Terry Clune wants us to get involved in passing on the word on smaller investment in Ireland, writes JOANNE HUNT
JUST BE the eyes and ears for Ireland – that’s all entrepreneur Terry Clune is asking of each of us.
If the company of your cousin in California, your daughter in Abu Dhabi or your fiancée in Finland wants to expand overseas, Clune wants to know about it. Pass on the lead to his Government- backed scheme ConnectIreland. com and, for every job your tip-off creates, you’ll get €1,500.
“We all have contacts. You don’t need to know the ceo of Google. Your second cousin might be a receptionist in a medical device company in Florida – that’s all we need.”
The idea came to Clune, the founder of the successful Kilkenny-based company Taxback.com, while giving a talk last year. When a 70-year-old woman in the audience said that her relations – who had left Kilkenny in the 1820s – had gone on to set up the Coca Cola Company, Clune was struck by the potential of the connection.
While Famine and emigration may have scarred the country, he feels the resulting diaspora is a pot of gold we have so far failed to tap. With the economy in tatters, he thinks there is no time like the present.
“We have a global diaspora now that, if we got behind it, could really help the Irish economy to turn around.”
Pitching his idea to the Government about a year ago, the aim was to target small and medium-sized companies and business people – the sort not reached by IDA Ireland. Minister for Jobs Richard Bruton took the bait and put the running of the programme out to tender, Clune got the gig.
Under the initiative, any person who successfully introduces a company to Ireland that creates jobs will be paid a minimum of €1,500 for each job, up to a maximum of 100 jobs. The will be paid €750 one year after the job is created and the balance after two years.
“If you can introduce us to a company that creates 30 jobs or more in a 12-month period, then the reward is doubled,” he says. “We want to ensure that we get the jobs for Ireland Inc as quick as we can.”
Clune’s company will be paid €1,0000-€2,500 by the State, for each job created, payable two years on.
Investing “a seven-figure sum” of his own money in the project and employing 30 Kilkenny-based staff to hunt down and develop the leads into jobs, isn’t he taking a risk?
“Absolutely. We don’t receive anything from the IDA if jobs fold after 13 months . . . but I really believe in this project. I’ve been successful in other areas of business – I employ 820 people in 22 countries. We’re good at what we do and I’m very, very driven to make sure this thing is going to work.”
But already a busy man, why put his own skin in this game?
“Look, the Government in my view is very progressive but, in order to turn our economy around, it needs the support of a lot of people. I would prefer that my kids when they reach the age of 20 wouldn’t have to emigrate. If I can do something to change that situation, I’ll do it.”
Clune says ConnectIreland.comis looking to "extend the net of the IDA by catching the smaller fish".
It’s not just any old fish he’s after, though.
“We are looking for quality companies that are export- focused. If an American hairdressing chain wants to come in and hire 20 hairdressers, that’s great, but this programme isn’t for that. It is to help bring in overseas companies that are exporting and adding wealth to the economy.”
With Martin Sheen, Michael Flatley and Saoirse Ronan already lending their support to the programme, Clune wants the rest of us to get involved too.
“This gives everybody an opportunity to take part in Ireland’s recovery simply by thinking about who you know,” he says.
“There are a lot of people who, unfortunately, are still looking backwards. They have lost in the past 10 years, maybe on property, but we need to stop looking back and look forward. It’s the only way we are going to get out of this problem.”
