The situation at an Enterprise Ireland-backed medtech firm last year was “very grim” after delays in bringing its products to market, with shareholders warning that funding might not be forthcoming, its chief executive (CEO) has said.
The senior executive was giving evidence at the Workplace Relations Commission (WRC) on Monday on complaints alleging unlawful non-payment of wages and constructive dismissal by a senior software developer.
Hammad Ul Ahad is pursuing complaints under the Unfair Dismissals Act 1977 and the Payment of Wages Act 1991 against his former employer, Amnexis Holding Ltd, a Dublin-based software developer.
The firm is involved in developing virtual assistance and transcription software for use by medical professionals, the WRC was told.
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Ul Ahad’s case is that from the start of July 2025, his hours and pay were cut by 50 per cent in what he said had been a “unilateral” decision by the company. He quit after four months on half pay, the tribunal heard.
“I couldn’t work under the enforced conditions. I was facing severe financial difficulties; the contract was already void,” Ul Ahad said.
The sum in dispute in the pay claim was not specified during the hearing. Ul Ahad’s evidence was that he was supporting two families in his home country of Pakistan.
He accepted under cross-examination by John Madden, instructed by Kate O’Brien of Hogan Dowling McNamara Solicitors for the respondent, that there was a clause in his job contract providing for lay-off and short-time working.
His position was that this was meant to be in the event of a short-term shortage of work. Ul Ahad said, however, that the decision to cut his hours was a “financial shareholder strategy” with “no clear timeline” and was “clearly not a temporary shortage of work”.
The company’s founder and CEO, Joachim Mueller-Wende, said in his evidence that the firm in early 2025 was in “a very grim situation”.
The company’s position was that the development of new app features was stalled for most of that year because of difficulties with its underlying data architecture, though Ul Ahad disputed this.
There had been “some good results” from tests of its virtual assistant app, Eva, at Germany’s largest hospital which had started in October 2023, Mueller-Wende said.
However, Eva was not ready to go to market, and the company had decided bring out a stand-alone transcription app for use by medical professionals, which it called Quixxs, Mueller-Wende told the WRC.
“So, being late launching Quixxs – some competitors had been there a year earlier – and not having been able to create Eva to go to market either, we were facing a very grim situation at the start of 2025,” Mr Mueller-Wende said.
In particular, Mueller-Wende said there was “overcapacity” in back end development work on Quixxs, which was Ul Ahad’s area, and he could see “no other candidate to cut back”.
He said Ul Ahad “agreed with me to accept the period of cutting down” with the proviso that it start in July 2025, and not in June that year as originally proposed. Ul Ahad strongly disputed this.
Adjudication officer Orla Jones closed the hearing and is expected to give her decision in writing on Ul Ahad’s complaints in due course.
