Ep 19 - Damien Mulley - Start-Up Programme Manager at UCC

0:01 Hi, welcome to the Founders and Funding podcast. I'm your host, Philip Smith. On the podcast, I'll be interviewing founders, investors, startup advisors on how to fund the journey of your startup and some tips and advice they have for you along the way. This podcast is sponsored by Perfect Technologies and Leighton. Enjoy the episode. Hi, Damien, welcome to the Founders and Funding podcast. Thank you, nice to be here. It's nice to have you here, Damien, to kick us off. Could you tell me a bit about your company and your role? Yeah, I'm, I work for UCC Innovation. So I'm startup program manager for UCC Innovation. And one of the programs I work on is Ignite.

0:43 So we're an incubation program for recent graduates from any Irish university, and we have recent graduates and also on campus we have UH students who have maybe business ideas and we help them to maybe turn it into reality. Fantastic and Damon, just for listeners who might not be familiar, what is UCC? UCC is University College Cork, so it's one of the the oldest universities in Ireland and it would have maybe about 25,000 students on various programs full time and part time undergraduate and postgraduate. And there might be in the region about 3000 staff that supports those students and we're based in Cork.

1:28 I've not mentioned I'm from Cork yet. Now imagine I'm from Cork. That's very important when you're from Cork, it has to be it. Is you have to get it in the first sentence. Yeah, If I was from Cork, I'd I'd be doing that as well. And and what does average day look like right now for you? So for me, we every every couple of months we bring new startups onto our program. So this week actually we brought a couple of new starts onto the program. So it was all start for them. So an average day for me would be coordinating with trainers, with workshop facilitators, with guest speakers and then working with our existing startups and our new startups on getting their ideas into shape and turn them into reality. And this week as well is a very packed week because as well as you start starting the program, we have our awards and showcase on Thursday.

2:27 So we're coordinating that we'll have a couple of 100 people seeing our startups pitch and there is an award show as well for best business plan and best idea. So it's every day is is quite different. Tuesdays and Wednesdays would be where all the workshops and guest speakers come in. And then the rest of the days would be again coordinating with the startups and coordinating with trainers and speakers and mentors and investors. Fantastic. That sounds really exciting. And is there, I suppose, do you find, I was thinking here in terms of the steps that have been found at the university? Is it mostly from undergrad or postgrad students?

3:10 Is a combination of all the above? So what we we get is we get students that might have just graduated, they've been working an idea maybe in second and third year and 4th year. Sometimes it's a project if they're doing a post grad. So they could be doing, say a master's and it might come from that. And sometimes it's from people that might have graduated a couple of years back and they, they've gone into industry. But there was always something, I guess kind of nudging at them in their brain. And then say over Christmas or over an Easter, they go, you know what, I'm going to take that leap now. I've been in the industry. I've got this idea. I think now is the time to do it. And so they come in to us and we we have a couple of meetings and then we might recommend them joining the program. And then they pitch the idea to a panel of our advisors and our mentors.

4:04 We might invite them to come onto the program then. So we see, we see sometimes the journey of an undergraduate and as they graduate, then they might want to join the program. Or sometimes people have heard of us through careers offices or just from friends and family, and they can come onto the program too. Yeah, it's just really interesting. Just it really excites me that university kind of start up scene and find out how it works, because I've seen a lot of great serfs coming from, from universities and I regret myself not having taken that opportunity at the time. But it's good to hear a lot of a lot of students are. And how has UCC helped startups with how to fund their their journey?

4:50 How have they opened that part of the journey for startups? So there's there's, there's a couple of things actually. So 1 is we have two programs during the year for, for existing students on the grads and post grads called Startup Lab. And at the end of startup Lab, we actually have prize money to help you with your startup idea. So there's Dash. Then there's also we run a student award program. So there's 10 to €15,000 in prize money for, again, best idea, best start up idea. So you get funding that way. We encourage people then to apply for the Enterprise Ireland Student Startup Awards as well.

5:35 That can be another way of funding it. We also encourage people to get their idea and get selling. So the most important thing really for a startup is revenue. I mean, an idea is great and iterating out and iterating on it is great, but it's, it's getting funding to and then we are supported by the local enterprise offices here in Cork. And so they have various funding routes from feasibility studies to priming grants to maybe expansion grants. And we work with the startups and the local enterprise offices to get funding that way. And then there's additional funding from, say, Angel investors, and we work with them. And there are then private investors that come to our events, like the showcase that we're having this week. And then sometimes some of the people that have been on the Ignite program end up becoming high potential startups with Enterprise Ireland.

6:30 So an example recently would be Dura Bell America. Sullivan was on the date program. He was a postgraduate doing a PhD. The idea came from there, finished postgraduate, finished a PhD, came to Ignite, worked with Ignite, got various funding routes there and eventually then worked with Enterprise Ireland. So there is, I guess, a lot of funding routes. And also we really encourage students and startups to just enter all the various startup competitions that are out there. There's loads there and these can be all nice little bits of money to keep you going and keep you motivated. And it's also good if you don't win the prize.

7:11 It's a very good way of networking and you can find partners, customers or potential investors there. Yeah, I I really like that. I think it's great to introduce uh, students and uh, founders to local offices, enterprise relevant and diverse mechanisms and grants there. But I think there is, there is a really kind of unique opportunity, uh, for students to look at those, umm, or say those kind of hackathons and those, uh, prizes and the kind of those, uh, targeted, umm, grants and loans for them as well, which uh, only they can avail of. Uh, but I think it's, there's a lot, there's a lot of, I think students and founders don't know where to start. So I think UCC is really kind of sounds like they're really filling that kind of gap of educate and showing them where to go. We do, we actually give specific kind of other seminars and modules and all the ways that you can get money for your start up idea.

8:02 And we we have a fantastic bunch of students at the moment that as you said are going to the hackathons, they're going to the Hackathon Europe. They've been winning competitions locally in Cork, in Ireland and in Europe as well. And there's there's something I think has changed in the past couple of years. I do think it's the influence of maybe quarter Dojo and other programs that we're actually seeing the effects of that now where students are coming in and they have that start mentality even before they come to UCC. And so they have a running start. And so we've seen first years doing very well at the moment in second years and that starts to feed into Ignite as well.

8:43 So there's, there's a lot of stuff happening and I think there's a lot of students taking that leap and just trying stuff out. And so it's, it's probably easier, especially with funding from the likes of Amazon and other companies as well and say Claude where you give them tokens or giving hosting. So it's much easier to become a startup and then just pitch and win all those prizes. Yeah, I've seen, you know, companies get more involved, but it is great like it seems like the founders getting younger and younger and the other starting earlier and there's a much more kind of a entrepreneurship driven culture I think that's happening at. But you know, UCC is no small part of that to to be pushing that forward.

9:26 And I suppose more generally, Damon, what is the best way to fund a startup sharing in your opinion? For me, I think it's it's bootstrapping, it's seeing all the resources out there and use as much as possible. Say for example, Ignite, when someone starts in the program, there's a stipend is when you start off, there's a stipend sale of €5000 to to help you. You've got desk space as well in UCC. So you're not paying rent, you're not paying electricity. You've got your, your free Internet connection and UCC, Bing University has really good Internet connections. So all those small little costs, I guess are out of the way. And then we do encourage as quickly as possible to get paying customers because that validates you. It gets you used to dealing with money and expenses. We, we give workshops and seminars around financial projections and looking after your money. And when we then put you in front of VCs or investors, they can see that you're earning money and you couldn't, you can actually make money.

10:40 And then the local enterprise offices as well, like that whole idea that you can actually generate revenue. I mean, sometimes people have an idea and they're working on the idea and they're, they're two years into it and they're still working on the idea. There's a maybe a fear of actually open armed jumping in, seeing what's going to happen. But once I think you start generating even a small bit of revenue, like two or three paying customers, we have someone on the program, they're only on the program a couple of months at this stage and they've already got paying customers and it's great validation for themselves and paying customers. Sometimes they love startups and they advocate strongly for you.

11:21 So some of those paying customers get you more paying customers. And once again, there's there's money coming in. It becomes easier maybe for investors to happily give you funding or invest in you. Yeah, I really agree with that. I think and a lot of fun founders kind of waited for the perfect time before they, you know, they want to take on customers, they want to go to market. But I think if you can get some early customers and especially if those customers understand that these are students or it's a young company, it's a startup and you know, often with these software's, you know, the price point isn't allowed either. So I think it's good to see, you know, getting those initial customers was good to see companies going to taking a bit of a risk or even a small risk on these setups to support them. And particularly if Irish companies can do that, I think it's very important.

12:10 I'd agree. And we, we've had guest speakers in so say Becky Popova from everywhere English and she was saying to our startups that use the fact that you're a startup and you're just starting it in a way you, they're more forgiving, they're more patient with you. And people love the underdog, Irish people, Irish culture loves the underdog. And they'll back you the back, the small company way more. As they said, they're more forgiving than maybe a professional outfit that might have boogie software. If you have boogie software, they'll, they're going look, you're, you're new, you're going to fix it. That's OK. So huge advantages of, of being a startup and getting something that's not perfect, but again, done is better than perfect. Just get it out there.

12:59 Paying customers will, because you're paying will give you good strong feedback and that helps you out as well to make a better product. And they're there in a way. They're advocates for you. It's fantastic. Yeah, I think if more syrups can do that, I think would be a great thing for them. And to look at the phone in Teams Epidemic, what are the best skills you've seen from new founders that's maybe helping them to be successful? I actually think it's resilience. It's being able to listen. Umm, this whole idea of getting out of the office, getting out of the building is really important. Going out and meeting people, being able to be curious. Umm, what we do in Ignite is we, we have alumni come in every couple of weeks and give a guest talk. And what the alumni, they always say is talk to more people. If they had their time again, it would be get out of the office more, talk to more people and just listen and being able to modify their idea.

14:03 I think some people go in and they, they have a strong idea to have a strong idea of what the solution is and they're not willing to make any changes. But if you're open to making changes once you have informed data, then that's that's the best quality. It's resilience as being curious, open to other ideas and then making those changes. And then speed is the other thing. It's get it out there as I was like, I'm probably repeating myself too much, but it's it's execution of an idea and getting it out and then making modifications to it. Oh, I think it's good. You know, I think it's important to make that message clear because I think a lot of startup founders, umm, they are that they're not, they're not trying to, you know, as you put it, they're kind of done as better than perfect. They're trying to achieve perfection. The perfection doesn't exist and you can end up chasing your tail for years doing that.

14:58 And I'm getting that, you know, get no one speaking to nobody. So I think it's a very important highlight that. No, we, we, we actually, we have like a performance coach who actually works with say GA teams and sports teams and works with our startups. And it's the idea again around resilience and blockers. And a big thing is just getting people to be, I guess, more, more liquid in what they're doing and not just keeping the original idea and not making any changes to it. So we, we're always working with our guys through that and we, we see almost like moments every now and again in the problem or someone goes, yeah, look, I had this idea and I wasn't, I wasn't changing my idea.

15:46 I was not going to change. But from listening to other people and just thinking about it more, I've now moved on to a different space or I've pivoted ever so slightly. And there's so much delight when people have that like just I guess self reflection piece and the energy that that's created as a result of that means people start moving faster and getting out there again and getting paying customers. Yeah, I think it's a it's a bit of a self fulfilling prophecy. If you can get yourself out, dispute to customers, get the feedback, umm, you know, make kind of makes you want to move faster and move forward and not, uh, not start when it shows perfection as well. And how can companies attract investors effectively, do you think, Damien?

16:31 This is this is the the communications thing. It's it's having less than 10 sides talking about the problem, talking about the solution that you're creating and talking about the market. Like what investors want to know is OK, are you exciting the problem? They probably all know the problem. When you go to and go, yeah, yeah, there is a problem. What is your solution? What is unique, your unique solution and, and how are we going to go around creating that solution? And then how are we going to scale it? So a lot of it is investors want to know how you think, how you plan, how you execute and can they back that person And you, you see it with, with pivots happening that investors will stay with the company even if they change the original solution.

17:20 They're, they're backing people and they're backing, I guess the mentality of the people or the, the resilience that's built in, in those people. So you have to be able to clearly explain in a single PowerPoint slide maybe what the problem is, what your solution is going to be. And then it's why you should back me in particular compared to other people. And that's about how well you understand the problem where you're going to go to by creating the solution. And then how are you going to make money out of it as well? I, I, again, we go back to the, the money and the funding thing. But sometimes that's where people let themselves down is fantastic.

18:05 You're creating a solution, but where are you going to get the money? Is, is someone going to pay for it? How are you going to, to get people to pay for it? And again, what the return for the investors are going to be? Yeah, I think, I think he said something interesting there as well about umm, when founders are, you know, they're pitching to talk about why me or other people. I think that's actually, I think often they give a bit of ACV kind of, but they don't actually say why me or other people or why am I the person to fix this problem. I think that's umm, you know, showing their resilience and showing their qualities. I think is, uh, is what something investors not going to say enough? Yeah. And it, it does come down to communication skills. And sometimes it can be quite hard for people because they could be quite introverted and again, they just want to code, they don't want to talk to people.

18:54 And sometimes This is why having a Co founder that maybe has more of the communication skills. And you can, you can still be the CTO if you want to, but someone in the organization needs to it. And it's not like like a sharp salesperson or anything like that. It's just someone that can communicate things easily to investors. Again, I'll talk about, say, Marco Sullivan from Nurbel when he came in to talk to her stars recently and he talked about having different slide decks for different audiences. And so for investors, it's clearly explaining stuff that investors want to know about or say, if it's working with the likes of Enterprise Ireland, it could be a different slide deck, slightly different language.

19:34 So you, you have to in a way, I think they call it code switching, where you, you speak differently to different audiences. And you need someone in a starter that can do that, that can talk to the tech people, maybe that can talk to investors, that can talk to people say like the people that run an incubator and you can speak their language as well. So being a, being a good communicator, I think is, is really, really important for startups. And that happens, you see, when some people don't do well, it's because they're not actually, they're doing fantastic work, but they're not able to expand it to people. And if people yes, get it, it's because probably it's a communications thing more than anything else. Yeah, it's, it's kind of a sad reality that you could fix, you know, a huge problem with a great solution. But if you can't communicate that to people, then no one's going to learn about it or want to use it. And before we finish up, Damian, if you to give one key piece of advice to share on fun in a startup, what would it be? It would be having a so there is an opportunity in every interaction you have with someone. They might be an investor, but they might know someone that's an investor.

20:52 They might be someone that can buy into. SO having a pitch ready to go if it's speaking to someone in an like literally speaking to someone in an elevator, for example, or bumped into someone. Like I bumped into someone in a coffee shop recently and they were asking about the Ignite program and they were interested in maybe coming in and giving a talk. So having a pitch deck ready to e-mail. So have it in a draft in like in your e-mail account on like so you can access on your phone you can send on to people or having one or two slides ready to go. I think having that kind of material is is my main tip is once you make a connection send follow up straight away with that connection and have a slide deck or something ready to to send people. Yeah, I think that's really good advice. Umm, to finish off a lot of great advice that you gave Damien, uh, thanks so much for coming on. Uh, it was a real pleasure.

21:45 And, uh, you're obviously doing fantastic work at ECC and, uh, excited to see Errol more about the startup start emerging from there. I appreciate your time. Thank you, Philip. Thanks, Damien. Hi, Thanks for listening to this week's episode of the Founders and Funding podcast. If you'd like to be a guest or have a guest suggestion, please get in touch. Thank you.