Interview

A month ago, Derek Ahmedzai was our first Self Starter of the Week for our 2015 Awards entering our acclaimed 2015 Hall of Fame. Derek has been a Startacus startup member for some time and it was great to give him some recognition for his latest business project Fundsurfer - a funding platform for creative, social and green projects. Intrigued, we caught up with Derek himself to find out more abo...
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What makes a Social Entrepreneur? We chat to the School for Social Entrepreneurs A little while ago, we were given a rather generous 20% discount to Startacus members to attend a  School for Social Entrepreneurs workshop  on Funding - a fab event by a pretty fab organisation. In light of this, we thought it’d be worth having a chat with Leonie Jarrett, Communications Officer of t...
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If there’s one industry that is booming at the moment, and tempting ever more people to try their hand at entrepreneurship, it’s the artisan food market. The public really have developed a taste for loving crafted, and unique food products, and this has opened up a huge range of possibilities for the food-loving, enterprising individual. However it's important to remember that setting...
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One of the UK’s newest and most innovative start-up accelerators will be opening soon in Belfast, aiming to put the city on the world stage as a hub for high growth potential startups. StartPlanetNI, delivered with support from Invest Northern Ireland, will deliver a truly unique international accelerator programme, combining exciting startup companies from NI with international peers on ...
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John Durham tell us about his new business ‘Communication Skills through the Arts (CoSkA)’ John Durham is an early stage entrepreneur who aims to take his new business idea and make it a living and breathing reality within the next month. Since Startacus is all about hearing from its members and John is a new member to the site, we gave John the chance to highlight his new ‘com...
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Ever wanted to take your passion for photography and turn it into a living and breathing business reality which makes money?! Looking to bridge the gap for the wannabe professional photographer and the realities they would face in running a trading business is engagelive.co. In essence it is an online training platform that offers free live classes, in-person workshops and mentoring to enhance yo...
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Growing the digital economy must surely be one of the most important steps that any nation can take in safeguarding the future security and prosperity of its people. But encouraging meaningful and sustained digital growth in this sector is far from straightforward, with many SMEs and more traditional businesses often struggling to build the connections necessary to achieve this ambition. Help, su...
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Nowadays, in order to ensure that your business grows and reaps the seeds of success, it is important to have a strong online presence. How you do this is up to you - perhaps you have a website, a blog or are big on social media? Whatever the case, you’re probably familiar with the ever-present struggle of writing your own content. It can take a lot of time, can be quite tedious and someti...
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With just under one month to go until the Intertrade Ireland Seedcorn Competition closes for entries we got the inside scoop from Connor Sweeney, competition Project Manager, on the competition, why an Irish Startup should apply, what they look out for in applications and perhaps most importantly (for applicants) what common mistakes that startups make when applying. Connor, great to speak to you...
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We all love convenience; being able to carry out mundane everyday tasks quickly and easily is something that we can’t get enough of. This resonates even more with those who own their own business. For example, if you send off a plethora of envelopes of letters every week, you’ll know just how tedious it can be. We were rather pleased to recently discover Re-post, an innovative creato...
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Taking a creative passion or skill and turning it into a ‘real-life’ trading business can be a tough thing to do. It’s also a process that many post-graduate artists and designers struggle to achieve; the commercialisation of one’s art can be as challenging as creating that art in the first place. So, when we had the opportunity to chat with Sandra L O’Hara, a D...
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Andy Parker is the Co-Founder & COO of Zealify, a career discovery platform, showcasing the opportunities and working environments at exciting, high-growth startups and SMEs. Post listing their Startup in the Startacus showcasing area for startups and ideas, Andy shares, amongst other things, details on what Zealify is all about, their journey, their vision for the future and some valuabl...
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