CitySwift is just one of the successful businesses that has passed through DCU’s UStart programme. Brian O’Rourke, founder and Chief Executive of CitySwift, explains how the company first began and how UStart supported and guided the company to success. Where did the business idea for CitySwift come from? The initial idea for CitySwift originated back...Continue Reading
Launched in 2018, GiveBack.ie is a passive way to raise funds to end street homelessness in Dublin. By downloading the social app, online shoppers can donate to the cause of homelessness without having to make a direct donation. Instead, the 1,200 retailers partnered with GiveBack.ie make a 1% to 10% donation on the online shopper’s...Continue Reading
20-year old UStart participant James Gallagher from Ratoath in County Meath is a 3rd year Computer Applications student at DCU and the founder of social enterprise GiveBack.ie together with his girlfriend Victoria Ryan-Nesbitt. GiveBack.ie is an online platform that enables Irish consumers to help some of the most vulnerable people in society by simply shopping...Continue Reading
Sheelagh Brady is a former Garda who left the force in 2012 to work with the UN as a Senior Security Analyst in Abuja, Nigeria. There she advised organisations such as Unicef, the World Health Organisation and the World Food Programme on the security environment, threats and managing risk when implementing their programmes on the...Continue Reading
The ten start-up teams supported by this year’s UStart student accelerator programme recently gathered at DCU’s Alpha Campus for the UStart Demo Day where the winners of the Best Start-up Opportunity and Best Pitch awards for 2017 were selected following a competitive pitching process. Demo Day marks the culmination of UStart, DCU’s accelerator programme which supports...Continue Reading
CitySwifter is a transport technology platform that enables commuters and event attenders to crowd-source transport. It was set up in 2016 by three friends from Longford – Brian O’Rourke, Alan Farley and Seán Byrne. Brian O’Rourke explains how the UStart student accelerator helped: “We already had the broad concept and our core team in place...Continue Reading