2010 Winners

Established in 2003, Sigmoid Pharma is a privately-held drug delivery technology and pharmaceutical product development company. Sigmoid has developed two technologies, LEDDS™ and SmPill™, both of which can simultaneously enhance solubility and permeability while also permitting controlled or targeted delivery. Based on the unique ability of these technologies to target the colon and using only well known drugs, Sigmoid is developing innovative products to treat gastro-intestinal diseases with clear unmet clinical needs, including ulcerative colitis and Crohn's disease.

In the future, Sigmoid will develop innovative products, including combinations, to treat cardiovascular and neurological conditions and is developing a technology to permit the conversion of vaccines from injections to an oral pill format. Sigmoid has on-going collaborations with leading international academic and clinical centres in Ireland, the UK, Europe and the US. Sigmoid is positioning its technologies and products to address unmet global pharmaceutical industry and patient clinical needs.

NUI Maynooth's roots as a college extend back to 1795, but today the University is at the cutting edge of scientific research winning highest research income per academic in the Irish University sector for 2 years running. The University, which is home to 8,000 students, is truly international, with 12% of students and over 30% of academics coming from outside the country. In 2009, NUI Maynooth was ranked joint first for Student Employment.

Located close to the Irish and European headquarters of many multinational high-technology companies, NUI Maynooth continues to forge strong links with industry and is well placed to cater for the growing demand both regionally and nationally for high quality third level and fourth level graduates.

Blue Box Sensors is one of three companies to spin out from NUI Maynooth in 2009.

Medtronic is the global leader in medical technology, alleviating pain, restoring health and extending life for millions of people around the world. With deep roots in the treatment of heart disease, Medtronic provides a wide range of products and therapies - every five seconds, another life is improved by a Medtronic product or therapy.

Medtronic is present in Ireland since 1999. The state of the art facility in Galway is a centre of excellence for the development and manufacture of a number of the company's key medical technologies for the treatment and management of cardiovascular and cardiac rhythm disease.

The organisation also has a sales and shared service office in Dublin supporting key businesses including Cardiac Rhythm Disease Management, Neuromodulation, Spinal and Biologics, Diabetes, CardioVascular, and Ear Nose & Throat (ENT). Medtronic partners with medical professionals to develop life-changing technologies that improve the way chronic diseases are treated.

Concern Worldwide
Concern Worldwide is Ireland's largest international humanitarian organisation, dedicated to reducing suffering and ending extreme poverty. Since the beginning, over 40 years ago, Concern's focus has been on transforming the lives of the poorest people in the poorest countries of the world.

Constant learning is at the heart of Concern's work; hands on experience on the ground, informs new and sustainable ways of tackling poverty, hunger and disaster. Concern brings this learning to bear on policy decisions made at a local, national and global level, thereby ensuring that the greatest possible impact on poor people's lives and the wider fight against global poverty.

Valid Nutrition
Valid Nutrition is an Irish business that has revolutionised the treatment of severe malnutrition by treating starving people in their homes using Ready-to-Use Foods. This new paradigm has been adopted by the UN and is now being rolled out in over 35 countries worldwide. Valid Nutrition, a registered charity, operates a unique business model combining best commercial practice and corporate governance with a not-for-profit status wherein all revenues are reinvested to improve access to life saving foods. We research, produce and market an increasing range of innovative, highly effective nutritional products made exclusively in African countries.

Our activities add value to local crops; improve the food security and incomes of small-scale farmers, while also providing employment and stimulating sustainable economic activity in poor communities. This distinctive approach, of a social business that ultimately generates its own funding is a model adapted to the new global economic environment.

Irish Aid
Irish Aid is the Government of Ireland's programme of assistance to developing countries. Ireland has had an official development assistance programme since 1974. It has grown steadily over the years from modest beginnings to its current size (total ODA in 2010 is estimated to be €671.4 million). Ireland's development cooperation policy is an integral part of Ireland's wider foreign policy.

Irish Aid has supported Concern and Vaild International to develop the Community based Thereputic Care system (CTC). Initial funding was provided to carry out the research and Irish Aid has provided substantial support for the implementation of the CTC approach in a significant number of countries. In addition to supporting the development and implementation of CTC Irish Aid has also continued to support research in this area through support to Valid Nutrition (€426,000 in 2009). This includes their work on the targetted use of CTC for particularly vulnerable groups such as people living with HIV and AIDS.

Bausch + Lomb is dedicated to bringing visionary ideas to eye health. Its core businesses include contact lenses and lens care products, ophthalmic surgical devices and instruments, and ophthalmic pharmaceuticals. The Bausch + Lomb name is one of the best-known and most respected healthcare brands in the world. Founded in 1853, the company is headquartered in Rochester, N.Y., and employs more than 10,000 people worldwide. Its products are available in more than 100 countries.

Bausch + Lomb's Waterford manufacturing plant has grown from a small soft lens manufacturing operation established in 1980 to today's multi-function complex which, in addition to contact lens manufacturing, also includes pharmaceutical, RD&E and surgical. Now the principal contact lens plant for Bausch + Lomb worldwide, the operation employs 1,100 people in Waterford.

Bgate is an online order-capture and invoicing system that connects buyers and suppliers at a fraction of the cost of traditional business methods. The company was developed to tackle the communication gap between buyers and suppliers of goods and services who do business with each other on a regular basis.

The Bgate system can reduce the cost of processing a transaction from order-capture to invoice significantly; from €107 down to €2. With order-capture alone, Bgate can demonstrate a productivity gain of over 10,000%. The system requires no up-front costs and no training and can be introduced almost immediately to any business. The goal with Bgate is to establish the system as the de-facto industry standard for buyer-to-supplier communications. Bgate is aimed at small, medium and large businesses across all industries. Current clients include Allied Foods, Johnston Mooney O'Brien and Burger King. Since its inception in 2004 Bgate has processed over 80,000 transactions annually worth in excess of €60,000,000.

Mcor Technologies Ltd was set up by two brothers Dr Conor MacCormack and Fintan MacCormack with the vision of bringing 3D printing to the masses. Mcor have developed a revolutionary 3D printer, the Matrix 300, the only 3D printer in the world that uses A4 paper to make 3D objects - turning your ideas into rapid reality!

This key technology breakthrough significantly reduces the costs involved in 3D printing, making it more accessible and democratizing the innovation process.

The Matrix is up to 50 times less expensive than competitors' current technologies and the printer has been termed the world's most sustainable 3D printer by industry experts.

BiancaMed has developed a breakthrough wireless sensor & software technology for the non-contact monitoring of sleep and breathing in the home. Our vision is to transform personal health and wellbeing by delivering our unique non-contact sleep sensor to the home health market. We will shortly launch the world's first baby monitor product that monitors a baby's breathing while he sleeps.

Our technology is wireless so is non intrusive yet offers comparable performance to standard sleep measurement tools. Our technology is scalable enabling transfer into low cost consumer and clinical applications. Our combination of patent protected IP and in house know-how allow us to build value creating relationships with global players.

Headquartered in Dublin, with offices in Belfast and California, BiancaMed employs a team of 21. We are backed by leading Investors and are actively supported by Enterprise Ireland and Invest Northern Ireland.

InTime Media has designed a new application for TV and Radio broadcasters. A downloadable application for mobile phones which enables audience interaction via their mobile phone with programmes.

Audiences can interact through their mobiles as the show is transmitted, having downloaded the application through a link sent to them in response to a short code or by email/text. When opened, the application uses the phone's network connection to pull down the content set for that show by the producer in the configuration scripts created by the application management system.

Founded in 2008 by Dr. Mazhar Bari, Roy Horgan and Andre Fernon and located in Sandyford, Solarprint is leading the way in the commercialisation of the next generation of solar power. The Company has developed a fully printable, patented Dye Sensitised Solar Cell (DSSC) that is proving to be a highly credible alternative to standard silicon Photovoltaic's ("PV").

Solarprint's technology has several unique characteristics. It is fully printable and can be applied to glass, metal or plastic surfaces. This greatly simplifies volume manufacturing in order to produce the lowest cost of any PV technology for generating electricity. DSSC also generates significantly more energy in diffuse light with less angle dependency which makes it one the most diverse solar materials in existence today.

Solarprint has targeted three main market sectors for the rollout of its products, consumer electronics, building integrated photovoltaics and the automotive sector. Solarprint's technology has the potential to become a creditable alternative to major power utilities.

Dundalk-based Easydry is creator and manufacturer of the disposable eco-towel, which has sparked a global revolution in industries that depend on a constant supply of clean towels, such as hairdressing, beauty and healthcare. Cheaper, convenient, more hygienic and at least twice as absorbent as a traditional towel, the Easydry eco-towel provides an affordable, eco-friendly alternative to cotton towels and the daily grind of laundering them. Every Easydry eco-towel is recyclable, biodegradable and made using eco-friendly processes.

Over the past year, Easydry has opened a division in Australia and New Zealand and is broadening its reach overseas with deals in the pipeline for Scandinavia, America, Canada, the Middle East and central and Mediterranean Europe. It has also extended its range beyond various sizes and colours of towels to inlude bedroll, body wrap, disposable underwear, sheets, gowns and water and colour-resistant capes.

TreeMetrics ("TM") is a Cork based technology company. The company is a provider of commercial forest measurement, valuation and yield optimisation software systems. The products exploit leading edge technologies such as 3-D laser-scanning and artificial intelligence to determine and optimise the management of the growing forest.

This innovative technology based system provides a better method of matching standing forest areas to sawmill requirements. This information significantly reduces the volume of trees that need to be felled, thus reducing wastage. It is the first system in the world to also accurately measure tree shape, size and straightness, the key attributes in determining forest value. The reliability of the system has now been tested and proven in over 12 countries. All of the international trials have been conducted in conjunction with independent Government forest research agencies. Numerous published papers have been published as a result of this work.

The company has just moved from the development stage to the commercial stage, with the securing of its first commercial contract. This is the first time that technology has replaced the calipers in 100 years of tradition in forest measurement. The company's aim is to become the universal de facto standard of forestry measurement and management.

Dublin Airport Authority (DAA) is responsible for the management, development and operation of Dublin, Cork and Shannon Airports. In 2009 DAA introduced a new retail brand - The Loop. The Loop is the overarching brand for airport shopping, covering all retail at the 3 airports. Delivering innovative solutions to help customers is one of the key tenets of The Loop brand - the introduction of Shop & Collect, a new, free service is the first of a number of planned initiatives.

Increased travel security restrictions and the airline "one bag rule" contributed to a significant fall in retail sales at Dublin Airport. DAA introduced Shop and Collect as a solution to help customers overcome these restrictions. Since its launch it has had a marked impact on retail sales with average Shop & Collect transaction values 4 times higher than non Shop & Collect transactions. Our customers are buying much more, now that we've made it easier for them.

The Agri-Food and Biosciences Institute (AFBI) is one of the world's leading providers of scientific research and commercial services to private sector clients and public sector bodies. With our unique breadth of facilities and scientific capability in agriculture, animal health, food, environment, biosciences and economics, AFBI conducts a wide range of valuable projects both nationally and internationally.

The College of Agriculture, Food and Rural Enterprise (CAFRE) delivers a growing range of programmes to develop the knowledge, skills and values of people entering, or currently in, the agri-food industry. CAFRE encourages the industry to adopt world-class, leading edge technology and assists those within the industry to deal with specific issues of adopting these technologies within their own business environment.

'Neurolink' is a web-based, GP referral service designed by the Consultant Neurologists at St. Vincent's University Hospital in Dublin in collaboration with Healthlink. 'Neurolink' speeds up the referral process to neurologists, reduces patient anxiety about what is happening between GPs and Specialists, and reduces the need for almost 25% of referred patients to attend out patients at all.

Ireland has one of the lowest ratios of Consultant Neurologists per head of population in Europe. There are only 20 Consultant Neurologists in the Public Hospital system and over 600,000 people in Ireland have a neurological problem. As a result, waiting times to see a neurologist in Ireland can be prohibitively long - up to two years in some institutions. All referrals via 'Neurolink' have been answered within 24-48 hours.

Using 'Neurolink', the patient knows what is happening, the GPs know what is happening and, in many cases, treatment is instituted almost immediately. In effect, we save time and money, reduce anxiety and reduce waiting times for others if the neurology appointment is felt to be unnecessary.

The Clinical Translational Research and Innovation Centre (C-TRIC) led by the University of Ulster, Western Health and Social Care Trust, and Derry City Council, facilitates clinical research and the streamlining of new developments from the laboratory to the market place through a focused 'bench to beside' approach.

Located within the Altnagelvin Hospital complex, C-TRIC provides access to collaborative academic, business and clinical research in a bespoke environment. It is unique development on the island of Ireland and UK. The project, part of the North West Business Technology Zone, was initiated through the, InterTradeIreland supported, North West Science and Technology Partnership.

Clinical Conduct Associates are a European Clinical Research Organisation headquartered in Cork, Ireland with offices in Manchester, UK, and mainland Europe. CCA offer a range of clinical trial management services to the Pharmaceutical Industry to ensure new products are brought to market in an efficient and cost effective way. We manage research proposals from the conception and development of a project to the implementation and completion at Investigative Sites on a national and international scale.

At CCA we promote, facilitate and coordinate a network of GPs and Hospital consultants throughout Ireland, UK and Europe. These hospital and GP sites which number over 4000 all specialize in the areas of Cardiology, Oncology, Autoimmune And Inflammation, Allergy medicine, central nervous system, rheumatology, diabetes, and respiratory diseases. At Clinical Conduct Associates we understand the pressures associated with bringing a drug to market in today's environment.

We realize the need to condense timelines and reduce costs has never been greater. CCA through its revolutionary internet solution for the screening and recruitment of patients onto a clinical trial sets about increasing productivity by partnering early with project teams to optimize country placement, investigator site performance, reduce research