The Irish Tech News Podcast

In the past year businesses have had to deal with the ongoing challenges posed by the pandemic. This has seen digital transformation take centre stage and one company heavily invested in this is Logicalis who have a strategic partnership with Microsoft. Ronan talks to Mick McNeil, Vice President for Business Development in Logicalis about digital transformation and more. Mick talks about his background, what Logicalis does, the COVID-19 pandemic, remote working, their global strategic partnership with Microsoft and their cloud based AI security solutions. Mick also talks about IoT, what Logicalis have coming up, digital transformation with the cloud, and MaaS. More about Mick: Mick leads the evolution of Logicalis Group's Digital Transformation business leveraging Microsoft's technologies. Solidifying Logicalis's and Microsoft's joint commitment to a global strategic alliance to bring teams together and innovate with industry-leading solutions and services. Previously he used to work for Microsoft in their headquarters in Seattle where he held several global roles within Microsoft's commercial partner organisation. He was also instrumental in helping Microsoft's global partners transform their operating models to succeed in a cloud-first world.

Rachel Robinson catches up with Shane Reilly from Moyee Coffee to learn more about their FairChain initiatives. Changing the course of the coffee industry - Shane Reilly of Moyee Coffee talks FairChain and conditions along the coffee belt The coffee industry is one littered with unethical farming and trade – but some companies are trying to change the industry for the better. Moyee Coffee produces “radically good coffee with a radical impact” and utilises the model of FairChain. Rachel speaks to Shane Reilly, managing director and co-founder of Moyee Coffee in Ireland about the problems with the industry and how Moyee is paving a new way to farm and trade coffee ethically. Shane talks about how he set up Moyee Coffee in Ireland, how coffee is one of the most unethical drinks, with a model of “buy low, sell high” dominating the industry, and how conditions vary from country to country along the coffee belt. Moyee Coffee is based in Amsterdam, Addis Ababa, Nairobi and Dublin – it is the world’s first FairChain coffee brand.  Shane has a background in social enterprise with tech non-profit FoodCloud, as well as extensive experience working in political campaigning and communication roles. Rachel is a Journalism student at Coventry University, currently interning with Irish Tech News – which marks the start of a partnership between the two institutions. Rachel’s main interests are politics and conflict, human rights, animal welfare and the environment.

Over 1 billion people in the world today cannot prove their identity, and the challenge is not limited to the developing world. In the U.K. alone, 15% of the population do not have a passport or driver’s license. In contrast, Estonia, with a population of 1.3 million, leads the world with its national ID card system, where every citizen has an electronic identity and where all the records are tied together. While COVID-19 has strengthened the case for a digital identity, the road is not without perils. In this episode of One Vision, Theo and Bradley chat with Emma Lindley, digital identity expert and Co-Founder of Women in Identity, on the UK Digital Identity Framework, and what it will take to get to true inclusion.

We catch up with Chris to discuss his latest thoughts on fintech, cryptos, NFTs, why we must do much more to look after the planet, and his latest literary ventures. Chris Skinner is known as one of the most influential people in technology, and as an independent commentator on fintech through his blog, the Finanser.com. His latest book (sixteenth!) is called Doing Digital, and shares the lessons of doing digital transformation learned through interviews with BBVA, China Merchants Bank, DBS, ING and JPMorgan Chase.  He is Chair of Nordic Future Innovation, is a non-executive director of 11:FS and on the advisory boards of various firms including Mode, Moven and Meniga. Mr. Skinner has been an advisor to the United Nations, the White House, the World Bank and the World Economic Forum, and is a visiting lecturer with Cambridge University as well as a TEDx speaker. In recent years, he has been voted one of the UK’s foremost fintech observers by The Telegraph and one of the most influential people in financial technology by the Wall Street Journal’s Financial News and Thomson Reuters. Chris is also a successful children's author with a series, focused upon Captain Cake and the Candy Crew, being released in 2021 Captain Cake. He is also co-founder with renowned artist Basia Hamilton of The Portrait Foundation, Portrait Foundation, a non-profit platform to encourage children and the arts.

Yoshi, aka @yksanjo on twitter, is a successful musician living in NYC. He is also the inspiration behind YoshiDrops - an exciting new experiment in NFT drops on WAX with a philanthropic focus. Check out https://www.yoshidrops.com/ THE GREAT YOSHIDROPS SHOW BEGINS NOW! YoshiDrops is a collective of international rising stars and celebrity content collaborators delivering monthly music NFT drops while aiming to make the entire NFT industry carbon negative Random Drops of Awesome This unique subscription service gives users three tiers of random, high-quality DigitalVinyl™ NFT’s directly into their WAX Wallet every month. Each month, subscribers will receive random DigitalVinyls™: Nose Bleeds = (1 random) Front Row = (3 random) Backstage Pass = (6 random + early access to Yoshi’s Auction House) The packs are filled with randomly generated Music NFTs called DigitalVinyl™ from all the approved and minted submissions, that have been created from rising star digital artists and musicians to veteran superstars you may know. Who? Well, you’ll just have to wait to open the packs. But you know us, we can’t keep good secrets for very long, so you’ll probably get random drops of hints along the way. Read more at https://www.yoshidrops.com/ Your host is Jillian Godsil, award winning journalist, broadcaster and author. Her latest book is at https://persons-of-interest.io/

Amir and Doug talk about how his book “In Search of Mycotopia” came about and the research that went into it. As well as his initial interest in the world of fungi and mushrooms. There is also a conversation about citizen science and how fungi has contributed to the rise of citizen science, including why citizen science is important in our society. Doug Bierend is a freelance writer and recent first time author with his book In Search Of Mycotopia. He is  based in Hudson Valley USA. Over the last decade he has written about his specific interests in science, technology, visual and interactive media, food sustainability and general subversiveness. Links – Twitter - https://twitter.com/DougBierend Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/dougbierend/ Website - https://dougbierend.com/About-Me Amir Najib is a Student journalist from Coventry University, currently interning at Irish Tech News. His interests are mainly sports, entertainment and cryptocurrency. He is interested to see where the future leads him.

Paul Lindsell is the founder and CEO of Crypto Prophecies Crypto Prophecies is a decentralised peer-to-peer price prediction game that has NFT characters. Place your wager and go head-to-head with another player to battle it out over the candles, predicting how each one will close. It's a points based and it's against the clock, so be quick and watch out for your opponents magic spells! The winner at the end of the battle wins all the wager. Your host is Jillian Godsil who is an award winning journalist, broadcaster and author. Her latest book can be found at https://persons-of-interest.io/

The HSE and the health department were hit by a Conti ransomware cyberattack last Thursday and Friday, which has been described as possibly the most significant cybercrime attack on the Irish State. As we know the attackers managed to take around 700GB of data and encrypt it. So what might have happened and how do we deal with ransomware cyberattacks? Ronan talks to Stephen Bowes BSI Global Practice Director about this and more. Stephen talks to Ronan about the Conti ransomware cyberattack, what might have happened, how to prepare for a ransomware attack and what to do if you get hit by a ransomware attack. More about Stephen: Stephen is the BSI Global Practice Director (Data Management and Security Technologies). Previously he was their Head of Technology (Cybersecurity and Information Resilience), and their Head of Solutions Delivery & IT (Cybersecurity and Information Resilience). Stephen is also a highly experienced, accredited and award winning senior technology leader with a demonstrable track record of thought leadership and commercial acumen assisting organisations in increasing their cybersecurity posture and managing risk via the application of the appropriate technology, skills, processes and people management.

In this podcast Melanie Boylan returns to speak to Jordan Evans the Deputy Project Director of the Europa Clipper Mission about what the mission is setting out to do and what difference this will make with its findings. Jordan Evans  He was born in New Jersey and moved to Southern California when he was 3. While in college, he had internships at Edwards Air Force Base and NASA Goddard Space Flight Center. After finishing his undergraduate degree in Aerospace Engineering, he went to work for Northrop on the B-2 Stealth Bomber. He the decided his true calling was space, so his wife and himself moved to Maryland and he went to work at NASA Goddard in the Advanced Applications Section.  He spent many years there and really enjoyed it. While at Goddard he worked on numerous studies and proposals and pursued his Master’s Degree from the University of Maryland, College Park. He then worked on the Far Ultraviolet Spectroscopic Explorer (FUSE) as the Mechanical Systems Manager and on Wide Field Camera – 3 (for the Hubble Space Telescope) as a Lead Systems Engineer. As opportunities arose, he and his family then moved to Phoenix, Arizona, so that he could be closer to their family in California and he could work as the Chief Engineer/Deputy Program Manager for the Gamma Ray Large Area Space Telescope (GLAST) at Spectrum Astro, Inc.  While at Spectrum, he met several people from JPL and knew that the type of work that is done there that it's the type of work that he wanted to do.  So he and his wife and two daughters moved to the Pasadena area in early 2004 and he has thoroughly enjoyed the Caltech/JPL culture and the exciting missions that he has so far had the privilege to work on. Europa Clipper NASA's Europa Clipper spacecraft will conduct a detailed survey of Jupiter's moon Europa to determine whether the icy moon could harbor conditions suitable for life. The spacecraft, in orbit around Jupiter, will make about 45 close passes over Europa, shifting its flight path for each flyby to soar over a different location so that it eventually scans nearly the entire moon. After each flyby, the spacecraft will send its haul of data back to Earth. The time between flybys will also give scientists time to study the data and consider adjusting the timing and trajectory of future flybys if they find regions that spark curiosity and need more study.

Pedro Torres is the Co-founder and Head of Quant at Roseon.Finance. He is a decentralized finance entrepreneur who is interested in algorithm trading, computer languages (Python, JS, SQL, Solidity, Rust), philosophy, and blockchain technology. The most important traits for Pedro is to be someone who can be performance-driven, lives at a high level of integrity, practices self-discipline and autodidactism, and is goal-oriented. Jamil Hasan is a Generation X Author and experienced data intelligence technology builder with two decades of experience leading data-based teams at Fortune 100 companies, including AIG, Prudential Financial, and Ingersoll Rand. Jamil believes that skill and experience, not just age, is the most important factor required to build and lead corporate organizations. His unique story, as someone on the ground floor of the 2008 financial crisis and his role to help repay the $180 billion AIG bailout, enabled him to come face-to-face with many of the societal ills facing Generation X today and their causes. As the result of his experience, Jamil has developed a path forward for his fellow Gen Xers to restore his generation’s financial standing in society today and to rebuild the American Dream for Generation X.