AI?

“Embedding strong governance, risk and compliance frameworks will be key in ensuring the successful, safe adoption of AI. With new transparency rules now in effect from the EU AI Act, organisations will be subject to stricter regulations regarding the use of AI. Business leaders must use their organisation’s compliance with the Act, and accompany guardrails, to explore AI more before being permanently left behind.”

See more stories here.

The EU AI compliance deadline arrived on August 2nd and it’s important that companies have been preparing for it. According to AI expert Cathal McCarthy of Kore.ai, companies that establish robust AI governance frameworks today will be better positioned to deploy AI faster in a highly regulated industry. To help leaders assess their preparedness, Cathal has developed a six-question diagnostic that evaluates the maturity of an organisation’s AI governance program. The framework is designed to quickly identify whether key governance structures, accountability mechanisms, and oversight processes are in place, or where gaps still remain.

I caught up with Cathal to find out more about the EU AI compliance and how businesses should prepare for it. Cathal talks about his background, AI compliance, AI adaptability, the ability to learn, AI transparency and more.

More about Cathal McCarthy:

Cathal is Chief Strategy Officer at Kore.ai, an enterprise AI and agentic AI platform serving Fortune 500 and PE-backed customers globally. He has twenty-five years scaling enterprise technology businesses and has held leadership roles at Apple during its growth from $8B to over $200B in revenue, and at eBay leading initiatives across 163 million users. He also brings P&L instinct, GTM design experience, and credibility in the boardroom on AI transformation.

See more podcasts here.

Applications are now open for the 2027 Stripe Young Scientist & Technology Exhibition. Secondary school students from every county across Ireland are invited to turn their curiosity and ideas into reality and showcase them at the RDS in Dublin from 6-9 January 2027.

Whether inspired by artificial intelligence, the physics of the world around them, advances in medicine, or what data reveals about human behaviour, students are encouraged to bring forward their most innovative ideas that could help shape the future of Ireland.

The total prize fund will increase by 25% for 2027, with more than 200 prizes to be awarded. The overall winners will receive the Stripe Young Scientist(s) & Technologist(s) of the Year Award and a top prize of €10,000. They will also go on to represent Ireland at the European Union Contest for Young Scientists (EUCYS).

Stripe is expanding its YSTE Travel Bursary to support every school exhibiting at the RDS, increasing total funding by 25% to €150,000. By helping fund transport and accommodation for students and teachers traveling to Dublin for the four-day event, the bursary ensures more schools across Ireland can participate.

Stripe is also introducing Stripe YSTE Catalyst, a programme for the students behind the exhibition’s top four awarded projects. Catalyst participants will be paired with mentors from academia, industry and Stripe’s own engineering and science teams, travel to San Francisco to visit some of the world’s leading technology companies, and present their projects at Stripe Sessions, Stripe’s flagship annual conference.

Teachers and parents can find guidance on scoping and submitting a project on the Stripe YSTE website or in the Stripe YSTE handbook, which is issued to schools each August. The deadline for entries is 25 September 2026.

The inaugural Stripe YSTE in January 2026 drew 3,670 entries, with 550 projects featuring over 1,000 students selected to exhibit.

Eileen O’Mara, Vice Chair at Stripe, said:

“Many of the world’s most impactful ideas started as simple school experiments. The Stripe Young Scientist & Technology Exhibition gives young people the platform to explore big questions, build something new, and share it with the world.

“This year, we’re investing more than ever: alongside increased prizes and travel support, our new ‘Stripe YSTE Catalyst’ programme will connect exceptional students with the mentors who can help them imagine what’s possible next. We encourage every student in Ireland to apply, follow their curiosity, and take on the problems they think matter most.”

Hildegarde Naughton, Minister for Education and Youth said:

“The Stripe Young Scientist & Technology Exhibition is a wonderful celebration of the creativity, curiosity and talent of young people across Ireland. Each year, students demonstrate remarkable originality as they explore issues ranging from challenges in their local communities to some of the biggest global questions we face.

“I am delighted to continue my Department’s strong partnership with the exhibition. It provides students with an invaluable opportunity to develop skills in research, critical thinking, problem solving and communication, while building confidence and sharing their ideas.

“I wish all students every success and look forward to seeing the talent, innovation and enthusiasm on display at the 2027 exhibition.”

Dr Tony Scott, Co-Founder of the Stripe Young Scientist & Technology Exhibition, said:

“For more than sixty years, the Stripe Young Scientist & Technology Exhibition has demonstrated what can happen when young people are encouraged to explore the questions that matter to them. Each year, students bring forward work of remarkable creativity and rigour, testing ideas, gathering evidence and applying method to problems that matter.

“The introduction of Stripe YSTE Catalyst is a very welcome development, extending that journey beyond the exhibition and giving students the opportunity to deepen their research, learn from experts and discover what serious scientific thinking can achieve.”

The 2027 Stripe Young Scientist & Technology Exhibition will award prizes across five categories:

• Biological and Ecological Science
• Chemical, Physical and Mathematical Science
• Health and Wellbeing
• Social and Behavioural Science
• Technology

To enter, students must complete an online application and submit a one-page project proposal by 25 September 2026. Finalists will be announced on 23 October 2026, with selected projects showcased at the RDS from 6-9 January 2027.

For more information on Stripe YSTE and how to apply, visit https://stripeyste.com/how-to-enter

See more stories here.

Most conference organizers, when facing a crowded market, raise their prices and restrict their guest lists. The team behind CONF3RENCE is doing the opposite.

Germany’s largest emerging tech meets traditional economy event returns for its third edition on 15–16 September 2026 at Kokerei Hansa in Dortmund, and this year it costs nothing to attend. Free across both days. The move is not a gimmick; it sits inside the Festival of Arts, Tech and Taste (FATT) in North Rhine-Westphalia, a broader cultural and industry event designed to bring the region’s public, institutional, and startup ecosystems into the same physical space at the same time.

CONF3RENCE 15–16 September, Dortmund

The previous two editions of CONF3RENCE drew over 4,000 attendees from more than 70 countries. Opening admission removes the last practical barrier between that audience and a significantly larger one.

What the Programme Covers

The event is not trying to be everything. It runs a focused agenda across four core topic areas: AI and enterprise adoption, tokenisation and real-world assets, stablecoins and digital payments, and institutional finance and blockchain infrastructure. These are not aspirational themes. They are the areas where traditional economy decision-makers are actually spending time and budget in 2026, and CONF3RENCE has positioned itself as the event where that conversation happens in Germany specifically.

The format spans a main stage, a dedicated DeepTech stage, masterclasses, an exhibition floor, and networking across the full festival campus. The combination of conference infrastructure and festival setting is deliberate: the Kokerei Hansa site in Dortmund is an industrial heritage venue that does not feel like a hotel ballroom, and the FATT context means the surrounding programme includes considerably more than panel discussions.

Why Dortmund and Why Now

North Rhine-Westphalia is worth understanding as a location choice. It holds the highest university density in Europe. Dortmund sits within 90 minutes of millions of people across one of the continent’s strongest industrial and research regions. The companies that built German manufacturing are based here. So are the research institutions now building what comes next.

CONF3RENCE is organised by the team behind Solv3, a digital asset advisory and tokenisation firm. That background matters because the event’s institutional credibility comes from the same networks. Banks, asset managers, enterprise technology companies, and infrastructure builders are not an aspirational attendee category here; they are the returning audience.

Moving to free admission for 2026 takes a gathering that was already connecting those worlds and removes the one friction point that kept the broader public and earlier-stage founders at a distance.

Registration

Registration is free and open now at conf3rence.com.

This coverage is part of an official media partnership between CONF3RENCE 2026, Irish Tech News, and Belkin Marketing, recognised as International Media Partners for the September 2026 edition. The partnership was brokered by Iaroslav Belkin, founder of Belkin Marketing, a boutique intelligence firm executing strategic media partnerships, international expansion, and executive positioning via VVIP events including Davos WEF.

See  more breaking stories here.

Irish workers may be losing more than time to the daily commute, with new research suggesting the strain of the working day can continue long after they arrive home.

The findings come as a new report highlights Dublin’s worsening congestion, with drivers estimated to have lost an average of 95 hours to traffic in 2025.

Now, a national survey commissioned by Nurosym has revealed the less visible time workers lose afterwards: the period spent trying to stop thinking about work, recover from the journey and feel fully relaxed at home.

Working stress

The survey found:

More than two-thirds (68%) arrive home drained at least weekly

More than half (56%) take an hour or longer to relax

More than four in five (82%) check work messages after hours

Dr Elisabetta Burchi, Head of Research at Nurosym, describes this period between arriving home and genuinely feeling relaxed as a “hidden stress window”.

“Commuting is usually quantified as time lost, but from a physiological standpoint, it is better understood as one contributor to a sustained allostatic load.

“Urban environments impose near-continuous demand on the autonomic nervous system; noise, crowding, artificial light, and the vigilance required by unpredictable conditions all recruit sympathetic activity.

“When a congested journey follows a cognitively demanding day, these inputs summate rather than resolve. The result is that sympathetic tone can remain elevated after arrival home, with the parasympathetic recovery that would normally follow a stressor delayed or incomplete.”

Dublin workers are Ireland’s most likely to arrive home drained

The problem appears particularly pronounced in Dublin, where nearly three-quarters (73%) of workers arrive home feeling stressed or mentally drained at least once a week.

This was followed by the South-West at 71%, the Border and Midland regions at 68%, and the West at 67%.

Workers in Dublin were also among the most digitally connected after hours. Nearly nine in ten (87%) check work emails or messages outside their normal working hours, including four in ten (41%) who do so every day.

One in five (20%) Dublin respondents said their commute makes it more difficult to unwind, compared with one in six (16%) nationally. Similar results were recorded in the Mid-East, at 21%, and the South-East, at 20%.

The findings come against Ireland’s continued reliance on car travel. The latest Census commuting figures show nearly two-thirds (63%) of people travel to work by car, while the average journey takes 29 minutes.

Why getting home does not mean the body has switched off

A busy journey home requires ongoing concentration. Drivers must watch other road users, respond to delays and make rapid decisions when conditions change.

“In a well-regulated system, a stressor elicits a transient sympathetic response, after which parasympathetic activity,  largely vagally mediated, restores a lower-arousal baseline.

“Autonomic flexibility of this kind is measurable, for instance, through heart rate variability. The difficulty in contemporary daily life is that discrete stressors are increasingly continuous: a demanding day, a congested commute, after-hours notifications and evening screen exposure arrive in sequence with no intervening recovery.

“Under these conditions, sympathetic activation is sustained, and the expected parasympathetic rebound is attenuated.”

Almost a third (32%) of workers surveyed said thoughts about work make it harder to unwind, while more than a third (35%) pointed to excessive screen time.

Arriving home also marks the beginning of another period of activity for many. Almost one in five (17%) immediately begin household chores, and almost one in five (19%) reach for their phone. One in six (16%) first sit quietly or take time to relax.

Women take longer to unwind, while men remain more connected to work

The research reveals different pressures affecting men and women at the end of the working day.

Three in five (60%) working women take at least an hour to feel fully relaxed, compared with more than half (53%) of men.

Women are also almost three times as likely to begin household chores as soon as they arrive home, at 26% compared with 9% of men.

Men, however, are more likely to remain connected to their jobs. 85% check work messages outside their normal hours, compared with 78% of women, with two in five (40%) men doing so every day.

“These demands differ in nature and should not be treated as equivalent and meaning matters physiologically, since a task experienced as purposeful provokes a different autonomic response from one experienced as depleting.

“Where a demand does elicit a genuine stress response, what determines recovery is less the stressor itself than whether an adequate interval follows it, in which vagal tone can rise and arousal return towards baseline. When successive stressors leave no such interval, that recovery is curtailed, whatever the source.”

Creating a consistent transition between work and home can help signal to the body that the demands of the day have ended. Dr Burchi recommends five simple ways to support the nervous system’s shift into recovery:

Create a clear end to the working day

“Where you can, deal with final messages before the journey home, then switch off work notifications for the evening. After-hours checking keeps attention oriented to the next task and delays the point at which arousal can begin to subside.”

Build in a short buffer

“Try not to move straight from the commute into other commitments. Even five or ten quiet minutes creates the recovery interval that allows autonomic activity to settle before the next demand begins.”

Slow down your breathing

“Slow and controlled breathing, particularly with a longer exhale, can help the body move away from a heightened state of alert. Wait until you are safely home rather than trying breathing exercises while driving.”

Use movement to release the day

“A short walk or gentle stretching can create a physical transition out of work mode. This may be particularly helpful for people who have spent much of their day sitting at a desk or in a car.”

Support the vagus nerve

“The vagus nerve is a key effector of the ‘rest and recover’ state. Controlled breathing, gentle movement, and time away from digital stimulation can all support this transition.

“Non-invasive vagus nerve stimulation may also help support autonomic nervous system regulation. Nurosym stimulates the auricular branch of the vagus nerve through the ear and is designed to be easily used on demand during periods of rest.”

Dr Burchi added, “The answer is not to create another demanding routine. It is to give the nervous system a clear and consistent signal that the pressures of the working day have ended.”

The research was conducted on behalf of Nurosym on 8th July of 1,000 adults in Ireland.

Full survey results can be found here.

Sources:

Dublin drivers losing an average of 95 hours to congestion in 2025: INRIX 2025 Dublin Traffic Scorecard

Nearly two-thirds (63%) commuting by car and an average journey time of 29.1 minutes: Central Statistics Office – Census 2022 commuting data

See more breaking stories here.

The race is on to meet the EU’s Digital Services Act (DSA) regulation, as a number of platforms near the threshold for being classified as Very Large Online Platforms (VLOPs). Upon designation by the European Commission (EC), organisations have only four months to navigate an expanded set of regulatory obligations.

The challenge lies not just in achieving compliance but maintaining it amidst real-time regulatory scrutiny and a continuously evolving regulatory landscape.

KPMG Digital Regulation specialists Patrick Farrell and Hermes Peraza outline the risks of delay, what “minimum viable” compliance looks like, the top six areas for emerging VLOPs to get right.

Why waiting is risky

For platforms approaching VLOP thresholds, the biggest risk is waiting too long to act. Once designated as a VLOP, firms have only four months to comply with a significantly expanded set of obligations, including the need to:

• Perform Annual Systemic Risk Assessments
• Evidence Control Effectiveness
• Implement Risk Mitigation Measures
• Establish an Independent Compliance Function
• Arrange Annual Independent Audits
• Manage Direct Supervision from the EC

The priority for platforms approaching this threshold is simple: build a minimum viable regulatory framework early, then refine and scale.

“For emerging VLOPs, readiness cannot start at designation. Organisations that manage scrutiny best are those that build evidence, accountability and control effectiveness into their operating model before the four-month clock begins.  Those that wait until designation is confirmed risk trying to evidence compliance while the regulatory examination is already underway” said Hermes Peraza, Director in Risk and Regulatory Consulting at KPMG.

What “minimum viable” compliance looks like

The EC demands demonstrable, evidence-based proof that controls to keep online users safe are effective. “Minimum viable” readiness in practice means:

• A defensible operating model that can withstand regulatory scrutiny from day one.
• Evidencing knowledge of the risks faced, including having a robust, scalable and repeatable data-driven methodology to assess them.
• Demonstrable evidence that controls to keep online users safe exist, are consistently applied, and are subject to oversight, testing, and monitoring.
• Clear accountability for platform risk, compliance, and mitigation decisions, with defined ownership across management, the Compliance Function, and the Board.
• Having mitigation measures that are operating effectively, not planned or theoretical.
• Strong and realistic improvement plans with a credible and prioritised roadmap.

Regulators are specifically looking for practical governance and oversight arrangements that support effective supervision, including the EC’s ability to interrogate decisions, request information, and trace accountability to senior management and the Board. They want to see evidence that the platform has a firm grasp on key risks and can consistently explain and demonstrate control effectiveness and mitigations.

Compliance claims must be supported by verifiable evidence, including auditability, transparency reporting, and the ability to substantiate how DSA obligations are met in practice, with evidence, rather than merely being documented in policies and procedures. Overall, regulators want to see that online users are being kept safe, and that platforms have the ability to identify, prevent and minimise the risks online users are exposed to.

Heightened scrutiny for VLOPs under DSA

In two years, online platforms have reversed around 50 million decisions affecting users’ content or accounts, helping users exercise their Digital Services Act (DSA) rights online in the EU.

Newly designated VLOPs face intense regulatory scrutiny, with direct supervision by the EC since late 2023.

The enforcement risk is real: where a DSA breach is confirmed, the Commission can impose fines of up to 6% of global turnover, alongside enhanced supervision and corrective measures with a set deadline. We are already seeing some of those measures take place, commented Patrick Farrell, Partner and Head of Advisory Markets at KPMG.

As of July 2026, the EC issued around 75 Requests for Information (RFIs) across 23 VLOPSEs and initiated formal proceedings against 12 platforms, reflecting a supervisory focus on practical compliance. This involves testing the credibility of compliance claims, governance, oversight, and mitigation measures. VLOPs are assessed beyond policy frameworks, requiring meaningful internal and external data and systems access to withstand sustained supervision.

Top 6 areas for Emerging VLOPs to get right

1. Systemic Risk and Control Assessments (SRAs) – Establish procedures to identify, analyse, and assess systemic risks stemming from the design or functioning of the service and its related systems, including algorithmic systems, as well as from the use made of those services.

2. Establish an independent Compliance Function with a direct reporting line to the Board – An independent compliance function, framework and operating model is required to perform compliance oversight activities and processes. Consideration should be given to establishing a central compliance team, rather than operating in silos, particularly for global firms.

3. Crisis response, communication and learning – A crisis is deemed to have occurred where extraordinary circumstances lead to a serious threat to public security or public health in the EU. Online platforms should identify, assess, and implement measures to prevent or eliminate serious threats; develop crisis protocols for addressing crisis situations; and report to the Commission at regular intervals on the implementation and qualitative and quantitative impact of measures taken to mitigate those threats.

4. Transparency Reporting, Data and MI – Transparency reporting frequency will increase to twice a year. Accuracy of data will be critical, alongside consistency of messaging across disclosures. Information disclosed through systemic risk assessments, independent audits, transparency reports, and responses to regulatory information requests should be internally consistent and evidence-based.

5. Assurance and Remediation: Arrange an independent audit at least annually and implement any required remediation measures. Readiness requires clear ownership for engagement with the independent auditor and defined accountability across the Compliance Function, legal, product, integrity, and engineering teams. Organisations must be prepared for the volume and intensity of audit activity, including control walkthroughs, evidence production, and detailed review cycles.

6. Direct European Commission supervision – Under the DSA, the Commission has powers to request information, conduct inspections, open formal investigations, and assess compliance with the DSA. Where necessary, it may also adopt enforcement measures to address non-compliance.

How KPMG can help

KPMG offers deep technical expertise across all areas related to the DSA. The team specialises in readiness and assurance, risk assessment, control design and documentation, implementation of key processes, and regulatory engagement and reporting. With KPMG’s support, navigating the complexities of DSA compliance becomes a streamlined and effective process.

Markel Insurance, the insurance operation within Markel Group Inc., has announced its partnership with Verodat, a specialist data management and AI delegated data platform provider, as part of its continued investment in data-driven underwriting and delegated authority oversight.

Through Verodat’s bordereaux solution, Markel will be able to collect, process and gain deeper insights into data from delegated partners more efficiently. The system is designed to analyse and break down non-standardised bordereaux data into clearer, actionable insights, helping underwriters identify trends, monitor portfolio performance and make better-informed decisions.

Improved access to timely, high-quality data will strengthen collaboration between Markel, brokers and coverholders by enabling faster processing, clearer oversight and more effective feedback on data quality. It will also support stronger governance and regulatory compliance across Markel’s delegated authority business.

Kate Johnson, Director of Operations at Markel International, commented: “Rising data and regulatory demands mean insurers must modernise how delegated data is managed and used. Verodat supports our push for better quality data and more efficient bordereaux processes, helping us deliver a clearer and more responsive service for brokers and cover holders.

“Verodat stood out as a strong cultural fit. Its platform will automate routine tasks and allow our teams to focus on supporting partners as our delegated portfolio continues to grow.”

Thomas Russell, Founder and CEO of Verodat, added: “The delegated authority market has had a data problem for years – manual processes, offshore workarounds, and aggregated outputs that lose the granularity underwriters actually need. Verodat was built to change that. We’re proud to be partnering with Markel on this – it’s a strong signal that the market is ready to do things properly. When bordereaux data is clean, complete and fully traceable from source to system, everything downstream – governance, reporting, and AI – becomes possible.”

See more stories here.

Nearly half (45%) of Irish festival goers are likely to buy a new smartphone ahead of this summer’s festival season, according to new research from Ireland’s leading refurbished tech marketplace, refurbed, despite growing concerns that global chip shortages are set to increase the cost of new smartphones.

Yet while refurbished devices could offer a lower-cost alternative, fewer than one in three (30%) festival goers would consider buying a refurbished smartphone, while 61% would opt for a brand-new handset.

Published ahead of Electric Picnic, the findings highlight the increasingly important role technology plays in festival preparation, with smartphones remaining the must-have purchase for many attendees, despite reported price hikes.

Among those planning to buy a smartphone before attending a festival, more than half (52%) said they want a device to capture photos and videos, while 41% want a phone with longer battery life and greater reliability over a festival weekend.

Other reasons include staying connected through messages and social media (35%), replacing a lost, broken or outdated device (27%), entertainment (22%), and concern that an existing phone could be lost or stolen (12%).

The research also found that smartphones are just one part of festival tech shopping lists this summer. More than half (53%) plan to buy a portable charger or power bank, while 38% are purchasing headphones. Cameras (29%), smartwatches (22%), and speakers (21%) also feature among the most popular festival technology purchases.

Outside smartphones, attitudes towards refurbished technology are significantly more positive. Overall, 62% of festival goers said they would be likely to buy refurbished technology for their upcoming festival, while just 4% said they would not buy technology specifically for festival season.

Speaking on the findings, refurbed CEO and co-founder Kilian Kaminski said: “It’s clear that tech purchases and festival prep now go hand in hand, but the fact that nearly half of festival goers are planning to buy a brand-new smartphone for a weekend raises an obvious question: do you really need a new phone, or do you just need your existing one to work reliably?

“Whether it’s capturing photos and videos, making sure your battery lasts or staying connected with friends, having a reliable device has become an important part of the festival experience. However, buying a brand-new handset for a festival feels like an expensive and unnecessary upgrade when a refurbished device can deliver the performance and reliability people need, for less.

“With new smartphone prices expected to rise, it’s time to challenge the idea that ‘new’ automatically means ‘better’. For festival season, your phone needs to be reliable, it doesn’t need to be the latest model.”

As part of its mission to become Europe’s destination for sustainable shopping, refurbed premium offers the chance to buy devices in like-new condition, with no visible signs of wear, full functionality and at least 90% battery capacity. Customers can also choose to have a new battery put in their refurbished smartphone at purchase.

See more stories here.

BPFI welcomes the launch of Ireland’s first National Anti-Money Laundering, Countering Financing of Terrorism and Countering Proliferation Financing Strategy by Tánaiste and Minister for Finance Simon Harris. The Strategy sets out a comprehensive plan to strengthen the State’s response to financial crime and protect Ireland’s economy, businesses and citizens.

Commenting on the publication of the strategy, Brian Hayes, Chief Executive, BPFI, said: “We welcome today’s publication of Ireland’s first National Anti-Money Laundering Strategy. Financial crime is increasingly sophisticated, technology-enabled and cross-border, and an effective response depends on close collaboration across the public and private sectors.”

Ireland’s first National Anti-Money Laundering Strategy

“Ireland’s banks invest significantly in preventing, detecting and disrupting financial crime and have an important role to play in protecting customers and the wider economy. We especially welcome the Strategy’s focus on enhanced intelligence and information sharing, stronger financial intelligence capabilities and a coordinated national response. We believe there is significant potential to deepen public-private information sharing and develop collaborative, technology-enabled approaches that allow financial institutions and public authorities to identify and disrupt criminal activity more effectively.”

Mr Hayes concluded: “BPFI and our members look forward to working with Government, An Garda Síochána, FIU Ireland, the Central Bank of Ireland and other partners to support the implementation of the Strategy and further strengthen Ireland’s collective ability to combat financial crime.”

Further details on the strategy can be found on the Department of Finance website here.

Note: Banking & Payments Federation Ireland (BPFI) represents the banking, payments and fintech sector in Ireland. Together with its affiliates, the Federation of International Banks in Ireland, and the Fintech & Payments Association of Ireland, BPFI has over 120 member institutions and associates, including licensed domestic and foreign banks and institutions operating in the financial marketplace.

See more breaking stories here.

The Digital and Techworker Alliance branch of the Communications Workers’ Union (DATA-CWU) has announced plans to host a counter event to the Government-hosted International AI Summit in October of this year.

No more Slopaganda

The Workers’ AI Counter-Summit will take place across two days, on Saturday 10th October and Sunday 11th October. The Union has opened a call for submissions, inviting workers, researchers, activists and artists to contribute to the event in the form of critical responses to AI, centring on workers and the effects on communities.

The Union says that this event, billed as a Workers’ Counter-Summit, will provide a necessary counterweight to what it calls the “wild claims and hype-manufacturing” rampant in the tech sector and among policy makers.

The event will platform workers at the sharp end of AI and those involved in the creation and maintenance of AI technology – both within the tech sector and wider society. Tech workers are critical to the supposed aims of the Government-hosted Summit, specifically how it will likely deal with “how AI is delivering real-world value” and “workforce transformation”.

At a time when Ireland has positioned itself as Europe’s leading destination for technology investment and AI infrastructure, decisions being taken here will shape not only the future of work in Ireland, but influence how these technologies are developed and governed far beyond Ireland’s shores.

The Union’s event has the tagline “Workers Against Slopaganda”, which expresses the objective to open a space for critical voices, and the rejection of tech products that undermine societal interests and Big Tech’s desire to achieve AI profitability at all costs.

Commenting, CWU Deputy General Secretary, Ian McArdle, said:

“While the Government’s AI Summit in October has a notable deficit in worker representation, the feedback from our members is that token representation would be insufficient in giving workers a meaningful seat at the table.”

Mr. McArdle went on to say that the Union is not opposed to technological advancements.  He said: “We are opposed to the manner in which these tools are being wielded and implemented. We are opposed to changes that line the pockets of billionaires while disempowering, disciplining and displacing labour. For private sector workers in Ireland, the employer veto on unionisation and collective bargaining means that swathes of the workforce are denied a say in how these technologies are being implemented in their workplaces and in their society and communities.”

The Union has pointed to events taking place across the world this year which positions this event in a global context. These include the “Summer of Ludd” festival in New York, Ivy League students booing and walking out of tech CEO’s commencement speeches, to striking Samsung workers in Korea seeking a share of AI profits, to the Union’s own members in Meta outsourcing firm, Covalen, taking to the picket line against AI-driven job losses. The UK sister union of DATA-CWU, the United Tech and Allied Workers, also led its members in frontier AI lab, Google DeepMind, in their unionisation bid earlier this year.

CWU Head of Organising, Fionnuala Ní Bhrógáin, commented:

“This event is part of a global movement of workers in the tech sector and beyond who are determined to have their voices heard. The current framework for discussions around AI – that it is “inevitable” and that “it is happening, so we have to deal with it” or that it constitutes some kind of “revolution” – is not one that ordinary workers accept. To do so eliminates the crucial factors of human agency and decision-making and hides the very real power imbalances experienced by workers being impacted by AI. This Workers’ Counter-Summit will set out that there are, in fact, two sides to the AI story.”

This event will play an important role in opening up the debate around AI and the realities that workers are facing in its implementation. While governments and businesses bet huge sums on this technology, DATA-CWU is demanding that workers are central to any proposed vision of a future radically reshaped by AI, rather than just a fallout casualty, or a statistic.

Remarking on the event organised by the newest branch of the union, CWU General Secretary Seán McDonagh stated:

“It is not surprising that our members in the tech sector are angry and expressing such strong views about this technology and the government’s planned AI event. Their grievances are inevitable when workers are denied access to a real seat at the table with their employers – and by this we specifically mean collective bargaining. The current employer veto on unionisation has to go. There must be a radical overhaul of the voluntarist system of industrial relations we have in Ireland. If workers are not listened to, you can be sure that they will shout loud and be heard!”

To learn more about the Digital and Techworker Alliance branch of the Communications Workers’ Union (DATA-CWU), please go to www.datacwu.ie

See more breaking stories here.

The Artificial Intelligence Collaboration Centre (AICC) at Ulster University, in partnership with AI for Collective Intelligence (AI4CI), will host a free public forum in Derry~Londonderry this September exploring the growing impact of artificial intelligence on society

People from across Northern Ireland are invited to join a public discussion on how Artificial Intelligence is shaping communities, public services, education and the workplace at a free event in Derry~Londonderry next month.

Discussion on AI and our society with AICC

Hosted by the AICC, an Ulster University led initiative that advances awareness and responsible adoption of Artificial Intelligence, the event is delivered in partnership with AI for Collective Intelligence (AI4CI).

AI and Our Society will bring together AI experts, industry leaders and local and national decision-makers at the Guildhall on Thursday 10 September for an open and accessible conversation about the opportunities, challenges and wider societal impact of artificial intelligence.

Free to attend and open to everyone, the forum will give members of the public an opportunity to hear from leading voices across government, academia and industry, and to ask questions about the opportunities and challenges AI presents for the region, both in the North West and across business and society in Northern Ireland.

Although the event is taking place in Derry~Londonderry, people from every part of Northern Ireland are encouraged to attend and contribute to this important regional conversation.

As AI continues to influence many aspects of daily life, the forum will explore what the technology is, how it is being applied across society, and how governments, businesses and individuals can navigate important issues including ethics, environmental impact and governance while harnessing AI’s potential responsibly.

Professor Michaela Black, AICC Principal Investigator and AI4CI Theme Lead for Infrastructure and Governance at Ulster University, said:

“AI is not simply a technical issue, it raises important questions about the kind of society we want to build and the values that should guide us. The decisions being made today will have long-term implications, so it is essential that they are informed by a wide range of voices and lived experiences.

“We hope this event will give people the confidence to challenge assumptions, share their perspectives and take an active role in the conversation. Responsible innovation depends not only on what technology can do, but on whether it reflects public needs, earns trust and delivers meaningful benefits for society and everyone.”

The discussion will be chaired by Lorraine Acheson, Independent Strategy & Policy Adviser and former Managing Director of Women in Business NI, with panelists:

·        Patricia O’Hagan MBE, CEO Core Systems (NI)

·        Mark Lee, Acting Deputy Secretary for Economic Policy Group, Department for the Economy NI

·        Kathryn Harkin, Head of AI Northern Ireland, NTT DATA

·        Professor Michaela Black, Professor of Artificial Intelligence, Ulster University

·        David Crozier CBE, Director, AICC

Professor Seth Bullock, AI for Collective Intelligence (AI4CI) Hub Director and Toshiba Chair in Data Science and Simulation, University of Bristol, said:

“Events like this are important because they give people the opportunity to have meaningful conversations about AI with experts and decision makers. We often think about AI in terms of how individuals or businesses use it, but AI also has the potential to help groups of people tackle shared challenges – from reducing traffic congestion to making community decisions or managing health conditions. That’s why it’s so important to involve as many people as possible in the conversation, so that experts and the public can help shape how we want AI to develop and be used in our communities.”

Following the panel discussion, audience members will have an opportunity to put their own questions directly to the speakers during an interactive question-and-answer session.

The event is free to attend, but advance registration is required. Doors will open at 5.30pm, with the discussion beginning at 6pm.

Event details

Date: Thursday 10 September 2026
Time: 6.00pm to 7.30pm (doors open 5.30pm)
Venue: The Guildhall, Guildhall Square, Derry/Londonderry, BT48 6DQ

Registration: aicc.co/publicforum

The Artificial Intelligence Collaboration Centre is an Ulster University and Queen’s University Belfast partnership funded by Invest Northern Ireland and the Department for the Economy.

The AICC has become a leading regional hub for responsible artificial intelligence. To date, it has supported more than 115 SME collaborations, launched the AI Learning Lab, trained more than 490 professionals in AI skills and established a pipeline of future AI talent through 260 fully funded postgraduate places.

About Ulster University

Ulster University is a forward-looking institution, uniquely placed to drive economic, social and cultural development through our three campuses in Derry~Londonderry, Coleraine and Belfast.

Student experience is at the very heart of everything we do. Every year, over 30,000 students from 70 different countries trust Ulster University to help them reach their career goals. Our high-quality teaching, informed by world-leading research across key sectors, boosts the economy and makes a positive impact on the lives of people around the world.

Ulster University was UK and Ireland University of the Year 2024 (Times Higher Education).

·        Ulster University is 1st in the UK for Optometry, Ophthalmics and Orthoptics, 2nd in the UK for Pharmacology and Pharmacy (Complete University Guide, 2026)

·        Ulster University is ranked 1st in the UK for Nutrition and Food Science (Guardian University Guide, 2026)

·        Ulster University is ranked Best UK University for job prospects and teaching quality (StudentCrowd, 2025)

·        Ulster University is in the top 10 for course quality rankings across the UK (University Compare 2023)

·        Ulster is 2nd in the UK for overall satisfaction in the Postgraduate Research Experience Survey 2025. The University is 1st in the UK for both Research Support and Online Learning Resources, 2nd in the UK for both Professional Development and Research Responsibilities and 3rd in the UK for Research Community

Research and innovation at Ulster University:

Ulster University was ranked in the top 10% of UK universities for research impact in the (latest) 2021 Research Excellence Framework.  Headline results for Ulster University include:

·        In the top 10% of UK universities for research impact

·        97% of Ulster University’s research impact was judged as having outstanding or very considerable impacts in reach and significance

·        80.1% of Ulster University’s research outputs have been assessed as ‘world leading’ or ‘internationally excellent’.

For more information, please visit www.ulster.ac.uk

See more breaking stories here.

Guest Post by Crystel Robbins Rynne, CEO, HRLocker

Across most organisations, AI adoption hasn’t followed a strategic plan. It’s arrived through day-to-day work. A manager uses ChatGPT to screen CVs, sales teams rely on Copilot to clear admin, finance prototypes a bonus model with Claude, an operations lead asks Gemini to rewrite a sensitive letter.

None of these actions looks like formal AI deployment, yet they all carry regulatory implications. The Central Statistics Office reports that text generation tools are now embedded in routine business processes. That means AI is already influencing decisions about people, performance and money, often without any governance structure around it.

This isn’t an IT issue. IT can explain how a model behaves. It cannot determine whether its output should influence a hiring decision or a disciplinary process. Once AI touches people?related decisions, the responsibility shifts to HR, compliance and governance.

The regulatory trigger point

Ireland’s AI Office opened on 2 August. The following day, Article 4 of the EU AI Act came into force, activating supervision and enforcement of AI literacy across the Union. Many organisations still believe the meaningful obligations sit years away.

The complex requirements for high?risk systems, including recruitment and dismissal, have indeed been delayed until December 2027. But AI literacy wasn’t delayed. It’s the first requirement under active oversight. And it applies to every organisation using AI tools, regardless of scale or sophistication.

You’re not expected to understand model architecture or training data. But once AI is used inside your organisation, you must ensure that staff understand the risks, limitations and boundaries of those tools. That obligation extends to contractors and agency workers. And the level of literacy required depends on the impact of the task. Editing a social post is low?risk. Ranking job applicants is not.

AI, in regulatory terms, includes the everyday tools already in circulation. Free accounts. Built?in features. Automated summaries. Meeting transcription tools. If it’s used for work within the organisation, it is in scope.

How governance failures emerge

The Workplace Relations Commission has indicated that enforcement will be incident?driven. Inspectors are unlikely to appear without a trigger. That trigger will be a complaint, a challenge or an adjudication where AI influenced the outcome.

Until now, disclosing that AI assisted a decision was neutral. Under Article 4, it becomes a point of scrutiny. The focus shifts to three questions: who used the tool, what they understood about it and whether the output was verified. If the answer is that a manager accepted an AI?generated result without checking it, the organisation’s governance position is weakened.

The organisational maturity gap

The CSO reports that AI use is already widespread. One in five Irish businesses uses AI, rising to nearly six in ten among large employers. Yet CIPD Ireland’s latest HR Practices in Ireland research shows that most organisations have no AI guidance, minimal training and leadership teams that do not feel prepared for an AI?enabled environment.

AI adoption has outpaced governance. The tools arrived. The controls did not.

The minimum viable control framework

The European Commission has been clear about what organisations need to demonstrate. There is no certification requirement. No literacy exam. The compliance baseline rests on three controls.

1 – A boundary?setting policy. A short, operational document that identifies approved tools, prohibited tools and information that must never be entered into any AI system. For most organisations, this includes employee data, candidate information and commercially sensitive material. It should also specify where human oversight is mandatory and who is responsible for escalation.

2 – Training that builds risk awareness. Employees must understand how AI can fail. Fabricated facts. Non?existent sources. Biased patterns. Over?confident outputs. Training should use real examples from your organisation, not generic scenarios. Staff involved in hiring, performance or pay require deeper, role?specific sessions.

3 – Evidence of compliance. A record of who was trained, when, on what and which version of the policy they acknowledged. This mirrors existing disciplines in health and safety and data protection. Most HR systems already support this level of record?keeping.

If AI touches recruitment, performance or pay, those areas should be prioritised. They carry the highest risk and will be the first areas examined by regulators.

The strategic upside

AI literacy isn’t just a regulatory obligation. It’s a control that improves decision quality. Staff who understand the limits of AI make fewer errors, rely less on unverified outputs and extract more value from the tools already available to them. Organisations gain cleaner audit trails and fewer surprises when decisions are challenged.

CIPD research shows strong appetite for AI learning among HR professionals. The barrier is not interest. It is structure.

A practical starting point is simple. List every AI tool currently in use, including the unofficial ones. Then ask two questions: who has been trained to use it, and where is that documented?

The second question reveals the governance gap. Closing it is now a compliance requirement. And solving it should be a top priority.

About Crystel Robbins Rynne

Crystel has been with HRLocker since 2013 and now leads the company as CEO. She drives the organisation’s strategic direction, aligning product, operations, and customer experience to support HRLocker’s next stage of growth. Crystel works closely with internal teams and external partners to ensure the company is positioned to meet the evolving needs of employers across Ireland and beyond.

A long?standing advocate for better employee experience, Crystel is recognised as a leading voice in the HR space and regularly shares insights through thought leadership articles, HRLocker’s webinars and industry events. With more than two decades of HR experience, she brings a rare combination of board?level perspective and first?hand understanding of the pressures HR teams face every day. Crystel is the driving force behind a new nationwide online community, the HRLocker Hub, built to connect and support anyone working in HR in Ireland.

About HRLocker

Ireland’s leading people management platform, HRLocker, helps SMEs replace manual HR tasks with simple, secure and intuitive tools. Core HR provides one central location to store, manage and organise all employee data. Perform supports structured employee development. Recruit streamlines hiring. Onboard delivers a smooth start for every new employee. Each product works independently or as part of the wider HRLocker suite. Together they provide accurate and compliant record-keeping that strengthens confidence, reduces risk and supports audit readiness. HRLocker is also home to the HRLocker Hub, a free community where HR people across Ireland learn from and support each other. Find out more at hrlocker.com.

See more stories here.

Ekco, one of Europe’s leading security-first managed service providers, has announced a €4 million investment in the launch of Ekco AI, a platform that helps organisations to adopt AI securely while maintaining visibility and control over its use across the business. The platform will encourage safe AI exploration and save businesses €2M for every €10M of operating costs by boosting employee productivity.

Ekco’s research has found that a typical business environment may have as many as 28 AI applications in use, leading to a ‘shadow AI’ blind spot for employers who may not know which tools are in use, or how company data is being handled.Ekco AI is designed to address this by helping organisations to see what applications are being used, set clear guardrails, block potentially hazardous applications and reduce the risk of sensitive information being shared on unsanctioned systems.

By providing peace of mind to employees and their employers, the platform aims to encourage greater use of AI by individuals. This will help to boost the average employee’s productivity by more than five hours each week, resulting in significant operational cost savings.

Ekco AI also supports practical, role-based training on Microsoft Copilot, Claude and other AI tools. Separate awareness training covers data protection, unsafe practices and AI-related risks, giving employees clearer guidance on what they can use and what information they should not share.

The launch comes days after transparency obligations under the EU AI Act came into force on 2nd August 2026, with more scheduled for 2027 and 2028. Ekco AI creates an audit trail of AI activity and provides reporting for boards, auditors and regulators, while its controls also support compliance with the cybersecurity directive NIS2 and the digital resilience act, DORA, for financial services institutions.

Steve MacNicholas, CEO, Ekco Ireland, said: “Businesses won’t truly get value from AI until they and their employees feel comfortable using it and experimenting with it. We have seen that organisations who are generous with AI by equipping their leadership teams and employees with tools that will benefit them, excite them, and which are safe, are the ones who have the fewest issues with harmful AI platforms.

“In reality, today’s CIOs don’t always know what AI platforms their employees are using. Ekco AI gives them that oversight and signals any applications that are potentially harmful.”

Cian Prendergast, CEO, Ekco MSP, said: “Most businesses are no longer asking whether their employees will use AI. They are asking how they can stop that activity becoming a blind spot. A blanket ban is not an effective answer because people may simply continue using the tools they already know. Businesses need to give employees approved options, explain the rules and put controls around the data. That is what Ekco AI is designed to do. Ultimately, our mission is to safely and securely share our expertise with our customers to give them up to 50% strategic advantage over their competitors within a three-year timeframe.”

See more stories here.

We will shortly be reviewing the new Google Pixel Watch 5. It will be interesting to see how it performs relative to the earlier iterations. Especially because it went through a few transitions with the app over the last 12 months, as it changed from using the Fitbit platform to subsequently becoming Google Health. See more about the Pixel Watch 5 here. The product is due to go on sale on August 20th, by which time we will have hopefully put it through its paces, and the various information embargoes will have lifted.

More about the Google Pixel Watch 5

Materials and Finishes
Housing: 100% recycled aluminium1
Active Band (2nd gen)

Band made of Hydrogenated Nitrile Butadiene Rubber (HNBR) with soft-touch coating

Housing: 100% recycled aluminium1
Active Band (2nd gen)

Band made of Hydrogenated Nitrile Butadiene Rubber (HNBR) with soft-touch coating

Dimensions and Weight
Diameter: 41 mm

Height: 12.3 mm

Weight: 31 g (without band)

Diameter: 45 mm

Height: 12.3 mm

Weight: 36.7 g (without band)

Display
Actua 360 display

Custom 3D Corning® Gorilla® Glass 5

320 ppi AMOLED LTPO display with DCI-P3 colour

Up to 3000 nits (peak brightness)

1 nit minimum brightness (AOD)

Responsive Display (1–60 Hz)5
Always-on display

Actua 360 display

Custom 3D Corning® Gorilla® Glass 5

320 ppi AMOLED LTPO display with DCI-P3 colour

Up to 3000 nits (peak brightness)

1 nit minimum brightness (AOD)

Responsive Display (1–60 Hz)5
Always-on display

Connectivity
4G LTE and UMTS2
Bluetooth® 6.0

Wi-Fi 802.11a/b/g/n/ac/ax 2.4GHz, 5GHz

NFC

Ultra-Wideband3
Satellite SOS communications17
4G LTE and UMTS2
Bluetooth® 6.0

Wi-Fi 802.11a/b/g/n/ac/ax 2.4GHz, 5GHz

NFC

Ultra-Wideband3
Satellite SOS communications17
GPS
Dual Frequency GPS: GPS, Galileo, Glonass, Beidou, QZSS
Dual Frequency GPS: GPS, Galileo, Glonass, Beidou, QZSS
Compatibility
Works with most phones running on Android 12.0 or newer4
Requires a Google Account and the Google Pixel Watch app. For more help or information on compatibility, visit g.co/pixelwatch/setup
Works with most phones running on Android 12.0 or newer4
Requires a Google Account and the Google Pixel Watch app. For more help or information on compatibility, visit g.co/pixelwatch/setup
Band Size
Active Band: Small and large band sizes included

Small fits wrists 130-175 mm around
Large fits wrists 165-210 mm around
Active Band: Small and large band sizes included

• Small fits wrists 150–185 mm around

• Large fits wrists 165–215 mm around

Power (Battery and Charging)
332 mAh (typical)

Built-in rechargeable lithium-ion battery

Up to 30 hours with always-on display6
Up to 48 hours with Battery Saver mode6
Quick Charge Dock

Charging speed:

• About 15 minutes to 50%7
• About 25 minutes to 80%7
• About 45 minutes to 100%7
465 mAh (typical)

Built-in rechargeable lithium-ion battery

Up to 40 hours with always-on display6
Up to 72 hours with Battery Saver Mode6
Quick Charge Dock

Charging speed

• About 15 minutes to 50%7
• About 30 minutes to 80%7
• About 60 minutes to 100%7
Chip
Qualcomm Snapdragon® W5 Gen 2 Accelerated

Cortex-M55 co-processor

Qualcomm Snapdragon® W5 Gen 2 Accelerated

Cortex-M55 co-processor

OS
Wear OS 7.0
Wear OS 7.0
Storage
64 GB eMMC flash8
64 GB eMMC flash8
Sensors
Compass

Altimeter

Red and infrared sensors for oxygen saturation (SpO2) monitoring9
Multi-purpose electrical sensors compatible with ECG app
Multi-path optical heart rate sensor10
3-axis accelerometer

Gyroscope

Ambient light sensor

Electrical sensor to measure skin conductance (cEDA) for body response tracking11
Far-field skin temperature sensor12
Barometer

Magnetometer

Compass

Altimeter

Red and infrared sensors for oxygen saturation (SpO2) monitoring9
Multi-purpose electrical sensors compatible with ECG app
Multi-path optical heart rate sensor10
3-axis accelerometer

Gyroscope

Ambient light sensor

Electrical sensor to measure skin conductance (cEDA) for body response tracking11
Far-field skin temperature sensor12
Barometer

Magnetometer

Interaction
Touchless one-handed gestures

Side button

Haptic crown

Gen 3 Premium haptics

Touchless one-handed gestures

Side button

Haptic crown

Gen 3 Premium haptics

Audio
Built-in microphone

Built-in speaker

Built-in microphone

Built-in speaker

Durability and Water Resistance
Custom 3D Corning® Gorilla® Glass 5

5 ATM13
IP6813
Custom 3D Corning® Gorilla® Glass 5

5 ATM13
IP6813
What’s in the box
Google Pixel Watch 5 (41mm)

Active Band 2nd gen (small and large bands)

Google Pixel Watch Quick Charge Dock

Quick Start Guide

Google Pixel Watch 5 (45 mm)

Active Band 2nd gen (small and large bands)

Google Pixel Watch Quick Charge Dock

Quick Start Guide

Warranty
Two years
Two years
Sustainability
Materials:

• Google Pixel Watch 5 is made with recycled plastic, metals, glass and rare-earth elements14
• Housing is 100% recycled aluminum1
• Main logic board is made with 100% recycled copper and gold18
• Battery cell is made with 100% recycled cobalt19
• Recycled cobalt is at least 16% of the battery cell weight

• Haptic engine is made with 100% recycled tungsten and 100% recycled copper wire20
• All magnets are made from 100% recycled rare-earth elements21
• Google Pixel Watch 5 uses 100% recycled tin in the solder paste of multiple printed circuit boards, including the main logic board15
• Packaging for the Google Pixel Watch 5 uses 100% plastic-free materials16
Materials:

• Google Pixel Watch 5 is made with recycled plastic, metals, glass and rare-earth elements14
• Housing is 100% recycled aluminum1
• Main logic board is made with 100% recycled copper and gold18
• Battery cell is made with 100% recycled cobalt19
• Haptic engine is made with 100% recycled tungsten and 100% recycled copper wire20
• All magnets are made from 100% recycled rare-earth elements21
• 100% recycled tin in the solder paste of multiple printed circuit boards, including the main logic board15
• Packaging for the Google Pixel Watch 5 uses 100% plastic-free materials16

See more breaking stories here.

Guest post by Matthew Egan, who is the author of The Failure Advantage: Why Setbacks Are Your Secret Weapon for Success,

I once had a team asked to fix something they had no business fixing.

They were in customer service. Their day was billing enquiries: people ringing because a charge looked wrong. And they were being asked to join a task force tackling a persistent back-end network infrastructure problem.

I thought someone had made a mistake. My team knew customers. They didn’t know infrastructure. There was a specialist team for that, and it wasn’t mine.

The Failure Advantage: Setbacks Are Your Secret Weapon

If I’m honest, I was mildly annoyed. I was being asked to hand over people to solve a problem that wasn’t mine either.

It was only later that someone explained the choice. They had asked for that team because they knew those people would keep working until an answer was found. And they did.

At the time I heard that as a compliment about attitude. I now know it was a far sharper observation than that.

In telecommunications, any given week might bring a network outage, a software update that broke customers’ handsets, the backlash from a marketing campaign nobody had warned them about, or people calling from bushfire zones wanting to know whether they would still have coverage.

Look at that list again. Every item on it is a failure.

Maybe not their failure but arriving at their desks, in volume, before nine in the morning. That wasn’t the exception in their week. That was the week.

They weren’t calm because they were clever. They were calm because they had spent years dealing with things going wrong and had learned that the queue moves anyway.

Here is the part I think organisations consistently miss.

Talent is built in conditions of success. You get good at something by doing it, well, repeatedly. Resilience cannot be built that way. It can only be built in conditions of failure. There is no other route.

Sim Sitkin made this argument back in 1992 – that failure isn’t an unfortunate by-product of learning but a prerequisite for it, and that it is small, frequent failures that build real adaptive capability, rather than the rare catastrophic ones.

Later work suggests how durable that learning is. Peter Madsen and Vinit Desai, studying decades of orbital launch vehicle programmes, found that organisations learn more from their failures than from their successes – and that what failure teaches them fades more slowly.

So, a team fluent in failure has been quietly accumulating a more durable kind of knowledge than a team that has mostly succeeded.

Brilliance is legible. It arrives in a meeting, attached to a name, easy to recognise and reward. Resilience is invisible right up until the moment you need it. And by then you cannot recruit it. You can only have built it – which means somebody had to have gone through the difficult years first.

Notice which team keeps getting pulled into other people’s hard problems.

Your organisation is already telling you where its resilience lives. In my experience almost nobody writes it down, and almost nobody pays for it.

I have watched that pattern repeat in several organisations since.

Talent wins the moment. Resilience wins in the end.

A smart person can get a moment in the spotlight with a bright idea. The team that has absorbed a thousand failures and turned up anyway gets the result.

When you are deciding who to put on the thing that is genuinely hard, the answer is rarely the cleverest people available.

Matthew Egan is the author of The Failure Advantage: Why Setbacks Are Your Secret Weapon for Success, a finalist in the Business Book Awards 2026 and endorsed by Reid Hoffman, co-founder of LinkedIn. The book explores how leaders and teams turn setbacks into a source of trust, learning and growth. Drawing on two decades in consulting and technology leadership, including at Microsoft, Matt writes about reframing our relationship with failure as a path to higher performance. Views expressed are his own.

See more breaking stories here.

Jaguar TCS Racing head to London this weekend for the 2025/26 ABB FIA Formula E World Championship season finale (15/16 August) – the last of the GEN3 era – fighting to win both the Teams’ and Drivers’ World Championships.

Jaguar TCS Racing have enjoyed significant success throughout the third-generation of Formula E – with more race wins than any other team – and to celebrate the British team secured two official Guinness World Records.

The first record, achieved in collaboration with Official Title and Technology Partner, Tata Consultancy Services’ (TCS), saw Jaguar TCS Racing create the largest GPS drawing on foot. The 100km drawing across the streets of London outlined the Jaguar I-TYPE 7 and showed how both organisations are together ‘for the long run’.

The Guiness World Record-breaking stunt, designed as a tribute to the 18 wins Jaguar TCS Racing have taken to date in the GEN3 era, depicts the Jaguar I TYPE 7. Some 29 runners – comprised of both Jaguar TCS Racing and Tata Consultancy Services team members – completed the +100km route which started and finished at TCS’ London headquarters.

Each runner carried a single GPS device passed baton-style between participants, meeting strict Guinness World Records’ criteria for recognisable artwork, continuous route mapping, timestamped GPS files, and full participant logging. The full record-breaking route image was released at 9.00 BST tomorrow, Wednesday 12 August.

Jaguar TCS Racing have also set the Guinness World Record for the most participants in a racing simulator videogame relay. Taking to the virtual 2km London ExCel track, where the British team has taken victory on three previous occasions, 109 competitors at Jaguar TCS Racing’s technical HQ helped secure the team’s second official World Record.

These achievements reflect a remarkable GEN3 era for Jaguar TCS Racing. As well as the team’s 18 wins in the GEN3 era to date (a total unsurpassable by any other team), Jaguar TCS Racing have secured a further 23 podiums and 1,144 points.

Jaguar TCS Racing now head into their home races in London, the last of the GEN3 era, holding a 14-point advantage over nearest rivals Porsche as the British team look to secure the second Teams’ World Championship in three seasons.

In his final races for the team after a decade with Jaguar TCS Racing, Mitch Evans is fighting for his maiden Drivers’ World Championship. The Kiwi arrives in London second in the standings, just two points behind leader, Andretti’s Jake Dennis.

In his debut season with the team, António Félix da Costa still has an outside chance of taking his second Formula E Drivers’ World Championship. The Portuguese talent is sixth in the standings – 33 points off the top spot. The top nine drivers are still in mathematical contention for the title.

Technology proven on-track by Jaguar TCS Racing has directly enhanced development of the Jaguar Type 01, the new luxury four-door GT that will be revealed later this year.

Rounds 16 & 17 of the 2025/26 ABB FIA Formula E World Championship will take place on 15-16 August at 15:05 BST.

Mitch Evans, Jaguar TCS Racing driver #9, said: “It has been an incredible journey with Jaguar TCS Racing over the past 10 years, but we are hoping to write one more special chapter in London this weekend. There’s all to play for in the Drivers’ championship and it would be an incredible feeling to win that, while the opportunity to secure our second Teams’ world title at our home event gives us even more motivation heading into London.”

António Félix da Costa, Jaguar TCS Racing driver #13, said: “It has been a great first season at Jaguar TCS Racing and there have been so many high points along the way. The team has always enjoyed a strong record at home and we are hoping for the same again this weekend. We are still in championship contention and so I will be going all out to end the season strongly to deliver the maximum out on track in London.”

Ian James, Jaguar TCS Racing Team Principal, said: “GEN3 has been a record-breaking era for the team, and what better way to mark it than by officially putting our name into the Guinness World Record books ahead of this weekend’s London E-Prix.

“Heading into our home event in strong contention for the Drivers’ and Teams’ World Championships is what we have been striving towards all season. And, whilst we know how strong the competition will be, we will do everything to support our bid for the Drivers’ title. In addition, delivering a second Teams’ World Championship in three seasons across a record-breaking era for the team in GEN3 would be a fitting finale.

“I’m confident that the team will thrive under pressure, while we know from last year how competitive our Jaguar I-TYPE 7 can be around the unique London ExCel circuit.”

Abhinav Kumar, Chief Marketing Officer, Tata Consultancy Services, said: “Running marathons and motorsport racing requires similar qualities: endurance, intelligence, and executing a winning race strategy; mile after mile, lap after lap. TCS has been part of many record-setting marathons and podium celebrations this year. So, it was natural to bring the two sports together by running side-by-side with Jaguar TCS Racing across London to trace the outline of the Jaguar I-TYPE 7 and set another world record. Congrats to the team and all the runners who set this new record.”