Business leaders meet to plot creation of 100,000 jobs
Speakers at the regional branch of the Global Irish Economic Forum, held in University College Cork yesterday, included:
* Liam Casey, founder and chief executive of PCH International;
* Laureen Regan, president of Regan Productions in Canada;
* John Hartnett, president and chair of the Irish Innovation Centre in the US;
* Colm O’Carroll, president of Epsilon Chemicals and Advance Laboratories.
Their plans for the think-in include increasing the number of foreign people coming here to work in multinationals, and creating a global Irish investor fund to help fund and foster indigenous start-ups.
Mr Casey suggested we should help multinationals by allowing them to bring more skilled people here.
“The one [issue] I’d focus on is jobs, on actually attracting international people here to take up jobs in some of the bigger companies that are trying to hire people here,” he said.
“I actually think that that is important, because for every job created by the big multinationals, there are support jobs created as well.”
Mr Hartnett, who is based in Silicon Valley, said he would be suggesting a global investor fund to bring Irish companies to the multinational scale.
He said that this fund would be willing to invest money and mentor companies through the help of people who already have experience of scaling businesses.
Mr Hartnett said: “I think we need to help Irish companies gain scale. I think that the diaspora can help in three ways:
* “One is obviously investment — there are very high-net-worth individuals here;
* “Secondly, there are people who have created and scaled companies, and they have experience.
* “Thirdly is the contact base — we can really help young Irish people who have created companies and introduce them to people.”
The speakers at UCC, who will all sit on the two-day forum at Dublin Castle which begins today, had left Ireland — and not one of them felt this was a bad thing.
In fact, they all believe that emigration was key to them becoming successful.
Mr Casey said he didn’t view the current tide of young people leaving Ireland as a brain drain. “I actually see it as expanding your brain,” he said.
“I think it’s phenomenal because when you take Irish people abroad and put them in companies, they win, whether it is in sports or business. There is a can-do attitude. I think its great.
“I have two tickets for Sunday. One is for San Francisco, the other is for Hong Kong; I don’t know where I am going yet.
“Travelling today is an opportunity; an opportunity you should take,” he said.
When you are abroad, you are forced to take risks and take on the best in the world, Mr Hartnett said.
“Travelling internationally makes you compete with the best in the world and that ups your game. When you stay in Ireland you are more concerned about who is around you. Abroad you are alone and you have to take risks,” he said.
Mr O’Carroll recalled sitting in the Aula Maxima in UCC and quietly failing a chemistry exam. He said he never expected to return to the college to tell others how to help the country. “When I left Ireland, I became confident,” he said.
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