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| The garage in Palo Alto where Stanford University classmates Bill Hewlett and Dave Packard founded Hewlett-Packard in 1939, with an investment of $538 and then went on to build one of the Silicon Valley's most innovative electronics companies. |
A group of Irish tech start-ups, frustrated trying to get the attention of Dublin venture capitalists, is embarking on a trip to America's Silicon Valley.
The attention span of Silicon Valley venture capitalists is famously short and the Irish will need to pitch more than blarney.
"Irish start-ups have a range of connections in the Valley," says tour organiser Conor O'Neill, "but even with all our enthusiasm and contacts we were a little short on ways to raise our profile and make a real mark for Irish start-up entrepreneurialism."
This week Enterprise Ireland agreed to endorse the trip. It will provide facilities and additional contacts for the Irish in California. The trade mission is planned as the first of many cross-Atlantic trips that
will help build trade links between Irish early stage technology companies and investors and technology companies in Silicon Valley.
"We're delighted that Enterprise Ireland is supporting our trip and it brings much needed validation to what we are doing. Enterprise Ireland is greatly respected in Silicon Valley and we'll have a lot more doors opened for us now as a result of this," says O'Neill;
Benjamin Mosse, a Market Advisor with Enterprise Ireland based in New York, said: "We are delighted to see grass-roots initiatives such Paddy's Valley taking place. As the United States is the largest single destination for Irish software exports, representing Irish exports of over €500m in 2006, it is critical for Irish entrepreneurs to think internationally and develop links to the US at a very early
stage."
Co-organiser James Corbett added: "We see this trade mission as a way of building foundations for a long standing trans-Atlantic trade network, a way of showing a very healthy investment community in Silicon Valley that there's plenty of investment potential in Ireland and additionally this is a great way of showing off Irish intellectual property that American companies can licence."
O'Neill added: "We need to be part of the international high tech culture. It's not just about the United States or Silicon Valley but the fact is that's where many of the changes that affect us start. Paddy's Valley starts to roll in December this year."
The Paddy's Valley website is at: http://www.PaddysValley.org
Paddy's Valley is an ad-hoc group of Irish business and technology people who have decided to form their own delegation to tour Silicon Valley and create closer bonds with companies and people in the mecca of the computer world. The tour nicknamed "PaddysValley" will head off on December 2nd 2007, taking advantage of the new air routes from Aer Lingus. The December 2nd visit will be the first of what is hoped will be regular trips, building up stronger and stronger links between Irish technologists and Silicon Valley.
