Winner of High Potential Start-Up ‘Founder of the Year 2017’ announced
Tony McEnroe of SiriusXT has won the inaugural Enterprise Ireland High Potential Start-Up (HPSU) “Founder of the Year Award”, supported by Grant Thornton. SiriusXT has developed and built a bench-top, Soft X-Ray Microscope [SXT100] that is capable of generating high-resolution 3D images of the internal structure of whole biological cells. The SXT100 is built on soft x-ray source technology and has been exclusively licensed by the company.
SiriusXT was one of nine start-up companies to be selected for the Founder of the Year Award whereby each of the companies shortlisted were nominated by their founder peers. Liz Fulham of SalesOptimize and Eoin O’Broin of Solar AdTek were recognised and received awards as runners-up on the night.
The other nominees included Immersive VR Education; Hub Controls; Clubstohire.com; Future Ticketing;Feedpods and TVadSync.
The Founder of the Year award forms an important element of the HPSU Founders Forum. Enterprise Ireland created the HPSUFounders Forum in 2015 and currently there are over 100 participants from a variety of sectors including software, medical devices, food, engineering and construction. The objective of the Forum is to provide a platform for founders to help founders succeed internationally and scale faster.
Addressing delegates at the Awards, Kevin Sherry, Executive Director, Global Business Development said: “The Enterprise Ireland Founder of the Year Award forms an important part of the HPSU Founders Forum, providing a platform to acknowledge and celebrate the commitment that entrepreneurs and start-ups have made to build world class companies of the future. The main objective of the Forum is to provide a platform for founders to help founders succeed internationally and scale faster and Tony McEnroe, CEO of SiriusXT exemplifies a founder with a clear pathway to building international scale and with the potential to become a world leader in his field. The future looks bright for Irish start-ups and we congratulate Tony and wish all the nominees shortlisted here today the very best for the future.”
The judging panel of the HPSU Founder of the Year Award 2017 included former founder and HPSU alumni John Purdy, CEO of Ergo, Kevin Foley, Grant Thornton, Colin Goulding, Google Customer Experience and Joe Healy, Divisional Manager, HPSU, Enterprise Ireland.
As the overall winner, SiriusXT received a prize valued at €15,000 provided by Grant Thornton to further support the development of the company.
Announcing the winner, Kevin Foley, Partner, Grant Thornton said: “Grant Thornton are delighted to sponsor the Enterprise Ireland Founder of Year Awards 2017. The quality of the participants is a true reflection of the talented entrepreneurs we currently have across all sectors in Ireland. The awards are an excellent way of recognising the talent that is being nurtured and developed with the support of Enterprise Ireland’s HPSU Founders Forum programme. We look forward to working with Tony and SiriusXT to recognise the full potential of a very worthy winner.”
