On to Belfast

An early day turned into a long one as the team boarded the bus for Belfast at 6:45 and never slowed down. We arrived at the Catalyst innovation center around 9 where we were greeted and hurried onto an abbreviated tour of the Titanic build site. We were shown the pump house, pointed to the large hole where the Titanic was constructed, asked for a quick round of questions before being ushered onto our guest speakers. It was a point, shoot and move-on experience. I suppose even the Titanic lasted longer than our tour.  The team heard from two successful entrepreneurs and business leaders before making our way into one of the tech startups on campus. The company we visited on-campus is pursuing a technology that can identify individuals based on their ECG heart rhythm readings using machine learning. Two takeways from this morning is how prevalent machine learning applications are in upcoming technical innovations and the impressive entrepreneurial ecosystem that Northern Ireland provides.

After our morning at the innovation center, we broke off into groups and began work with the companies we will be working with over the next 3 days. It was a short taxi ride through Belfast where I was able to get a glimpse at the beauty of the city. We met with our company, axial3D, and its CEO Dan Crawford. Dan is a 27 year old Biomedical Engineer who has successfully transformed his masters thesis into a small business that has raised a few million and is trending up. Kai, Eric, and I will be working with Dan and his team. We spent most of the afternoon getting a demo of their technology, meeting the staff, and outlining the scope of what we plan to deliver. The short duration of our time has really highlighted the importance of managing expectations and defining a clear scope in a consulting role. Tomorrow will be a long day where we hope to complete most of our project. After our first day, we went out with the majority of the company in the Cathedral Quarter which contains great architecture and some cool bars.The team at axial3D were warm and inviting and I'm really looking forward to working with them in the days to come. A long day has brought on condensed thoughts but I plan to detail more about the entrepreneurial ecosystem, our consulting work, and Belfast in the coming days.