The Irish Tech News Podcast

During the current pandemic, the retail industry is facing a major shakeup as network planning and measurement of convenience are harder to do. Gamma Location Intelligence Services is helping by providing insights to the retail industry so that they can do this. Ronan talks to Feargal O’Neill, CEO of Gamma Location Intelligence Services about this, what Gamma Location Intelligence Services does, and their work with insurance companies. Feargal also talks about how they are coping during the current COVID-19 pandemic, the importance of location intelligence especially during the current COVID-19 pandemic and their plans for the future. More about Feargal: Feargal is a graduate of Trinity College Dublin and University College Dublin and he joined Gamma in 1993. He has a background in planning and the spatial sciences.

We catch up with Yossi Vardi to discuss the latest version of DLD now taking place online today and tomorrow, for free, with some great speakers - see below for details. With 40 years experience of co-founding, leading and participating in building over 60 high-tech companies, he is one of Israel's early entrepreneurs. Yossi co-pioneered instant messaging as the founding investor and the former Chairman of Mirabilis Ltd., the creator of the highly popular instant messaging program ICQ now owned by AOL. Today's program -> 16:00 CET Welcome Steffi Czerny, Co-Founder & Managing Director of DLD  Yossi Vardi, Co-Chairman, DLD 16:05 CET What's Next, Jimmy? Jimmy Wales, Founder and Chair Emeritus, Board of Trustees, Wikimedia Foundation 16:20 CET Follow Your Ears Dennis Crowley, CEO, Foursquare Yossi Vardi, Co-Chairman, DLD 16:40 CET The (R)evolution of Movement Marc Berg, CEO, FREE NOW Florian Reuter, CEO, Volocopter Tabitha Goldstaub, Co-Founder, CognitionX 17:05 CET Shifting Paradigms for a Sustainable Mobility Oliver Zipse, Chairman of the Board of Management, BMW Group Steffi Czerny, Co-Founder & Managing Director of DLD  17:30 CET Urbanism Reloaded - Empowering the Countryside Rem Koolhas, Founding Partner, OMA See rest of the program on the website here. More about Yossi from his wikipedia entry Joseph "Yossi" Vardi (Hebrew: יוסי ורדי‎, born September 2, 1942) is an Israeli entrepreneur and investor. He is one of Israel's first high-tech entrepreneurs. For over 47 years he has founded and helped to build over 85 high-tech companies in a variety of fields, among them software, energy, Internet, mobile, electro-optics and water technology.

As part of our tech for good series of interviews we caught up with Bennet Barth, from the BMW Foundation, to learn more about the work they are doing to help support positive leadership globally and to support the implementation of the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals. About Bennet Barth Prior to joining the BMW Foundation team in March 2019, Bennet Barth worked with MAZE – Decoding Impact in Lisbon, Portugal. Maze works alongside impact ventures and investors to scale effective solutions for social and environmental challenges. Bennet concentrated his efforts on impact investment activities, consulting impact ventures and international policy work around the topic. He holds a Bachelor of Science in Industrial Engineering and Management from the Technical University of Berlin and a Master of Science in Economics from Nova SBE in Lisbon. He previously worked in development cooperation in renewable energy projects in Asia and West Africa. Surfing is Bennet’s passion and so he is constantly searching for the perfect wave in all parts of the world. He enjoys spending a lot of time outdoors – on the water, in the forest or in the mountains, keen for adventures in the wild. Bennet is driven by curiosity and eager to learn something new every day, especially around economics, the environment, and entrepreneurship. He is inspired by smart and bold solutions that challenge the status quo for the better. The BMW Foundation Herbert Quandt promotes responsible leadership and inspires leaders worldwide to work towards a more peaceful, just and sustainable future. About RESPOND RESPOND is an accelerator programme of the BMW Foundation Herbert Quandt with support from UnternehmerTUM. It is the first accelerator programme that promotes Responsible Leadership and thereby contributes to scaling sustainable business models for a better future.The programme supports founders who, through entrepreneurial approaches, contribute to a peaceful, just and sustainable future in line with the United Nations' Agenda 2030. In the programme, teams of founders receive access to workshops and mentoring at the interface of business, society and the environment. Furthermore, participants benefit from close contacts to the global Responsible Leaders Network of the BMW Foundation and the extended network of both organisations. The Responsible Leaders Network connects more than 1,800 leaders worldwide who are committed to social change within and between societies.

Carolin Wend, Co-founder of Mintbase.io NFTs are not just about art. Into this exploding field comes estalished player, Mintbase, with ambitions to rethink NFTs. Just as we get our heads around the concept of digital art NFTs then another cargo-load of applications arrives to really fry the brains. So let’s begin at the beginning shall we? Carolin Wend joined me from sunny Lisbon to go through some of the basics. First up, NFTs themselves or non-fungible tokens. “There are two types of tokens, fungible and non-fungible. Fungible for example is like a dollar or a euro. It’s exchangeable ‘like for like.’ In addition, it’s tangible so you can break it down and swap one dollar for two 50cent pieces. “On the other hand, a non-fungible token is something unique and which cannot be broken into two pieces. An example might be a birth certificate or a title to a house. It might also be a ticket, a song or anything except money. Anything in this world can be an NFT – it’s the new standard of technology – it’s like an open API.” NFTs first came to prominence with digital art. Finally, artists were able to share their art online showing not only provenance but also delivering a unique art piece – one that could not be copied as the original was backed with an NFT. “We quickly realised that there were other applications for NFT. We organised NFT ticketing for an event in Berlin called MetaCartel Demo Day with non-fungible tokens or ticketing. Every ticket was an NFT. Listen to find out more about the amazing world of NFTs Jillian Godsil is an award winning journalist, broadcaster and author - to find out more please visit https://persons-of-interest.io/

Listen to the audio recording from Sangeeta Waldron's virtual book event of Corporate Social Responsibility Is Not Public Relations, on 18 February, 2021 with a global audience including international speakers, who include: Martin Lui, from LID Business Media, publisher of the book. David Katz, CEO, Plastic Bank from Vancouver - Named one of the world’s most compassionate entrepreneurs by Salt magazine. A steward of the environment and champion for the poor. James Quinn, CEO, Faradion, Europe - World leader in non-aqueous sodium-ion cell technology. . Tonya Fitzpatrick, Co-founder World Footprints Media from Washington D.C. - Award-winning Travel Journalist; Delegate, U.N. Commission on the Status of Women. Aisha Raheem, Co-Founder, Farmz2U, Nigeria - Helping farmers farm better. Sarita Bahl, One of India's leading sustainability storytellers & PR experts. with Moderator: Sahera Chohan, Former BBC TV Presenter, Author, & Leadership Coach Book is available online from all bookstores including Hive https://www.hive.co.uk/Product/Sangeeta-Waldron/Corporate-Social-Responsibility-is-Not-Public-Relations--/25474850 And Amazon: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Corporate-Social-Responsibility-Public-Relations/dp/1911671421

Jillian Godsil speaks with legal eagle Jetse Sprey on GDPR and its impact on Europe and beyond Jetse Sprey, CLO and co-founder of Europechain It’s almost three years since GDPR came into effect in the EU. We talk to legal eagle Jetse Sprey in Amsterdam about the impacts of the law both within Europe and without. What the main impacts? Funnily enough the rules didn’t change that much from the rules that were in existence pre GDPR, but the key difference lies in the penalties attached to flaunting data protection rules. This is a nutshell can explain why GDPR burst upon the world with such a vengeance three years, in some ways out of proportion to the new legalities. It fostered an awareness for companies who realised they needed to look after the data they held and to ensure they were GDPR compliant. And not just here in Europe, anyone dealing with European people and their data also had to become compliant. It’s been an earthquake. At the same time, GDPR has become a sort of standard for international legislations, or rather an example to be followed. In California, the new data protection laws draw heavily on many of the elements of GDPR. The same can be said for new laws in India. In this field of data protection, Europe is leading the way. To find our more about how GDPR works, listen to the podcast Jillian Godsil is an award winning journalist, broadcoaster and author. Her most recent book, Persons of Interest, Timestamped in Blockchain and Cryptocurrency, can be found at https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B08NS1LXG8

Very informative conversation with Alex Sparrow, author of The Hempcrete Book, about what hempcrete is, and the wider benefits of building with natural materials. Alex Sparrow is founder and MD at UK Hempcrete Ltd., an English company with an international reach, specialising in the design and construction of the structural and thermal envelope of buildings from bio-based, renewable, carbon-sequestering and often recycled materials. As well as construction and specialist material supply, UK Hempcrete offers design, consultancy and training services to assist others in the use of natural materials in construction. Alongside his work at UK Hempcrete, Alex currently holds two board positions in the wider industry: - The Alliance for Sustainable Building Products (ASBP) (London) The ASBP works from a position of independence from government and from short term commercial interests. An organisation which champions construction products that are better for people and the environment, and companies and organisations prepared to push these aims forward, the ASBP seeks to support industry to make better decisions, and legislators to make better policy. Since joining the board in 2017, Alex has been working on the development of the ASBP Awards scheme which showcases construction projects that manifest the phillospohies behind the ASBP's "6 Pillars" model of sustainable construction. - YorSpace CLT (York) YorSpace is a Community-led Housing Developer building high-performance homes designed on passive solar principles and highly insulated, reducing the power they consume. The organisation is committed to using natural & low carbon building materials, helping to pioneer the urgently needed shift towards a full decarbonisation of homes and communities. By embedding fairness and cooperation in all its decision making, Torspace is creating homes that have community inclusion and cohesion embedded in their design. Alex co-authored "The Hempcrete Book; Designing and building with Hemp-lime", (pub 2014, UIT/Green Books); often cited as the definitive guide to this better-than-zero-carbon construction material. This, together with over a decade of practical experience in both hempcrete design and construction and the wider bio-based construction industry, has resulted in an increasing international demand for Alex's consultancy services and appearance at conferences, industry speaking engagements etc. In advancing the cause of natural construction methods in the UK and further afield, Alex is seeking to develop a wide network of like-minded companies in "coopetiton", to assist with the delivery of exciting future projects aimed at speeding up the decarbonisation of the construction industry.

Ronan talks to Mark Curtis the co- founder of the Fjord design agency which was acquired by Accenture in 2013 about the latest Fjord Trends report. Having spoken to Mark two years ago it was interesting to see how much the current pandemic has impacted on the latest Fjord Trends report. Mark talks about the 7 trends found on this years report, how this years trends compares with previous years trends, if remote working and automation is going to be seen more in the future, and if future trends will be as impacted by the current pandemic. More about Mark: Mark Curtis is a serial entrepreneur and innovator who has worked in media, digital, mobile and design for 30 years. In 2001 he co-founded service design consultancy Fjord with Mike Beeston and Olof Schybergson. At Fjord Mark is Chief Client Officer, and his role spans offer definition, marketing and business development. Fjord was acquired by Accenture in May 2013. Mark is also a frequent speaker at conferences and commentator in the media

Interesting and informative conversation with “the world’s most connected human”, we cover Ray Kurzweil, witches, techno pagans, Ireland's very own Newgrange and much more. Check it out, you will enjoy the ride. See more on his website here. Health and wellness pioneer, healthcare technology leader and entrepreneur, Christopher Dancy is frequently referred to as “the world’s most connected human.” Since the 1990s, when he was responsible for platform and technical development for the internet startup of WebMD, he has helped launch a number of successful startup companies in the technology and healthcare industries while serving in digital product development, senior management and leadership roles. He has been featured on the cover of Businessweek and as “patient zero in the digital health revolution” for the Showtime documentary series Dark Net, and has been interviewed by the Wall Street Journal, NPR, the BBC, Fox News and Wired. Follow him on Twitter here.

What does digital transformation really mean? Can banking truly be helpful? How can we be more thoughtful as we innovate, without leaving populations behind? For this week’s episode of One Vision, we move north across the border to Canada, where Bradley and Theo chat with Barb MacLean, Director, Application Development at Celero, on banking in Canada. Fun fact, do you know that ninety percent of Canadians live within 100 miles of the US border? And stay to the end to find out Barb’s favorite Star Wars character.