Paddy Cosgrave is out. Can Web Summit survive?

On Saturday, Web Summit chief executive and co-founder Paddy Cosgrave announced that he was resigning from his role at the head of the company with “immediate effect”.

The abrupt resignation came as the Dublin-based company continues to grapple with international backlash to Mr Cosgrave’s social media posts about the unfolding Israel-Gaza conflict. A number of the event’s highest profile sponsors and speakers withdrew from the conference after Mr Cosgrave tweeted that he was “shocked at the rhetoric and actions” of western leaders in support of Israel and that “war crimes are war crimes even when committed by allies”.

Web Summit says its Lisbon conference will go ahead as planned in November, but can the tech event survive the controversy around its CEO’s comments? And what will Paddy Cosgrave do next?

On today’s podcast, presenter Sorcha Pollak speaks to Irish Times technology journalist Ciara O’Brien about Cosgrave’s resignation as CEO of Web Summit.