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INSPIRE Summer School 2025
A three-day Entrepreneurship summer school was hosted for the INSPIRE fellows as part of the H2020 MSCA INSPIRE research and training programme.
On Day 1 the Fellows visited the iED hub at the ASSERT Centre as part of their training in Industry Engagement, where they met with the iED facilitators who gave them a tour of their state-of-the-art facilities and spoke to them about the collaborative benefits of industry and academia, the entrepreneurial mindset and leadership management.
Day 2 and 3 of the summer school was facilitated by Dr Maria Coakley (Economics) with Day 2 focusing on exploring an entrepreneurial way of thinking to prepare the participants for Day 3 of the workshop- The Sustainability Hackathon. Throughout the Hackathon, participants developed ideas for a solution for a problem, within an underlying SDG theme.
The fellows had sessions on Idea Generation and Design Thinking delivered by Dr Andrew Pope (BIS); Lean Canvas delivered by Dr Gillian Barrett and Dr Fiona Edwards Murphy (Management and Marketing), and heard from Dr Mark O’Sullivan, Neurobell about his first-hand experience of commercialising his research. In the afternoon, each team met with range of mentors from Cork University Business School (Dr Lana Repar), the Health Innovation Hub (Dr Michael Twomey), APC Microbiome Ireland (Prof Siobhán O’Mahony and Dr Julia O’Sullivan), the INFANT Research Centre (Michelle Dorgan) and Republic of Work (Eshna Gogia).
At the end of the day, the six teams pitched their ideas to a panel of judges, Prof Ciara Heavin (BIS, CUBS), Dr Alison O’Shea (Neurobell) and Mr Ed Donovan (AMS Services). Prizes (sponsored by AMS Services) were awarded to two teams for best pitch and best business idea/ commercial opportunity.
The INSPIRE fellows were joined with participants from another MSCA project RETORNA – a doctoral network programme which aims of which is to find treatment for Retinal Disease based on RNA therapy whose PIs Dr Aileen Murphy and Dr Ann Kirby (CUBS) together with Oonagh Cahalane (INSPIRE Programme manager) ensured all participants experienced a productive entrepreneurship summer school.
