Irish SMEs have proven their resilience over the past few years, but they are still facing multiple
challenges given the current business environment, including the ongoing economic effects of
Brexit, recovering from the Covid-19 pandemic, the availability of skilled staff and access to new
customers and markets.
As June Butler, Chief Executive Officer of the Strategic Banking Corporation of Ireland (SBCI),
points out, the abrupt increase of input costs, in particular energy costs, presents the most
significant challenge to SMEs in Ireland right now. However, relative to their European
counterparts, Irish SMEs have not invested to the same levels in energy-efficiency measures in
recent years.
The European Investment Bank Investment Survey, ‘European Firms and Climate Change
2020/2021’, shows that European SMEs allocate on average 12% of their total investment to
measures to improve their energy efficiency. Comparatively, Irish SMEs devote only 6% of their
investment budget, suggesting there is opportunity for efficiency gains in this area.
“We want to help Irish businesses to address this gap and make it easier for them to enhance
their energy efficiency and improve their sustainability in the long-term. In order to stay
competitive and improve their future growth prospects, Irish SMEs need to consider their green
transition and invest more in areas such as sustainability and digitalisation,” says Butler.
“We know that making a significant investment decision can be difficult when costs are rising,
but we are committed to helping Irish SMEs overcome these challenges by providing them with
accessible and affordable finance. To this end, we have developed and recently launched our
Energy Efficiency Loan Scheme [EELS].”
Specifically tailored
The EELS is a €150m loan guarantee scheme specifically tailored to the needs of SMEs,
farmers and fishers investing in energy efficient equipment and looking to reduce their energy
bills.
The scheme offers low-cost finance ranging from €10,000 to €150,000 at reduced interest rates
and with repayment terms of up to ten years. “This repayment flexibility aims to ensure that the
business’s existing cash flow is not negatively impacted for the investment cost,” notes Butler.
“Credit is available across a range of finance products to ensure the best match for the business
funding requirements. Types of finance include term loans, hire purchase and asset-finance
products.”

At present, EELS is available through AIB, Bank of Ireland and Capitalflow, with additional on-
lenders to follow in the coming weeks. Businesses can apply for the funding through a

straightforward two-step process that starts by completing the eligibility application form
available on the SBCI website (www.sbci.gov.ie). Eligible businesses will receive an eligibility
number (a code) that applicants provide to one of the participating on-lenders as part of their
credit application.
The energy-efficient equipment SMEs can invest in through the scheme ranges from heat
pumps, solar panels, LED lighting, chillers and fluid coolers to commercial water boilers, electric
vehicle charging points and other energy-saving technology.

“For instance, from conversations our team had with farmers who visited our stand at the
National Ploughing Championships in September, there was a lot of interest in EELS funding for
the installation of solar panels on farm buildings. Most farms have abundant roof space suitable
for this,” says Butler.
“Businesses in the hospitality sector may choose to avail of EELS funding for installing solar
panels or switching to LED lighting, but they could also use it for the purchase of energy-efficient
A4-rated kitchen equipment. This could include commercial ovens, fridges and dishwashers, or
even commercial water boilers and commercial laundry washers or dryers – all of which will
reduce their ongoing energy usage.”
Other businesses are considering this scheme to fund the installation of electric vehicle
charging points, so that their customers can charge their electric vehicles while staying at their
hotel or having dinner at their restaurant, she adds.
The Sustainable Energy Authority of Ireland maintains a central listing, the ‘Triple E Register for
Products’, which contains details of all of the energy-saving equipment that is eligible for funding

under EELS. This exhaustive register contains products that all meet a minimum set of energy-
efficiency criteria and typically are of a best-in-class efficiency standard.

Stimulating climate-friendly investment, supporting sustainability and the transition to a net-zero
economy is one of the key priorities of the SBCI’s strategy, according to Butler.
“EELS represents a milestone in our commitment to support the Government’s goal of achieving
a 51% reduction in greenhouse gas emissions by 2030, as indicated in the Climate Action Plan
2021. Businesses in Ireland account for around 13% of the country’s greenhouse gas
emissions, so reducing the energy that a business consumes will contribute to the reduction of
their carbon emissions,” she says.
“Not only does EELS offer businesses opportunities to lower their running costs and increase
profit margins; it also protects them from current and future risks such as energy costs and
carbon tax.
“Making a commitment to save energy and reduce emissions may also help businesses attract
and grow their base of customers in line with increasing consumer interest in climate change
and sustainability.”
Purpose and priorities
Established in 2014, the SBCI’s purpose is to improve the structure of finance markets for Irish
businesses, so that it is easier for these businesses to get the finance they need. This helps
businesses to prosper and builds economic activity in Ireland.
To date, more than 50,000 Irish SMEs from across different economic sectors, from agriculture
to wholesale and retail, have availed of SBCI-funded or guaranteed products. It has provided a
combination of low-cost liquidity and risk-sharing guarantees on loans to Irish SMEs totaling
over €3.2bn.

“We continue to support businesses that are still dealing with the economic impact of the Covid-
19 pandemic and the continued uncertainty surrounding Brexit. Our COVID-19 Loan Scheme

and Brexit Impact Loan Scheme offer low-cost lending of up to €1.5m per applicant over a six-
year period,” says Butler.

“In addition, as we provide an 80% guarantee to the participating on-lenders, collateral
requirements are reduced, with loans up to €500,000 being unsecured. Both of these schemes
will run until the end of December 2022 or until fully subscribed and are available through a
range of finance providers, including credit unions.”
Chief Executive Officer of the SBCI since September 2021, Butler has over 20 years’
experience in the financial services sector. Prior to her appointment, she served as Head of
SME Banking and Sectors in Bank of Ireland where she was responsible for formulating and
driving the strategic direction for the business, including the delivery of the finance and funding

requirements of Irish SMEs. She has also led a team of sector specialists providing strategic
insight into the needs of Irish businesses across a variety of sectors.
“My priorities as CEO of the SBCI over the coming months are threefold. Firstly, I want us to
continue delivering government policy measures by increasing access to finance for Irish SMEs
through large-scale loan guarantee schemes,” she says.
“At the same time, we will endeavour to promote sustainability through the development of
targeted financial solutions such as EELS, which address the challenges posed by climate
change to SMEs and the broader economy.
“Thirdly, I want us to enable SMEs to grow and prosper through the delivery of innovative
supports which we may develop through strategic partnerships for SMEs as they grow their
businesses.”
For more information, visit the website, www.sbci.gov.ie, follow the SBCI on social media
(@SBCIreland) or get in touch via email at info@sbci.gov.ie.

Virgin Media Ireland recently appointed Aidan D’Arcy as Vice-President of Wholesale and Business with immediate effect, reporting to CEO Tony Hanway. Having first joined the business as an engineering graduate in 2004, in his new role D’Arcy will be responsible for the strategic growth and development of Virgin Media Business, while also working closely with the Tech Solutions and Consumer functions.

An important area of responsibility for D’Arcy will be to oversee the expansion of Virgin Media’s full-fibre network – the focus of a current €200m investment by the company. The upgrade is expected to take three years to complete and create over 500 jobs, eventually delivering speeds of up to 10Gbps (Gigabits per second) to 1 million premises nationwide.

“Virgin Media’s full-fibre investment is an exciting development for customers across Ireland. It demonstrates our commitment to providing the best-connected entertainment experiences to Irish consumers and provides a step towards a 10G broadband service,” says D’Arcy.

The investment also offers the potential to work with other service providers at a wholesale level, he adds. “Wholesale is an interesting opportunity for Virgin Media and we will continue to monitor any potential place we could take in this area.”
Businesses will see benefits from going full-fibre from the perspective of speed superiority being maintained with flexibility to upgrade to 1G and also to add on tailored business services such as Virgin Media’s Cloud Voice product and Business WiFi.“Additionally, our business TV offering is going from strength to strength with our TV360 platform and some exciting current and new content in the pipeline,” D’Arcy notes.

Partnering with purpose
Virgin Media Business is very mindful of the unprecedented challenges facing businesses at the moment and is helping them as a trustworthy and reliable partner.
“Certainty is a key condition that businesses need and arguably the most illusive one over the past few years. Covid-19 was a difficult period for many businesses to navigate through and now there are fresh challenges emerging from inflation and supply-chain uncertainty – to name just two. On top of this, cyber threats are more prevalent now than ever,” says D’Arcy.

“Robust protections for businesses are important as we see the increasing use of cloud and digital services. Virgin Media’s connectivity portfolio from SD-WAN to Dedicated Internet Access and broadband all have options for cyber-security enablement. If any customer doesn’t have cyber protection – which we would encourage all businesses to have – we have options for them to review this with our expert team.”

The Central Statistics Office’s ‘Survey on E-Commerce and ICT 2021’ revealed that 59% of businesses had purchased cloud computing services, up from 51% in 2020. It also showed that one third of enterprises made use of interconnected devices or systems that can be monitored or controlled remotely via the Internet.

With the more widespread move towards a more digital future, it has become essential for businesses to be equipped with better connectivity and collaboration to fully embrace this transition. The gap in connectivity capabilities between larger enterprises and SMEs became apparent during the pandemic. However, the pandemic also presented an opportunity for smaller businesses to bridge the divide and increase their appetite for digital transformation.

In its white paper, The Road to the Digital Future of SMEs, IDC stated: “From Voice-over Internet Protocol [VoIP] to accessing the cloud, the benefits of flexible working, improving digital marketing and enhancing customer experience mean that reliable, high Internet-connection speed is a necessity for the future.” According to D’Arcy, this is especially true for SMEs taking their first steps towards a future that looks exponentially more digital than ever before and where hybrid working will become the norm.

The third annual National Remote Working Survey, released by NUI Galway in May, revealed that, of those employees who could work remotely, 52% were currently working hybrid, 40% fully remotely and only 8% were fully onsite. Compiled from responses from over 8,400 employees, the research highlighted that 30% of all respondents indicated that they would change job if their future remote working preferences were not facilitated.

“With many workplaces adopting a hybrid model of working, reliable and fast connectivity lies at the heart of this journey for small firms as they endeavour to empower their people to do their job wherever they are, whenever it matters and however works best for everyone,” says D’Arcy.

“Good connectivity is crucial for SMEs in helping people to collaborate better with colleagues and customers remotely. It has the potential to improve productivity for individuals working remotely, in the office or anywhere else – allowing people to do their jobs in a healthy, sustainable way in this new normal.”

Backing Business
Another important way that Virgin Media Business has shown its commitment to SMEs in recent years has been its #BackingBusiness initiative, which involved a €1m support fund being pledged in 2020.

“Our goal is to create opportunities for all businesses to grow through digital technology. With #BackingBusiness, we wanted to support them by sharing their inspiring stories of resilience and promote their businesses across our Virgin Media television channels and our social media platforms,” D’Arcy explains.
“With a reach of around 2.7 million people every week across our channels, we were able to support over 300 businesses through promotions, helping them to get back to business. We took our shows on the road, broadcasting on Ireland AM, Elaine, The Six O’Clock Show and The Tonight Show from Limerick, Cork and Kilkenny, showcasing some wonderful local businesses.”

Virgin Media Business then took the initiative a step further in partnership with Digital Business Ireland (DBI), Permanent TSB, Milk Bottle Labs and Local Enterprise Offices. Five successful applicants benefited from a complete digital transformation to enhance their e-commerce offering and trading platform so they could compete globally.

The digital transformation package, funded by Permanent TSB, included a professionally built e-commerce store on Shopify by Milk Bottle Labs; one year of free fibre business broadband with Virgin Media Business; dedicated training in digital marketing from their Local Enterprise Office; business development support and full membership of DBI’s extensive network; and expert support to boost their digital delivery.
“The idea was to help these small businesses make the most of new online consumer spending patterns with support from industry experts to help raise their e-commerce offering to the next level,” says D’Arcy.

“#BackingBusiness proved so popular and impactful to indigenous Irish SMEs in 2020 and 2021 that we will be continuing the programme in 2022 and beyond. The next phase of the initiative will bring together two of our passions – sustainability and supporting Irish businesses – and the focus will remain on innovative, forward-thinking and ambitious businesses.”

In June, Loci Orthopaedics was awarded over €8m in funding and financial support from the European Commission via the highly competitive European Innovation Council (EIC) Accelerator Programme – a major validation for the new implant it has developed for the treatment of thumb base joint arthritis. The Galway-based company will receive €2.5m in grant funding initially, followed by a €5.5m equity investment, supported by the European Investment Bank.

Over 30 million people in the EU and 20 million people in the US are affected by thumb base joint arthritis, a condition which causes pain and decreased hand function. Driven to improve the lives of sufferers and address the unmet clinical need they identified, Dr Brendan Boland and Gerry Clarke founded Loci Orthopaedics in 2017 as a spin-out from NUI Galway, University College Cork and KU Leuven in Belgium.

“We used the most recent biomechanics research to ensure the implant we designed fully recreates the natural biomechanics of the joint for superior clinical outcomes,” says Clarke.

“To receive this level of funding is a massive endorsement of the need for a better treatment for this crippling condition. It will enable us to complete a clinical trial we started recently and pursue regulatory clearance in the EU and US, prior to full-scale commercialisation and clinical use,” adds Boland.

Revolutionising bone repair
Also in the field of orthopaedics, Zoan BioMed recently announced a partnership with Swedish 3D bioprinting company Cellink, which it hopes will lead to a future where bone breaks can be repaired by 3D printing bones made from marine coral.
Founded in 2016 by Declan Clarke and Ronnie Robins, Zoan BioMed designs and develops orthopaedic devices from the ethical and sustainable cultivation of marine coral, grown at its state-of-the-art facility on the shores of Lough Inagh in Connemara. Along with leading clinicians around the world, Zoan BioMed recognised the huge potential of marine coral to improve patient outcomes and reduce the costs associated with bone repair.

“Because of its comparative similarities to human bone structure and inherent strength and purity, marine coral is a highly effective bone grafting substitute,” says Stephen Wann, CEO, Zoan BioMed.

The company has developed the world’s first, scalable indoor coral production system with ISO 13485 accreditation. When harvested, refined into granules and implanted by a surgeon into the bone trauma site, the material accelerates healing, safeguards against infection, reduces surgeon operating time and ultimately gets patients back on their feet and enjoying life quicker.

“With Cellink, we have the ideal partner that can build upon the encouraging trial results we have observed with our coral material. It is incredibly exciting to envisage that we can mimic and improve these results with a 3D-printed solution that can offer customised patient devices,” says Wann.

To date, Zoan BioMed has been funded through private investment, along with backing from the European Fund, Enterprise Ireland, Western Development Commission and Údarás Na Gaeltachta. In May it announced its latest fundraising round of up to €5m, to allow it to scale and grow internationally.

Easing discomfort

Meanwhile, three angel syndicates from the Halo Business Angel Network led a recent €1.925m investment in SymPhysis Medical, which is developing a device that eases the discomfort and distress of fluid in the chest for cancer patients undergoing palliative care.

Company founders Dr Michelle Tierney and Tim Jones uncovered the under-met need for effective treatment of fluid in the chest, or malignant ple

ural effusion, as part of the NUI Galway BioInnovate Fellowship programme. The condition is experienced by roughly half of metastatic cancer patients and can cause severe shortness of breath and chest pain. Often patients are fitted with an invasive and uncomfortable pleural catheter.

Using novel technologies, Tierney and Jones are working on a discreet, patient-centric drainage device called ‘Releaze’, which is less invasive to place than leading competitor devices on the market and can be removed after just 30 days.

Crucially, a usability study carried out with the UK’s National Innovation Centre for Ageing has shown that the device can be managed by patients themselves without the assistance of a nurse. “The ability to successfully drain the fluid and to perform this with confidence in an outpatient setting will greatly benefit patients,” said Dr David Breen, a leading interventional pulmonologist in Galway University Hospital, who has been advising the team for the past four years.

SymPhysis Medical has filed two patent applications relating to the novel aspects of the technology used to create the new device. According to the co-founders, the funding will be used to complete product development and target Food and Drug Administration (FDA) clearance. It will also help the company to expand its team from three to seven people by the end of this year.

“Following FDA clearance, we expect test market sales in the US to reach €1.5m in the first year, starting in Q4 2023. We are already working with two of the top five cancer care centres in the US. The team will quickly follow the rollout there by seeking the CE Mark in the EU and, by Q4 2025, we expect turnover to reach €49m,” says Jones.

Addressing air bubbles
Moving down to Cork, Gasgon Medical recently raised €2.25m as part of a funding round led by DBIC Ventures and including a number of private investors in the US. This comes on top of the company’s success in winning a €3m Fast Track to Innovation grant from the EIC last December and being awarded the top Seedcorn prize of €100,000 in 2021.
Founded by Vincent Forde in 2018, Gasgon Medical has developed a low-cost device called AirVault that attaches directly to intravenous (IV) drips in hospitals to eliminate air bubbles. These can be fatal for patients if they enter the bloodstream and potentially dangerous for nurses, who must break the IV line if air bubbles form, which exposes them to medications that can be harmful over time.

“We are currently carrying out pilot studies of our patent-pending technology in hospitals in Ireland, Europe and the US. They see it as a no-brainer and our aim is for every IV system worldwide to have an AirVault attached as the de-facto solution to eliminating air bubbles,” says Forde.

Currently employing six people, Gasgon Medical plans to hire in Ireland and the US with this new round of funding. The money will also be used for marketing and expanding into new markets, including veterinary and human use.

“The resources required to track and eliminate air from IVs is a constant drain for nurses and health systems. Our priority is in accelerating development work to attain regulatory approval, to be ready to launch products into hospitals, with an initial focus on the US,” says Forde.