NDRC Startup Sprint - Your Gateway to Entrepreneurship in the South-East

A guest blog written by Andy McManagan, Programme Associate in NDRC partner hub Republic of Work.

For the past three years, NDRC has been trying to lift the level of support for founders in Ireland to a global level. By all standards it has been a success but sometimes it can be difficult for founders to understand what’s on offer, if they are at the right stage and how do they go about applying to give themselves the best chance of getting accepted.

Everyone has an idea. We are unique in our capacity to see how complexities of life unfold and where there are opportunities to make it better. Out of such ideas, entrepreneurs are born and these founders create startups which change how something in the world works. These companies can be very small, or can completely redefine what a market is, having an outsized impact on both individual lives and total economic output of the world. A grandiose statement but it is true. As a society, we need to encourage more talented individuals start market defining companies.

Last year, I took over the MD position at the National Digital Research Centre (NDRC) with a view to helping shape how Ireland as a whole can better support high growth founders. We are recruiting again for the summer accelerator cohort and I wanted to pull back the curtains for a trailer on what happens inside the programme for anyone considering it.

At a time with so much macro uncertainty there is one thing that always gets me excited about the future — the launch of a new NDRC Accelerator cohort at Dogpatch Labs.