"Ah, sure it's grand" - an easy going Irish expression that belies a cultural attitude that possibly holds the startup ecosystem back. One of the things myself and Fiona Kelly set out to do when we opened Baseline Community + Workspace a little over a year ago was to agitate for behavioural change in Irish founders, investors, and the wider system that aims to support them.
We don't believe we can wait for government to catch up with other ecosystems, it has to be pushed by founders. So it's great to have the opportunity to lead a conversation on how to level-up the ecosystem from the ground up, from a founder's perspective:
Baseline member Meji Abidoye grew up in Nigeria, studied in the US, and worked for Google and Amazon, before taking part in Y Combinator last year to start Abundant, a company that creates high quality training data for agents and multimodal AI.
Biotech entrepreneur, Jack O'Meara, co-founded Oxford based Ochre Bio to discover new RNA therapeutics, leading the company to sign a $1bn partnership to develop novel regenerative treatments for advanced liver disease. Jack has recently moved back to Dublin, started a new company in an adjacent space which is yet to launch, and has raised significant capital for it.
Baseline member Cameron Yarbrough moved his family from the Bay Area to Dublin last year. As a therapist and executive coach, he built up a practice working closely with Silicon Valley founders, CEOs and leaders. This led to him found Torch, a leadership platform which raised almost $90m to scale. He's working on something new, to be launched later this year.
One of the first people in Ireland to recognise the potential of the web for creating new types of global businesses was Ray Nolan. Years before there was any kind of startup ecosystem, Ray and Tom along with a small team were busy pulling the rug out from under a global travel system that was still largely paper based, and slow moving. Hostelworld was acquired in 2009, and Ray has continued to create, invent, and drive forward other businesses including eDesk, as well as being a long term supporter of Irish founders, and investor in Irish startups.
So, it's a very different mix of backgrounds, but also real perspective grounded in other ecosystems that is relevant for the theme of this conversation.
We're delighted to partner with Stripe for this edition of Stripe Snacks. If you'd like to join, sign up here, space is limited and we're nearing capacity.
🔗 https://lnkd.in/eiiq7t7U
📅 25th September 2025
🕑 17:30–20:00
📍 Baseline Community + Workspace > 61 Thomas St, D08 W250.
cc Stripe / Jamie Heaslip / Jenna M.