I'm a serial angel investor, former (successful) technology entrepreneur and cross-border dweller. Way back in time, I co-founded successful Derry based online learning company Learning Pool following a solid government career and a spell as a Silicon Valley dotcommer. I exited Learning Pool in May 2014 because I was bored to tears by being part of the structure of a scaling business and because I really wanted to spend the remainder of my working life helping more early stage startups get off the ground and start to scale. So that's what I've been doing for the past 10 years ... and it's working out well.I'm interested in helping start & grow indigenous Irish & British tech companies and especially in working with first time and female entrepreneurs. I'm one of Said Business School's (University of Oxford) Entrepreneurship Experts, an Expert Advisor to the EU, a co-founder of AwakenHub (a growing community of female founders across the island of Ireland) and AwakenAngels (Ireland's first and only women-led angel syndicate).I sit on a few government-type boards (Western Development Commission and WestBIC in the ROI and the MATRIX NI panel in Northern Ireland), providing an entrepreneur's perspective into that government/academia/industry triangle. I work as a consultant and expert advisor, usually to national governments but also as a non executive director for a small number of scaling technology businesses across Europe.I love the arts and have been a non executive director on the board of Derry’s Millennium Forum & Theatre for many years. I have a couple of new projects kicking off in 2025 that haven't been announced yet and I'm also going to seek out one or two pro-bono trustee board appointments now that my term at CAST (Centre for Acceleration of Social Technology) has ended in 2024 - so if you're interested in having me join your not-for-profit or charity Board give me a shout.In the 2014 New Year’s Honours I was awarded an MBE by HM the Queen for services to digital technology, innovation and learning - which you have to admit is pretty darned cool.I'm always interested in talking to people about non exec positions in tech startups or scaleups and I'm happy to speak at or MC relevant events or write articles for publication on any of my specialist topics. Drop me a line to connect but please give me some idea of what you're looking for from me - like everyone else I get a lot of connection requests from people I don't know and some background is always useful.